Since EA’s return to greatness last year with FIFA 09 on the PS3, Xbox 360, and Wii, EA Sports has raised its game to an even higher echelon with FIFA 10. A few years ago EA Sports’ FIFA 07 tumbled from its regal position atop the soccer game throne to the previously second place Pro Evolution Soccer by Konami. After years of careful planning and not great game making, EA Sports has struck gold once again.

Although intended primarily for professionals, Portraiture Plug-in for Photoshop will be an invaluable addition to the toolkit of every designated family photographer. You already know who you are.  You're the person who is responsible for documenting family events - an often thankless job because the way people think they look, is often somewhat different from reality.

A couple of tips for those making the move to Windows 7.

Check you system's bios.  I have a relatively new EVGA X58 motherboard.  After using Windows 7 for several days without a problem, my system started acting very funky.  As far as I can tell the problem was created by some Microsoft Critical Upgrade that was installed on launch day, October 22.  I found that the problem could be solved by updating the bios on my motherboard.

I am an unabashed fan of Seagate's Replica, the automatic backup device so simple a chimp could operate it.  What I didn't know when I wrote the original glowing review was that the software that drives the Replica, that makes it easy to use and incredibly powerful, was licensed from a company called Rebit and that the software is available from them so that you can use it with any drive.

We've been playing Forza 3 for Xbox 360 non-stop since it arrived.  A full review will follow, but suffice it to say that this is a must have title, reason alone to buy an Xbox 360.  It earns all the superlatives:  innovative, entertaining, sparkling eye-candy, easy to pick-up and play, full of limitless customization for the hard core player. In a genre as oft-visited as racing, garnering these accolades requires real horsepower.

Over the past few years, heck, over the past few days, it seems as if we've been inundated with karaoke and music games.  Are we all suffering burnout and over-saturation from the genre at this point.  When I suggested we play Lips Number One Hits, my friend looked at me and said, " How could it possibly be different from all the other music games we've tested?"

"Do you talk to your computer often?" my sister asked yesterday when we were chatting on the phone. She heard me swearing at it when I was in the middle of attempting to upgrade to Windows 7. The truth is I do talk to my computer frequently ("please don't crash, not now, please"). The problem is it rarely understands me, and almost never listens, even if it does. Voice recognition software has promised to change all that - it even got snuck into Vista. But, the truth is more than ten years since I first tried voice recognition, its results have been pretty comical.

I was watching the new Halo ODST commercial on TV tonight and, while I really love playing ODST, there was something about the ad that really bugged me. They use real actors going through very intense basic training. It looks great. But, it looks nothing like the game.

Then, I turned on my Xbox 360 and fired up NBA 2K10. My girlfriend came into the room and wanted to know who was playing. Not who I was playing with, but what teams were on TV playing basketball. It looked that real to her.

The idea of a scanner that can breeze through a stack of photos from the family album is very appealling. Pandigital's Photolink One-Touch Scanner promises to do just that (and without need to hook it up to a computer, no less). But, this product gets just about everything wrong; so, hold onto your hats...this is going to be a bumpy review!

Before we get to how well it works, let's focus on how it works.

On a visit to George Lucas' Big Rock Ranch (for a preview of Clone Wars Season II) I took these shots of some of his amazing collection of film posters. Most are European, a few from Asia. There are also a few Star Wars related pieces and other art mixed in for good measure.