Nothing teaches the arcana of iPod models as thoroughly as a trip through Craigslist, as I recently discovered when looking for my first (cheap, second-hand) iPod. To the untrained eye, they sure all look the same, don’t they?

But subtle distinctions tell the story at a glance. And here they are, gleaned mostly from Apple’s own ”Identifying iPod Models." (Other sources: Apple’s hardware specifications site and Wikipedia.)

Old-timers (like me, phaw phaw) will recognize the above phrase from video and print ads from the '90s, "What’s on your PowerBook?" Then, the question addressed data: The teacher has lesson plans, the grandfather has his life story, the salesperson has data sheets, and so forth. Now that the dust has settled around the question of whether the iPhone will allow applications written by outside developers (it does), the question has become: What apps are on your iPhone?

You thought Acrobat was simple? Think again.

Oh, Adobe Acrobat! Unifier of nations! In apprehension, how like a god!

But seriously, folks. I recently installed Acrobat 8 Professional as part of Adobe Creative Suite 3 (included in all CS3 versions except Web Standard). And let me tell you, I'm continually impressed at how this application fills niches you don't even realize are there - until they become critical to your work.

A love of bicycling is possibly my father's most valuable gift to me. But it's easy to get into a riding rut, slavishly following the same roads over and over. (My own weakness: the San Francisco-to-San Jose route along the Caltrain tracks.) So lately I've turned to my Mac - and the Internet, of course - for new routes.

Every columnist has written about their catastrophic hard-drive crash, so I won't bore you with the details of the one I had last week. Suffice it to say I'm doing fine, thanks for asking. I also won't harangue you about making (and testing!) regular backups - you know that already, right? (I bet Mac|Life senior editor Eugene Robinson still hasn't gotten over his loss.)

Instead, I'm going to tell you about something that could have saved my tuchus at the expense of ten minutes per month of (unattended!) Mac time. To wit: Disk Utility - it's included in Mac OS X, installed by default in /Applications/Utilities.

Last month, the word on the street was that the Mac mini was on its last legs. Silver Mac, for example, said that - at best - it was to be replaced by a new low-end model, and AppleInsider believed "in all sincerity" that the Mac mini was dead. The smart money was on its demise, and that it would be replaced largely by the Apple TV.