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The day has finally come. As we were expecting, Google has just released Chrome for Mac, which can now be downloaded by Mac OS X 10.5 or later users.

If you’re anything like us, you’ve been anxiously awaiting the chance to get your hands on the new browser since last year’s release of the Windows version.

Of course, Google Chrome for Mac is just a beta release, and, as we’ve previously reported, you won’t be able to use applications like Gmail that run on Google Gears, but you can take advantage of other Chrome improvements such as speed and Google search right from the address bar.

Here’s a video demo that Google has released:

After you install Chrome on your Mac, you can optionally import your Safari or Firefox settings, which means your bookmarks and certain preferences can carry over from your existing favorite browser. Given that Google Chrome Extensions should launch any day, you might not even have to live without your favorite add-ons for very long (though at this time extensions are not available for the Mac version).

We’ve just installed it for ourselves, and after taking it out for a test drive, our first impressions are that this thing is slick. While we compile our notes, let us know what you think of Google Chrome for Mac in the comments.

The NPD Group has some figures now from the Windows 7 launch, and are reporting that the new Microsoft operating system is selling well — or at least, much better than Vista did at its launch. In the first few days of sales, Windows 7 units in the U.S. moved 234 percent faster than Vista did in its equivalent launch window.

Of course, in many ways the bar wasn’t set too high. Still, Microsoft must be feeling relieved at the good sales clip for what is still, after all, its core business.

Unfortunately, thanks to pre-sales discounts and general lack of promotional effort behind the Ultimate version, revenue growth wasn’t quite as impressive. Looking strictly at dollar sales, Windows 7 is up 82% over than the equivalent time period for Vista.

The NPD reported the top-selling versions of the software and their average prices for the week ending October 24 as follows:

1. Windows 7 Home Premium Upgrade / $76
2. Windows 7 Pro Upgrade / $147
3. Windows 7 Home Premium Family Pack 3 User Upgrade / $149

In a tough economic time for packaged software, Windows 7 appears to be faring fairly well. The PC hardware sales picture wasn’t nearly as rosy, however. Although total PC sales were up 49 percent in year-over-year sales and a full 95 percent over the previous week, the overall growth rate was not as high as during the Vista launch window, which saw a 68% jump in year-over-year and 170% gain over the week prior to Vista’s launch. Vista had a slight advantage with its January release however, which typically shows a larger PC sales footprint than the month of October.

Both Firefox and Chrome have a new version out, fixing mostly stability issues and a couple of minor security vulnerabilities.

Firefox 3.5.5 brings several stability fixes, most importantly the notorious GIF decoder bug which sometimes caused the browser to crash. You can find a complete list of changes in this version here.

Chrome has a bit more important update, bringing its (awkwardly long) version number to 3.0.195.32. The new version includes five stability fixes and several security issues. Among other things, Chrome should now behave better with Acrobat Reader 9.2, Google Maps, and AAC files. Read the details on these fixes here.

The latest Chrome beta build ushers in a great new feature: bookmark syncing. If you use multiple computers, or even just appreciate a cloud backup of your browser bookmarks, this feature will be a boon.

You can grab the new beta build 4.0.223.16 here, which also includes speed improvements by as much as 30% since the current stable release. For more information on how the bookmark sync works in the new build, head on past the break for an introductory video from the Chrome team.

Whether it’s a laptop and desktop, machines at home and at work, or just more than one machine in the house, it’s a pain to try to keep them in sync — you inevitably don’t have access to that one bookmark you’re looking for no matter which machine you’re on. That’s undoubtedly the reason Xmarks syncing extension was so popular in our “Favorite Firefox extensions” Lunchtime Poll.

The bookmark syncing feature actually debuted earlier in the developer version of the browser, but required setting a command-line flag. Now that Chrome supports bookmarking sync natively — if only in beta — will any of you consider switching or perhaps just adding it to your browser arsenal?

Remember that for now, unfortunately, this is only enabled in the Windows version of Chrome (Mac users are sadly still waiting for an official version). You’ll also have to of course download the beta and also enable each computer individually for syncing, by choosing “Synchronize my bookmarks” from the Wrench menu.

Check out the video below and let us know if you plan to use the new syncing feature in Chrome beta.

After the dust from the Snow Leopard and Windows 7 launch has settled, we have another important OS launch: the new version of one of the most popular Linux distributions, Ubuntu 9.10, is available for download.

Named Karmic Koala, the new Ubuntu – as always – promises to be faster and easier to use, bringing version 2.6.31 of the Linux kernel, latest version of GNOME, and Firefox 3.5. The biggest news, however, is Ubuntu One, a web sync service that gives you 2 GB of online disk space and lets you synchronize notes and contacts, as well as share files between several computers.

Boot time has been significantly reduced, claims Canonical (the company behind Ubuntu); accessibility has been improved (Ubuntu is now translated into 23 languages), and the OS comes packed with open source software, with more available through Software Center. Finally, netbook owners can download and install a version specifically created for them, called the Ubuntu Netbook Remix.

“Ubuntu 9.10 gives users more reasons than ever to seriously consider Linux at a time when many are thinking again about their operating system options. We are delivering a platform for users interested in an easy-to-use, great-looking, web-friendly operating system,” said Canonical COO Jane Silber.

Check out an overview of Karmic Koala over at the official web page.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 is a digital darkroom and efficient assistant designed for serious amateur and professional photographers. With Lightroom, you can organize, enhance, and showcase your images all from one fast and nimble application that’s available on Macintosh and Windows Platform.

Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 beta is designed for photographers and by photographers to help them focus on what they love—the art and craft of photography. Now you can grab Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 for absolutely free.

What’s new in Lightroom 3 beta?

1. Brand new performance architecture, building for the future of growing image libraries

2. State-of-the-art noise reduction to help you perfect your high ISO shots

3. Watermarking tool that helps you customize and protect your images with ease

4. Portable sharable slideshows with audio—designed to give you more flexibility and impact on how you choose to share your images, you can now save and export your slideshows as videos and include audio

5. Flexible customizable print package creation so your print package layouts are all your own

6. Film grain simulation tool for enhancing your images to look as gritty as you want

7. New import handling designed to make importing streamlined and easy

8. More flexible online publishing options so you can post your images online to certain online photo sharing sites directly from inside Lightroom 3 beta.

Download Adobe Photoshop Lightroom 3 Beta for free.

Now here is IconTweaker theme for Windows XP which brings Windows 7 Icons to your Windows XP.

IconsTweaker is an icon collection that will enable you to replace Windows XP icons with Windows 7 ones. This icon package has been built with IconTweaker, a freeware application and a good alternative to the more popular IconPackager.

The Pack includes all Windows 7 shell icons for Start Menu, Folders, Network Connections, drives, files and Desktop. It also includes beautiful and transparent Windows 7 cursors.

Download IconTweaker Theme for Windows XP.

Now here is one more synching tool Gravatar Importer which lets you to sync your contacts in the Gmail Contacts address book with their Gravatars, in case they didn’t choose a photo by themselves.

Gravatar is an image that follows you from site to site appearing beside your name when you do things like comment or post on a blog. Avatars help identify your posts on blogs and web forums.

Gravatar Importer

Download Gravatar Importer.

Gone the days when we had 5 Mb of email space and we had to keep deleting our emails frequently to keep free space for new emails. Now almost all email services provides virtually unlimited space and we tend to keep our emails lying in inbox for future reference.

However if your email account gets hacked that it can become worst nightmare for you, You must backup your emails frequently. Here is a small utility Email Carbon which is easy to use application that enables you to create backups of your emails from one server to another by copying emails over IMAP.

Email Carbon can also be used to switch emails you have from your old provider to your new one.

Download Mail Carbon.

Now here is yet another desktop tool Notification 2 which will instantly notify about new Facebook messages, events, friend requests, etc.

You can view summary of notifications right from your taskbar or compose message and or check Facebook page instantly with Facebook notifications 2.

Facebook Notification 2

Download Facebook Notification 2.