This is a single finger salute to those who insist that playing countless hours of Quake will dumb down a person's intellect.

Go read this then.

Blek  :P

With regards to all the bad things I said about Dell, I would like to humbly retract those statements. While I still won't fully agree that the QA for their products are fantastic (you can't argue with facts; just try asking any Dell laptop owners), I have to admit their customer sales/support teams are truly top notch. Very commited and professional. My hats off to you guys.

I started playing around with FM transmitters some 7 years ago. Back then, the technology was pretty much still in it's infancy. It's a really tempting concept; being able to transmit audio from any portable music device and receive it via somekind of tuner like your car stereo. But how does it work in real life?

I manage to get a friend to help me source for an early FM transmitter many years ago from the States. It's called AudiaX, and this was a real novelty back then. It cost about 150 bucks (RM la... plus all the hidden costs involved) and it runs on a single AAA battery and comes with a telephone-cord style stereo jack to connect to any portable devices you have. All you need is to pop a battery in, hook it up to an MP3 player and sync the transmitter frequency to you stereo. Voila. Instant wireless audio streaming.

Sounds wonderful. Unfortunately life isn't all that perfect. #1... the sound quality leaves a lot to be desired. There are some very obvious audio clipping, whereby you can definitely feel the lack of punchiness both at the lower and higher registers. Think of normal radio reception, only slightly worse. Another thing is that, running on batteries, playing time doesn't last very long. After a few days worth of heavy use, signal strength noticably reduces and static starts taking over. And it's also a real chore powering on the damn thing, firing up your MP3 player, trying to control the playlist while driving... etc... it's not ideal.

I barely used the AudiaX a dozen times before it was relegated into a dark corner in my unused stockpile. I never bothered touching the damn thing ever since then.

Fast forward some 6 years later. During one of the usual lunch DOTA sessions, I hitched a ride on Achew's Honda. And he had this new FM transmitter hooked up on his cigarette lighter socket, and he had a couple of ol' M.J. tunes playing via his car stereo. I was kinda suprised the tunes sounded rather good.

With that single listen, I decided to drop by BJC the next day to buy one of these new gen fm transmitter. It's obviously made in China, but the low buying price made it a painless purchase. The model I got was called MacSonic, but it's pretty much a generic transmitter which go by many different names in the market. The biggest advantage this fm transmitter have over the AudiaX was that it directly plugs into the cigarette lighter socket. This means batteries are a thing of the past and the gadget directly powers up the minute you turn on the ignition key. Another nice thing about it is that it comes with a built in MP3 player and accepts SD and USB thumbdrives as input. That removes yet another requirement which the AudiaX needs.

The sound quality was suprisingly good for an FM transmitter; as long as you don't push the volume max all the way to 16. Bass response was punchy, while the highs were clear. Definitely several notches better than the old generation trasmitters in the audio dept.

Unfortunately, impressive as it is, I found several drawback as well. #1, it doesn't support folders and there aren't any random play function on the MP3 player. So you're stuck with playing gigabytes worth of songs in a linear manner and there is no way to randomly jump around between songs. Sucky. #2, there were some serious quality control issues with this bunch of transmitters. I burnt out 2 of these (but managed to get replacements since the warranty was still valid) in 2 months. The third replacement didn't burn out, but was prone to overheating. And when that happens, it shuts down. It won't turn on again until it cools down. Which also suck.

A month ago, I realize the shops at BJC started carrying new models of these fm transmitters. And one thing that caught my eye was that these new versions came with Samsung chipsets. With that in mind, I decided to give these babies a try. It carried a premium of less than 10 bucks over the old models, so I purchased one on the spot.

Now this model is called Red Fox, and the build quality seems a notch better than the old one. And it even came with a more responsive remote control from the Macsonic version. Sound quality was at par, or even better than that old model. The display was significantly brighter and this made viewing the song titles much easier.  And this model is able to support up to 32GB of data... which is more than enough songs to last me a drive around the globe I guess. This thing also came with folder support as well as random play feature. And it even comes with EQ setting which actually work (Macsonic came with these also but it totally muddled up the sound quality).

I'm very impressed with how far FM transmitters have evolved. From being novelty items, these are now pretty much fully feature packed gadgets which can convert a lowly car stereo into a MP3 jukebox, with satisfactory sound quality to boot. Unless you're a diehard audiophile, I would say 80% of normal car drivers would appreciate what these little gadgets can provide. Definitely worth looking into. Do give it a try  ;)

I'm pretty much deprived of any net connection ever since I moved into my apt some 3 years ago. I admit I'm not an angel, and there were times when I resorted to less than morally-correct methods to gain net access. However, after much 'racun'-ing from both Sunshine and that bestet of an aquatic marine life, I finally decided to get myself a proper 'broadband' connection from Streamyass some time ago. Actually, the 60 buck package plus the free wireless modem sealed the deal for me.

 I have heard many horror stories about Streamyass; from applications, registerations, activation, service, etc. But I was kinda suprised how problem free my experience were with them.

i) Tuesday - Went to nearest TMPoint branch. Applied for line activation and paid line+registeration fee.

ii) Wednesday - TM contractor came over to 'listen' to my phone line and charged me 30 bucks. Confirmed my line is activated.

iii) Thursday - Went back to TM Point to make sure my Streamyass username is in the system and collected my free wireless modem. Hooked everything up but DSL light still not stable. Understandable.

iv) Friday - Called up the TM hotline to register my username. Fired up the modem again, lo and behold, the DSL light is now stable.

I'm online!

4 days turnaround time was very impressive IMHO. And so far I'm pretty satisfied with the stability of the connection speed, even though I'm on the cheapest package. I have no gripes so far.

But if you insist on asking me if there's any area which I'm not happy with, I have to say I ABSOLUTELY ABHORE STREAMYX'S TECHNICAL SUPPORT HOTLINE.

WHY?

1. I WAS PUT ON HOLD INDEFINITELY.

2. WHEN I'M FINALLY #1 ON THE QUEUE, I'M DIRECTED TO A VOICE MAILBOX.

3. WHEN I FINALLY REACH A HUMAN TO TALK TO, THE IDIOT TESTED MY PATIENCE AND WAS OF ABSOLUTELY NO TECHNICAL HELP.

4. I HAVE NEVER SLAMMED THE PHONE ON ANYONE BEFORE, BUT I ACTUALLY DID THIS TIME.

5. I FOUND THE SINGLE SHEET OF EXPRESS SETUP GUIDELINE WHICH CAME WITH THE MODEM WAS ACTUALLY MORE HELPFUL THAN THE IDIOTS ON THE TECH SUPPORT HOTLINE.

For heaven's sake... buck up TM...

Shit.

Provided this one doesn't end up as a hoax... I so damn bloody want this...

I've always been a fan of the Lumix... and if this is true... this is heaven sent.

Read more from the source I got from here.

2 and a half years. That's all the time my FARKING XPS laptop lasted. FARK U DELL. This is supposed to be a premium laptop. Was reading a webpage, when the display started flickering. Then all hell broke loose. Pixels started going haywire... the display is then fried... and now I'm left with a RM4K paperweight. Processor is still running, but wot's the use when I can barely make out wot's on the screen? First the battery died. Followed by the VGA port. And now this.

Michael Dell... if you're reading this... FARK YOUR XPS LAPTOP LINE TO HELL. This is the last time I'm buying your so-called-premium product from your company.

 At this rate... I'll never get that DSLR I wanted... fark shit.