A New Computer

I finally made the plunge, after much deliberations on which parts to buy.  All thing considered, 15,100 baht wasn't too bad for an assembled computer: a case, two casing fans, CPU, mainboard, and power supply.  The new case is quite roomy compare to my old one, the new power supply will give enough power for my three HDDs,  and hopefully the new CPU will lasted me five years or more.  It is good that I can still use all my old RAMs.  That save me a few thousands bahts for not having to buy new RAMs.  It was temping though...  Maybe I will buy them when the 8GB RAMs are cheaper.  It will be probably be after buying new graphic card next year though.

Entering the age of 2TB

The time had finally arrived, my collective harddisks space is getting full almost to the brim. So it is time to break open my wallet and buy another harddisk.

I have been eyeing the 2 Terabyte HDD for quite a while now. And finally bought one today. Since my weekend start tomorrow, I can spend tonight moving files (almost 750GB worth of... stuffs... notti stuffs mostly and TV series). Windows 7 would made moving files a lot smoother than XP. The actual physical change of harddisk is not my favorite thing to do but it needs to be done...

Hopefully things will goes smoothly without a hitch.

The New Member in My Electronic Devices Family

After much considerations and wantings, I finally succumb and bought a Kindle, a 3G one no less.
The reason is that I like to read. I began to read more novels than before and reading
it on my computer is less than comfortable. I did considered buying the tablet but since I planned to buy new phone anyway, I figured that I could do the things I might use the tablet for, such as web surfing, IMs, music player, and video player, on the new phone. I better get a dedicated e-reader with long lasting battery and not draining the device with reading while traveling. My Nokia 5800 was almost completely drained when I read PDF on it for about 2 hours...

Also the 3G on Kindle is free and internationally connected. Therefore I will be able to get on Google Map with Kindle regardless of the Wifi availability. Which happens while I was in New Orleans.

I loaded up many books from my collections onto my Kindle and even purchase the Arabian Nights one from Amazon store because it was well organized version of the ebook. I also apply the screensaver hack so I can use my own pictures as screensavers. The screen quality is really good at displaying all the different shades of gray from the colour pictures I added. I will be reading a lot for a while, until the release of new interesting DS games :P

The Second Mass Effect of Dragon Age

It's been too long since I do a game review post. As usual, this will be a double-billed game review post :)

Dragon Age: The Origins

My first thought when I start playing it was "This is Mass Effect, the fantasy version!". The character movement, the scenaries, the speech animations, etc., all reminded me of Mass Effect. Not that it was a bad point, it just that the similarities were rather jarring.

Overall, the game was entertaining, though it was not innovative in anyway regarding redefining the genre. Every things in this game were rather standard fantasy RPG motif. From the races, the classes, the weapons & armours, the settings, etc. The story was even rather standard as well. Some big demon army is marching to destroy all of mankind and the hero and his peer must defeat the demons and save all of mankind. It even use the accidental hero thing where the main character was thrusted into the chaos without really knowing the magnitude of it all.

I do like the fact that you have to recruit various people, can court the same sex character, and companions' quip in the map walk. The dialogues, however, can be straining sometimes.

Right now I am at about 2/3 or 3/4 into the game and did not feels like continuing on. But I will do it soon... I do wnana see what the end battle scene was like.

Mass Effect 2

It start with a bang, literally. Soon after the first scene start, the Normandy got hit by mysterious cruiser class ship. Shepard then have to go drag Joker (the pilot) from the bridge to escape pod and got thrown into the space with ruptured suit. After being dead for two years, he got resurrected by old enemy, Cerberus. The head of Cerberus wants to recruit Shepard to spearheaded the fight against the common enemy, The Reapers, following the events of missing colonies citizens.

So commander Shepard takes on the impossible mission again with the new ship, mixture of old and new crews and squard, and some interesting missions.

This times everything seems to be sleeker and easier to get into. The weapon systems got simplified tremendously. Now when you found an upgrade, your whole squard got it. The number of skills has been greatly reduced. Your squard initially got only three skills and the last one can be unlocked after successfully finished the loyalty missions of that sqaurd member.

I finished the game once already. Only to find out later how to finish one of the loyalty mission correctly. So now I have been replaying it from an old save. It is quite enjoyable to play than Dragon Age somehow. I guess it is because the fighting in Mass Effect 2 feels a lot more fast paced and reltively quick to finish. After all, you were attacking with guns and biotic power instead of sword and magic which is a lot more melee.

As of last night, I seems to skill have not got enough Praragon point to choose the correct dialogue choice for *the* loyalty mission. I still have a few other missions I can gain more Paragon points on, so I will tried that and see how it goes. If it's really bad then I would have to do the Renegade option instead...

Also, I still have problem with the graphic card driver. I just read a tip about how to fix this. I will tried it later tonight, eventhough I wants to just go home and try it right now.

Back to more *regular* post

Like I wrote in the previous post, I will probably have to start a seperate travel blog. Otherwise I seems to lost the motivation to post anything else.

I had a 4 days weekend last week, the weekend transition period. So I decided to use this opportunity to do the overhaul on my computer. This will be a total upgrade. Since I planned and ended up replacing every parts in in the case, including the power supply. Also, I decided I wants to use Windows 7 64 bits, I also have to replace my simple ADSL modem with ADSL modem router. This is something I have been resisting to do for a long time. I simply do not wants to muck around with the setup and what not.

Now I have Intel i5, with 4GB RAM, nVidia GTS250 and Western Digital 64mb 1.5TB harddisk + 1Tb + 750Gb. Now Mass Effect 2 and Dragon Age: Origins run smoothly :)

So on Saturday I went to Zears Rangsit with my mom who also wants to go there to fix one of the computer from her shop. Over all, it was 3-4 hours before the overhaul is complete and Windows 7 installed.

It took me two days to completely transfer the files from my replaced harddisk to the new one, setup all the programs, getting used to Windows 7, and working the router. It took me a long while to make the utorrent WebGUI works but it finally works today. I will definitely export the settings for safe keeping tonight.

I only start searching for solution for my webcam driver. I found a few possible leads which I will try later tonight.

I will also do a game reviews post soon.

250 to 1000 :)

It was more than a year ago since I last replace my harddisk. IT was ComMart show time so I went to buy it there.

I end up going on Saturday. Arriving at the show I felt a little light headed, I guess because I haven't eat yet. So I went to the food court area to eat. It is my policy not to shop with empty stomach. I feels that I would be more objective on my full stomach :)

I eventually bought the 1TB harddisk, an external box and power cable, all from different shops. All to replace the 250GB one. Then I went to check the Adidas sales like usual. I do like some of shirt but nothing really caught my interest.

After I got home, set everything up for transfer, and fire up the computer, something wasn't right. I heard buzzing sound coming from the computer case. It took me a while to figured out which fan made the sound. I eventually figured out that it came from the power supply. I was not happy with this. Since a new one usually cost about a couple of thousand baht for a reliable one.

It keep buzzing the first night and I have to turn off the computer after unable to fall asleep due to the noise. I decided that if it still buzzing by Monday, I will take it to an IT mall to buy a one power supply. Luckily the buzzing stop, I guess the fan was finally spinning in the right way.

It was the right decision that I went to buy the harddisk on Saturday. This allow me to fully enjoy my 4 days off this week. I really need these time off.

Harddisk Blues

After a little more than a year since the last time I buy new harddisk, I have manage to almost filled it. Although I did not feels like it's been that long, good thing that I did blog about it so I know when I bought it last year.

The price of 1TB (TB=Terrabyte which means 1,000 GB :d) harddisk became more attractive but I would love to buy the 1.5 TB one instead. However, the 1TB one is still about 1,300 baht cheaper than the 1.5TB one. The price which I do not wants to pay just yet. But it became harder and harder to make space for my downloads, especially in this series heavy season. The Closer and So You Think You Can Dance are running weekly now. Soon Leverage will began it's second season in July and then Dexter's fourth season in September :O.

I could not possibly housed all those files with my current 14GB space left on my biggest harddisk. Despite my wish that I wants to hold off buying new harddisk until the price of 1.5TB one reduce to about 4,000 baht. I don't think that I can wait that long.

Weather Foiled Plan

I decided to pay up and spend a bit of money to buy a snack from the coffee shop near my office to get their WEP code for their WiFi. Lo and behold it works!! I could open my WebGUI page on my Nokia 5800 :D

I tested it a bit and found that WebGUI page works nicely on my phone and everything works, albeit, slower than on actual computer :D

Too bad that by the time the TV show I wants to download, The Closer, became available online, there was a power cut at my home :ppp There was a brief heavy rain just when I walk back to office from my lunch break. And by the time I found that the show is available for download, I could not open my WebGUI page anymore. I thought that there could be a power cut at my home due to the heavy rain and my younger bro confirmed it. Bugger...

So now I have to wait until I got home and do it manually anyway :pp I suppose I will try this again on Friday for So You Think You Dance Season 5.

Experimenting With Remote BitTorrent

After realizing that many of the TV shows I want to see is being shown again in US summer season.

Since I sometimes would not be home when the shows would be uploaded to the BitTorrent, I would like to know how to remotely add the one I wants to download when I am not home. I figured I could use my phone to access internet and did what I wants from it.

I use utorrent as my BitTorrent client. It has WebGUI function which allow you to remotely access your client through internet with an addon and a bit of know-how. It was pretty easy actually. Here is the instruction I use to do it.

http://lifehacker.com/software/hack-attack/remote-control-your-torrents-with-utorrents-webui-260393.php

I also learn how to create domain name since my ISP will disconnect my connection every 24 hours, thus, shifting my IP address.

It was all pretty simple and easy really. The difficult part is to find a free WiFi spot that I can use near my office. There is one WiFi spot but you have ot pay to get their WEP code.

I am looking forward to test this and see if I can work it when I am on my trip as well :)

The Learning Experience

I have been using 5800 for a few days now. I am still learning how to customize it to my taste and I am learning more and more about it.

Garmin GPS software works today, finally. It took about 10-15 minutes before it was able to pickup the satellite signal. I was waiting for a bus at the time, I open the software and let it search for satellite signal while I put it back in my pant pocket. When I took it out again, the map was loaded up as the signal was founded.

It was said on the 5800 community webboard that it will eventually work faster the more often you search for the signal. Hopefully that will be true.

I have also loaded up new themes and applications. One of which give the home page a new, more useful looks. I certainly prefer this *shell* over the default one.

Like many other 5800 owners, I am waiting for the new firmware to be release. Somehow only a few people were able to get it. No one seems to know the official release date though... Only speculation, while other countries for their update already.

The New Phone

I finally bought new phone today. As planned, I bought Nokia 5800. Although I bought the red one instead of black, because they ran out of the black one.

I am happy with the big screen. But, for being tout as music phone, there is no button that directly play the music. I also have trouble making Garmin software works. Other than that I am quite happy with it. If only I have more reason to use it :p I do enjoy typing SMS more now, with the mini QWERTY virtual keyboard of the phone.

With bigger screen, it means that I have to redo most of my video conversion and upload larger wallpaper images from my collection. I am still learning how to best utilize it. Hopefully I will not have to change it again at least 2 years later.

The Brand Spanking New Look

I finally done it. After been putting it off for quite a few months, I finally use new template for my blog.

Personally, I would prefer dark/blue colour motif but this is the best I could find with three columns that I wants. I tried to get some help but free helps are not easy to find. Plus, after I check the template more closely, most of the white are not code but rather image files. So it will be extremely difficult to change it. I guess I will have to just use it as it is.

The move is not a smooth one, as many of the page element can't be export easily. I have to let go a lot of stuff I used to put up. I guess I will do some new ones later or just left it like this.

One thing that I do not like about blogger, is the fact that they have not update their own template collection for a really long time. Which I think it's a real shame.

Let me know what you think of the new look :)

The Template Options

Or rather the lack of options that is...

While I like blogger for it's ease of use and that the blogs that I read are also on blogger. The choice of templates are just pitiful. It seems that there were any additional template ever since I join, or simply a few that just add variations to the existing ones.

I have search for the right third party templates, found a few that I like, decided which one I would use (a three columns type). I still have no installing it.

Since, in doing so, I will lost my sidebars. In the old template style I can simply copy the sidebars part in the html code and paste it in the new one. However, in this new template style, everything are in more complex code. I did figured out how to save the sidebars code, even if just to be my references of what I current have.

I also asked a favour of friend who has a web design company to help change the colour of the template that I choose to be more to my liking. He still haven't got back to me on that... I understand that he is busy with his *paying* jobs.

I figured now that it is new year, I will finally install the template. Although now that I am browsing for the template again. I wants to have a 3 columns template with blue and dark colour style.

I still kinda beat after the New Year's Eve plan. I am still have not kick the sore throat yet. I will be working for two days and then it will be my weekends again. I will install it during that time.

Out with 200, In with 750 and Delayed Devotion

I finally made the purchase I have been itching to made. I bought 750Gb Hitachi S-ATA II harddisk. The day was certainly long, a lot longer than I would preferred for sure.

I began the day by taking an a/c bus to Zear rangsit, to claim my mouse. The right button was working half the times, and I thought there was something wrong with the computer at first. After wasting sometime at the claiming process, as the person in charge was out to lunch (I was there around 13:00). It was 14:00 by the time I left.

Then I took two buses to the shop that have the harddisk I want. It took me quite some time to actually reach the place. It was located in a village/resident area. I realize that they must do wholesales as well as there were about 10 or more customers waiting to get their orders.

When I finally got home, I began open my computer case. I began by brushing out the dust, and then began switching things. That when I realize that I do not have spare S-ATA II cable. Luckily, though, that an IT accessories shop near by have it. I began the data transferring around 18:00. However, I finally go to bed at 7:00. That's right seven effing AM in the morning. It was freezing up when I choose a lot of files to copy away. I ended up having to copying only a few GB at a time to help ease the problem. Finally, when I have had enough I select the last 21GB or so to copy and go to bed.

Then my office call, around 9:00... To ask if the cable TV, which have problem with late payment and results in signal disconnection, will still show the local TV. I said I don't think so...

I finally woke up, by myself around 11:30, about an hour ahead of my alarm clock. It was rather hellish...

On the brighter note, I found a new favorite song. 'Delayed Devotion' by the up and coming welsh singer Duffy. I was watching 'Tonight's Show with Jay Leno' and Duffy was the musical guest, performing her current single 'Mercy' The way she sang it, it reminded me of the older generation soul singers. She also rocks at singing live too :D I recommend you search on youtube for her live performance ;)

A New Day's Dawn

I finally finish re-install XP. The rest is to re-install the required softwares, make a few tweaks, and setup some defense mechanisms.

It was a tiresome process... I went to bed around 4am last night which is not nearly enough for me now. I could feel my heart pounding in my chest, reminding me that I give myself high blood pressure by being sleep deprived.

At least it is mostly done, I can watch TV and sleep before midnight tonight, Hopefully.

My Doomed XP

My windows is now inflicted with vicious trojan or virus... Something that the anti-virus and anti-spyware software did not detect...

I tried several things but none works.

So I guess my only option left is reinstall XP... Good thing I still have my XP CD.

Tonight I will do the installation... Not something I look forward to but at this point I have no other choice.

I suppose this is the high time to do some clean up to inaugurate my soon to buy harddisk. This weekend will be the high time to buy for sure.

Resurrection of The Demon

I had just found out, just now actually, that Demonoid site has been revived and now up and running.

I am so happy I have to make this little post for it :D I guess it just a great news in time for Songkran ;D

1 Became 1+4 and A Clima356

I did went to the ComMart fair and I am glad I did because, as I found out when I arrive at Queen Sirikit Center, that Adidas also have a sale event there as well.

After bought and ate chicken+bolognas sauce spaghetti, I began my round to scout the items. I found all the products I was looking for but end up buying only Kingston Micro SD 4GB. I did not buy the harddisk because the price seems to be dropping recently. I think I could wait until April to buy it. I also found Wi-Fi USB thingie that will broadcast the Wi-Fi. I am tempted to buy it so I can play my DS Lite online. The one I found, which seems to be the only non-Nintendo brand that have this, cost almost half the price of the Nintendo one, at 850 baht. It still pricey for me... So I will wait until the next ComMart to see if I really want to buy it. For the Micro SD, I actually walk all over the building looking for Sandisk brand to compare. As it turns out, Sandisk is more expensive and is lesser class than Kingston one. And I only pay 850 baht instead of the 890 baht listing price :D.

After the tech shop is done, I went to see the Adidas sales. I found one T-Shirt I really like but it was S size which a little tight for me. The sales staff are not very helpful. But yours truly was persistence, keep digging the tray and eventually found 3 more S size and each in M and L :DD I buy the M size though :)

My Saving Grace

Today, with a pure stroke of genius, while I was walking to the office. I recall that I still have my old harddisks, those that have the old data I kept before I move them to the newer drive because they began to freeze up after prolonged usage.

However, I have to wait till I got back home before I can est my theory. I can plugged the old drive into external box and plug to my computer via USB port to transfer the older stuffs into my new drive. Sure it won't be as updated as the busted one but at least it will be something. Plus I do not have to spend a good chunk of money to obtain the old data. Sure it might be one or two years ago before I retired those drives which means I will not have the more recent stuffs. But it's the old one I really longed for.

Good thing that I did bought this external box. It does save me from having to turn my computer off to cool down the drive to make it work, I can just turn off the box and wait.

I just hate it though, that Windows never have the 'No to All' functions for copying. It would save me a lot of grief when tried to copy folder filled with pictures over and over again because I don't know which haven't been copied...

My Worst Computer Woe Yet!

For the past few days, I notice that my oldest harddisk is acting odd. And it was what I was afraid of... It is getting bad.

It was slightly too late to copy everything to new drive. I was able to save a few stuffs. At least I was able to save my Trillian chat log and the gay stories that I have save since a long time before.

Now I have take it to a company that specialize in data recovery. And they call me later that I would have to pay 6,000 Baht for data recovery if they can do it and that I want what was recovered.

I will have to keep backup data on to DVD more often...