Jack of all trades

Reviewed in this week's column, the iP5000 photo printer from Canon's new Pixma range proves that you can get great-looking black text documents as well as sharp pictures if you're prepared to spend that bit extra (€245).

Also in today's paper, you can read about the excellent (and free) Picasa which has just come out of the Google labs after a makeover. Version 2 turns Picasa into a powerful digital shoebox program for managing and editing your snaps.

In games, two similar role-playing/real-time strategy games emerge from the EA vaults after getting overlooked pre-Christmas. Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-Earth is the better of the two, taking some welcome liberties with the Tolkien mythology. Armies of Exigo, on the other hand, is run-of-the-mill fare, bearing more than a passing resemblance to Warcraft III.