BT, External Firewire HD : Hot problem and hot solution

Since I want to be able to watch up-to-date US TV while I am physically in Hong Kong, I constantly BT. To lower to power consumption and heat generation, I use my crappy HP laptop instead of the desktop PC to do 24-7 BTing. To aviod overkilling the laptop harddisk by BTing, in addition to the ease of transfering all the BTed files from laptop to desktop, I use my external Firewire harddisk to hold both the temp and completed BT files.

The problem is that the combination heat generated by the laptop and the Firewire external harddisk is just way too much. Thus I am seriously thinking about stop using the external harddisk, but instead using the internal laptop harddisk. Hopefully that could cut down the heat generation.

"Apollo DVD to iPod": Caption friendly

I used a desktop machine to run "Apollo DVD to iPod", and the result was much better than the crappy HP notebook. Come to think about it, almost all notebook I tried suck at DVD conversion.

I just tried the Subtitles feature by selecting one (the top one) of the two subtitle selection available when I rip the CowBoy Bebop anime TV series Disc 2 (looks like a mainland China version though). Guess what? It worked like a champ. So now I can watch Cowboy Bebop with Traditioanl Chinese subtitle when I am on the road on my PocketPC. Sweet Sweet Sweet.

Man, I think I start to love this green/portable application. It enables me to rip DVD any workplace I am at >:-E .

More about VMWare Server experience

I spent a lot of time using VMWare server these days. Here's are some of the tidbits.

- When you migrate VMWare instance from VMWare Workstation to VMWare Server, you need to apply update on new VMTool. Otherwise strange thing may thing.

- VMWare instance to VMWare instance file copying (for instance, 1.4Gb worth of Data Guard Installation) seems to be fine. Notice that I already applied VMWare Server VMTool update on both instance.

- Strange Windows Remote Desktop problem: I had problem connecting to some Windows Server 2003 VMWare Instance. I kind of suspect that it was because the machine name was too long. After changing the name and left it for a night, it started working this morning. Honestly, I am not sure which solution cured the problem.

Clerks 2 .... same attitude, new packing

I watched Clerks 2 and kind of glad that it keeps the same spirit of Clerk 1. And since I am the same generation as Dante (the GenX).... I know the pain of being a 30somthing with not much accomplishment. **c* ..........

"Apolloo DVD to iPod" little trick

There are situations when one chapter contains a lot of small chapters. For instance, the Chinese Dance DVD that I had has one big chapter and then have each dance in individual subchapter. In order to get each dance in the separate video file, I need to unchcek the checkbox in the top level, and select each chapter in the sub-chapter. Otherwise all the dance will be concatenated in a big video, which is something I don't want.

"Apolloo DVD to iPod" works better with mainland China disc

I converted some mainland China released DVD today with "Apolloo DVD to iPod", and interesting enough, almost all file converted OK on the laptop... So .... I guess the problem is on the disc then.

Princess Princes D Drama ... where's the female look

The Princess Princess D drama finally started last month. However, I cannot find the female look of all the "princesses" in the web. What is going on?

Virtual PC 2004 SP1 is now free ... big deal. VmWare Server on the other hand ...

Yeah, Virtual PC 2004 SP1 is now free, but so what? Even though Wikipedia says that the speed is near native, most other blog didn't give the Virtual PC too much praise. When talking about virtualization, VMWare is still the king.

In fact, VMWare Server is now free, and based on what I read, VMWare Server does what VMWare Workstation does, plus more.

While I install VMWare server, I realized the following things:
- You need to uninstall VMWare Workstation before you can install VMWare Server.
- You need to have IIS installed before you can install VMWare Server.
- The VMWare was intended to be installed on a server. When installing it on a Windows XP machine, I got a message saying "VMWare Management Interface is only supported on Server Operating system. You may encountered some issues when using VMWraae Management Interface on this system."

- [Extremly Important] Make sure you setup VMWare server so that it runs each instance using a System Account instead of any particular user account. That way, even after you log off your account, the VMWare instance that you started will still be running in the background. This is ultra important for me. To change such setting, go to VMWare Server Console, access menu [VM]->[Setting…]->{click Options tab}->[Startup/Shutdown] item -> Select radio button {Local System account}.

So far, the VMWare Server runs very well on all the machines that I installed in. Say goodbye to VMPlayer from now on.

WiFi or not WiFi

I still don't have wireless network at home even when my brother next to my door used WiFi for more than a year already. I still haven't convinced myself that I need WiFi in my not so big room. Still, because I have two WiFi capable devices (x50v and NDS), I always had tiny incentive to consider setting one up. I was told, though, by several friends that getting low cost WiFi gear may lead to unreliable service (like constant drop off line for no obvious reason), and that kind of bothers me.

I took a chance to check out the price for setting up a low cost WiFi network, and found that low cost WiFi routers was selling at HK$299, while PC Card WiFI network cards was selling at HK$160. Fair price, but spending HK$$460 just so that I can surf net while I am sitting in restroom. I guess not.

I also saw the new Intel Core 2 Duo 1.8G selling at HK$1870. I heard that this is the first time Intel has a chip faster than all the AMD chips. Cool, competition is good.

Window shopping at Golden Computer Center

Well, it's my semi-routine window shopping at Golden Computer Center. Here's some of the found:

- A USB (1.1) to 100BaseT Ethernet converter (or actaully a USB based Ethernet interface) cost HK$49 in one of located at the ground floor , while the exact same generic thing cost about HK$69 or even HK$79 in some other store. Go figure. It looks too chessy though, and I have hard time believe that it will work consistantly.

- Dual layer DVD+R disc is still selling at Hk$20.

- 4Gb CF 50x Kingston card is selling at HK$875, while the slow blue color Toshiba SD card is selling at Hk$305 for 2Gb.

- People started to buy PSP again (unlike during the last whole month which people mostly buy NDSLite with SuperCard). I wonder if there's any must buy game and caused them to do so.

That's pretty much what I care.

NHK ni Youkoso! (TV)

I cannot believe that there's a Japanese animated series designed for the Hikikomori generation called NHK ni Youkoso! (TV). (More info in Wikipedia) Of course, in this animated series, the hikikomori is a pretty handsome guy, unlike those you found in reallife. I finished the first episode and I was like .... found it .... sigh, moronic.

Showtime original TV series Brotherhood

I wasn't expected much when I watched the Showtime original TV series Brotherhood Episode One, but surprisingly I was hooked at the end. When I totally ignored what's surrounding me and only focus on the PocketPC video screen, I know I am really into something good. LOoking forward to episode 2!

Pay money to buy free stuff

I saw something that really got on my nerve today during lunch time when I was shopping at supermarket near workplace. I saw two brands of generic distill water. One selling at HK$1.99 and the other one selling at HK$2.99. OK first of all, the idea of bottling free stuff and then sell it for a price already enough to make me grin my teeth. But the fact that there's a 33% price difference between two GENERIC brand name of DISTILL WATER is just crazy. I turned both bottles of water around and read the specification. They were both freaking the same. HOW can one charge a buck more than the other EXACTLY THE SAME PRODUCT. I mean, I feel like they might be even from the SAME factory, and I don't see that freaking greenish blue pigment on the plastic label that much more expansive than the white blue one!!! This is a crazy world I am in.

Crappy photo from my phone

This photo of a corner of the church I go to was taken in order to show how crappy the picture my mobile phone took. It's a old Motorola E398, and the resolution of the photo it takes is 640 x 480. File size is small like 16Kb. Once again this proves that my mobile phone is really good for nothing even thought it seems to have everything in the spec. The only thing good about the phone is the ultra long battery life. But the slow menu response can drive you really crazy.

wish Dave Chappelles good luck

And I was wonder about what hell is going on with the third season of Chappelles Show, and then I found the truth at Wikipedia. Sad. But wish Dave Chappelles good luck.

Tech Guy on KFI is still there. wow

I was cleaning up my iRiver-140 MP3 player to find more space for audio recording. And then I found some old Podcast that I used to listen to like The Tech Guy on KFI and Dot Net Rocks. I thought since Leo was doing so much of his own Podcast, he may have Tech Guy on KFI dropped. But no, he's still doing the show. Amazing, and good for him!

WinRoll Keeps crash :-<

I was trying to find a solution to allows me to minimize a window to a tray. My friend found me a solution, but it's a paid ware. Since I am putting the app on our production server, I need it to be a freeware solution. I found this WinRoll and thought it would solve the problem, but I caused some sort of crashing which is big no no. So just like U2, "I still haven't found what I am looking for."

Had to uninstalled IntlliPoint 5.5

I found out a while ago that the IntelliPoint 5.5 software actually made the left mouse click of my new wireless mouse LESS responsive. So I installeld it, and found that my mouse back to normal.

Now I am a bit hastiate to install IntelliType Pro 5.5 for the keyboard. :-<

How come everytime I brought new hardware, including getting this Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop 1000 , there's always some gotcha here and there :-<

Battery life, Wheel click, using the mouse in Mac OSX

I am still testing my wireless combo set to make sure that everything works right. Along the process I found out that the click wheel on the wireless mouse sometimes wasn't running as perfect smooth as I expected it to me. I'll probably try it a few more days, and may exchange it if I have it.

My friend was pretty skeptical about the battery life of the keyboard and the mouse. Judge by the fact that the tiny laser at the bottom of the mouse is almost on, I can see the short battery life issue my friend raised up. I'll keep my eyes on the situation, but because I am use 25o0mAh rechragable battery on both the keyboard and the mouse, I don't see too much an issue of recharge them say once a month.

What maybe an issue though was that my MacOSX 10.4.6 environment couldn't see the USB wireless mouse and keyboard. Maybe there's some sort of set up I need to change in order to make it work. I should worry about that a bit later though.

Some prices I noticed at Golden Computer Shopping Center today

The price of dual layer DVD+R disc continuous to drop. The recent price is about $20 to $22 for a disc. That's Mitsubishi and TDK brand, so it should be pretty nice.

Price of Toshiba generic (translation: slow) 2Gb SD card has neem dropped to HK$308. Kingston 50X 4Gb CF card has been dropped to HK$890.

White Nintendo DS Lite is selling at HK$1180.

That's the set of products that I care.

Nice wireless keyboard from Microsoft

Despite my gadget loving reputation, it's actually pretty hard to get me spend money on new computer hardware. This is mainly due to my bad experience of buying hardware in Hong Kong. About 50% of the time I have to bring back the hardware I brought from computer store to either exchange for a workable one of the product or got unsold to a more expansive mode of he similar product. That was not good, consider that the commute to and from the computer store can sometimes be more expansive than the product I tries to return!

Beside the bad experience, I am also a value conscious person. I work hard, so my gear must work at least as hard as I do. I don't want to buy some butt ugly productive, but at the same time I wonder pay hundreds more just for the style.

So when I finally got to a point of buy a new keyboard for my laptop, it took me several months to shop and shop. Before that I was burned by wasting HK$29 on a crappy USB keyboard. That piece of jerk is still around me, and one of these days I will smack that crappy keyboard apart just for fun. That keyboard was lousy because it was hard to type AFTER A WHILE. It's strange that when I trial used it it was not that bad, but after using it for more than 15 minutes, you will realize how suck it is.

Forward to today night (about 3 hours ago). I was at computer storing checking around and see if there's any new stuff worth mentioning in my blog. And then this Microsoft Wireless Optical Desktop 1000 keyboard with optical mouse combo set caught my attention.

With the price HK$230, the combo is at the same price range of the Logitech with the similar functionality. And in fact I saw most store selling Logitech wireless keyboard than the Microsoft one. However, the experience I had with Logitech wireless product at my friends house was less than OK, so I promised myself not to buy any Logitech wireless product. Frankly, the reason could be similar that the product was using old IR based technology instead of the recent radio wave technology. But sorry, the damage has been done.

Back to the Microsoft keyboard. This basic one is the lowest price among all the wireless product from Microsoft. The high end ones comes with comfy wrist rest, Bluetooth instead of radiowave (thus you can move your keyboard much futher away), cooler design and so on. But like I mentioned before, I am a realistic person. So I went for the cheapest model. And guess what, I wasn't regarding it.

The keyboard is similar nice to type on, and very quiet. The USB plus makes the combo working with both my desktop and my notebook, and the boxes even says that it works with Mac (which makes total sense). I will later try it by rebooting my desktop to the Mac OSX 10.4.6. So, since both the mouse and the keyboard work with the same wireless station, I only need to scarify one USB port for both the mouse and keyboard. In addition, the USB wireless station allows quick switching between my laptop and the desktop since all I need is unplug the dock from my desktop and then plug it in my laptop's hub. I tried, and while it worked reasonable as the device was recognized within 5 seconds, the desktop XP require an additional hardware scanning when I plugged in the wireless station. While I can still use the keyboard without completing the hardware recognition process, this is still a bit annoying. Why can't the system simply recognize the keyboard and the mouse generic keyboard and mouse? Strange to me. On the other hand, the laptop takes the keyboard and mouse almost instantly.

Most of the function key works without installing any software, but of course you get more function and flexibility after you install the macro program. I hate installing extra stuff on my machine, so I gave it a pass.

The most important thing about this combo is the wireless aspect. The fact that I can get rid of that long tangling wire on the table and enjoy the complete freedom of moving the keyboard and mouse wherever I feel like was priceless. I was not too crazy about the wireless keyboard and mouse thing before getting this combo. But now I SIMPLY CANNOT GET BACK to the OLD way. Get those wired keyboard and mouse away from me >:-} !!!!!

Lake House

I heard that Lake House is a horrible movie, but then I saw this review and it seems like the movie is not the crap as some portraited.

Just where is the 2200mAh Battery at DELL online store

I am not able to buy a new 2200mAh battery from DELL since my current one is working pretty fine. But how come I cannot find the battery at online store page. On the other hand, the regular 1100mAh battery seems to be reasonably priced (HK$89), and I have a feeling that I may need it real soon.

Seems like my regular x50v battery is going ... down

I am not sure if it's just my imagination of what, but it seems like the battery life of my regular DEll X50v battery is getting lower and lower these days. Well, I am not too worry as I still have my extended x50v battery. I was just suprise that the life span of the regular battery seems to be much shorter than I expected.

By the way, after using for several months, I can report that my x50v system is more stabler ever since I updated the version of WinBar Advance to version 2.6.0.1 . I also found iLauncher 2.3.07 a really good Launcher, allowing me to have a much better user experience with my x50v. On the top of that, I was also pleased by the new .Net Compact Framework 2.0 SP1 as it support installing on non-main-memory places. That is critical to x50v since it doesn't have much main memory. So basically I can live with my x50v for quite a while until a really really really good Ultimate Portable PC arrive 3 years later, if the product line has not been cancelled that is.

Learn to play Puppynu Vector One

I came acrossed this game called Atama wo Kitaete Asobu Taisen Yajirushi Puzzle: Puppynu Vector One, and I was puzzled by how to play it. Finally I got the clue from the original web site, and learnt how to play it. The point is: how come the game itself doesn't comes with a tutorial?