Computer Knowledge. Gadget. Anime. Design. Dance. Hong Kong Life. Stuff like that.

5.30.2006

Golden (Shopping Center) report

Since I left work at 7:00pm today , which I considered early comparing with the time I took off from work normal, I went to Golden Shopping Center at Sham Siu Po. Here's some of the finding:

- Finally, Double Layer DVD+R discs are selling at various stores at the ground floor. However, they are all DVD+R disc, and no DVD+RW (Rewritable). I was told that the technology was "not ready yet".
Usually the discs were priced at HK$28 to HK$30 for brands like Maxell, TDK, Mitsubishi and such. No generic or middle to low end brands like eBlue, Sky or so sells Double Layer disc. HK$30 a DL disc .... and then HK$1.5 for 1 Single Layer disc ... Hmmm ... I wonder which one I will choose.

- DVD+RW and DVD-RW are still stuck at 4x speed. I saw one 6x speed but ... don't care.

- My DVR-111 DVD Recorder was selling at HK$330. Difference comparing with my old one DVR-110: DVD Ram support. As HK$35 per DVD Ram disc (at 3X), I say .... forget it.

- Kingston 1Gb DDR400 RAM is selling at HK$660. Simply no change at price comparing with what I saw a month ago.

- eBlue DVD+R 8x discs are selling at HK$120 a barrel of 50. There are a lot of 16x disc selling now, but usually priced at HK$3 a disc. I persoanlly think that 8x is more than enough.

- $360 is the new price of Toshiba 2Gb SD Card. Toshiba blue SD card is always the guage of the cheapest brand name SD card.

- Nintendo DS Lite is still selling like hot cake. The price slighly increased from HK$1250 to HK$1280.

That's pretty much it this time.

Dexpot 1.4 - Portable Friendly

Just found out that a nice virtual desktop application called Dexpot 1.4 can be ran in portable friendly fashion.

Found some info about Pioneer DVR-111

I still have completely no clue about the difference between my old DVR-110 and the new DVR-111, so I googled and found a few links.

- DVR-111 Internal
- DVR-111 Japanese price
- Full Review - 1 (CDRFreak)
- Full Review - 2 (CDRInfo)

Best encoder for video to watch on my DELL Axim x50v

PocketDivxEncoder is my pick of video encoder for converting video to watch on a mobile device, including my DELL Axim x50v Pocket PC. I cannot recommand more about this great tool, and it's my default (if not only) video encoder. In fact, I am encoding another batch on 1Up show to watch on the road.

Update my Pioneer DVD Burner to DVR-111 without asking

After using the Pioneer DVD Burner DVR-110 intensively on my PC for about 4+ months, it started gradually degrade in quality, meaning that it started to stop working at higher burn rate (8x). I was thus forced to buy some max 4X DVD-RW disc. In the last few weeks it got even worse that even burning at 2x failed. So I had no choice but sending it back to the dealing and ask for repair.

Well, I got my drive back yesterday after sending it in for less than 2 weeks. In fact, I got a NEWER model back. It's a DVR-111, and the person at repair center told me that they didn't even dare to check the old drive. They simply gave me the new one.

So I tried the new drive by buring two discs. One on a 4X Sky disc burned at 4X, the other one on a 8x sky disc burned at 8X. Both worked very well. And was readable on both my home machine and my office machine.

But then if history repeats itself, then it will gradually decay within ... errr... 6 months, just in time for me to exchange to another drive before the warrenty expries.

In fact maybe tonight I will try to burn a disc at 12X on a 8X Sky disc and see how it goes.

5.27.2006

Office 2007 Beta 2: Worth downloading

The fact that I can use Office 2007 Beta 2 to do some fancy layout using the new user friendly and then open the same document on Office 2003 makes it a worthy download.

5.26.2006

6 x 8 inch tablet does make a difference

Yesterday I finally got a chance to try out a 6 x 8 inch tablet from a non-Wacom company. And man, the difference between my 4 x 5 and that 6 x 8 was a big leap. It felt very comfy to paint on tiny area, unlike the fact that I had to move micro movement on my 4 x5 tablet in order to draw something small on the screen.

That sort of unknown brand was selling the 6 x 8 broad for HK$899, cheaper than the Wacom one. But I definitely won't it because:
- I am ultra worry about driver support.
- The pen needs it's own battery which is ultra not cool.
- No eraser button at the top

In fact, there another cheap brand called Genius selling a 6 x 8 board at even lower price: HK$399. Same problem: driver support and battery on Pen.

So I will definitely go for a Wacom Graphire (no money for the highend one) 6 x 8 inch tablet. In fact, I think I will do the trade in to get the HK$150 off since I know that once I adapted to the 6 x 8, there's no turning back to 4 x 5.

By the way, some Golden Shopping observation:
- 4Gb Kingston CF is still around HK$999. Looks like the price has been finally stabilize.
- HK$1250 for a Nintendo DS Lite iPod white color. And man I saw many, many, I mean many NDS selling these days, and a lot of them buying it with a ... err... SuperCard. Go figure :- E.
- Cheap NEC DVD Burner is selling at HK$250. If the Pinoneer DVD Bruner that I sent in for fixing wasn't coming out right, maybe I neeed to shell out HK$250 for a new one.
- I saw almost all stores selling Wacom Graphite 4 6 x 8 inch at HK$1250. Seems like this is a standard price and won't change from store to store usually.

Sin Episodes: Slow startup time

I haven't been playing PC games for such a long while, so maybe I was spoiled by console gaming experience. But do haave problem for the long start up time of a lot of PC games. LIke the Sin Episodes I recently tried. The game looks pretty nice, but I have big problem with the slow slow start up time. It's take a whole 1 minute and 15 seconds to start to the game. By the time it starts up, I should be already kicking some butts in New Super Mario Brothers on DS.

5.25.2006

Ds Organize 1.9 still immature

I tried out DS Organize version 1.9 and found that it's still not for prime time. Maybe I have high expectation, but still I won't rely my important daily information on it.

Princess Princess Live action show ... what the ...

I mention I heard about the Princess Princess Live action show (Princess Princess D), I was like ..... what the XXXX. I can stand a drag queen anime character, but a live action one .... June 28 2006 will be the first episode, and then they should have at least some photo posted on their web site. Let's see how "pretty" these princesses will look like.

FlashGet setting

Everything I install FlashGet at workplace I need to deal with reconfiguring the application. I think I better write it down here so that I won't forget it again:

Under Proxy Setting:
Server: (well, the proxy server name)
Port: 8080
Type: HTTP
Check the following checkboxes: [x] No-Cache, [x] PASV Mode

Probably go for Graphire 4

After asking for suggestion from friends, comparing the price and performance, I think I pretty much settle with getting the Wacom Graphire 4 CTE-640/S0-C Silver color 6X8 USB Tablet. With the Hong Kong price HK$1250, the tablet is pretty reasonably priced comparing with the US Price. My next question will be whether I should trade in my old tablet for HK$150.

5.24.2006

Link you download ZoneAlarm free version

You can download ZoneAlarm free version over here.

Microsoft Office and Vista public beta program

The Microsoft Office Product is open for public beta. For instance, you can download the following Microsoft Office Pro Plus software:

- Microsoft® Office Professional Plus 2007 - MTP6Q-D868F-448FG-B6MG7-3DBKT
- Microsoft® Office Visio® Professional 2007 - QB6MH-Q82HX-BFWPK-8TXTY-HHJT6

... from the page . And even more if you access this microsoft page. Guess it's time to suck up more bandwidth.

5.23.2006

Redirect mail service

I tried a few different redirect email service since I found some site requiring me to use non-free email address like hotmail.com and Yahoo.com .

So far MailExpire seems to work the best. At least I see it working.

SpamHole seems more like a hoax to me, but I could be wrong.
MyTrashmail also doesn't seem to do me any good.

Yahoo email failed on FireFox?

I don't know why, but I have problem sending email and deleting bulk mail with Yahoo mail using FireFox 1.5.0.3. I have, on the other hand, no problem with Yahoo mail.

Strange.

5.22.2006

Retro LucaArt graphic Adventure on Nintendo DS

Man, I tried and it was so much fun. All the retro game memory is back. I am talking about the LucasArt graphic action emulator for Nintendo DS called Scumm VM. And since I do have the Maniac Mansion and the Maniac Mansion 2 PC software in my closet, so I think I am legally able to play these games on my Nintendo DS :> . It worked so well, and with the support of touch screen and any place any where instant save, the game is much more interesting and enjoyable to play! I may even stopping new DS games and instead focus solely on all the retro games :D .

5.21.2006

More experience on playing NES ROMs on SuperCard

Here more info about playing NES rom on SuperCard:

- Don't expect to be able to put too much ROM in one folder, I found that after a few dozen of files, superCard's menu will stop displaying the rest of the file in the system. So next time just put enough in a folder.
- Not all games play OK on SuperCard. I tried a game called Alien something something and it was not running well. On the other hand the "3-D Battles of World Runner" was totally kick ass fun.
- Make a .sav file, otherwise you are not able to save state. And damn instantly saving state is like the major reason why playing NES roms on NDS totally rock. (Yeah I am lame, but then I don't have hours to play video games, and I want some satisfaction :-> ).

Story telling: the most important aspect of any movie

After being impressed by the visual effect of the Open Source movie Elephants Dream , I suddenly have an urge to take a look at the freelance CG animation short world. So I did a quick serach on YouTube, and found that while a lot of people putting their nice animation short online, many of them are just bad story in OK to nice CG. A lot of them are related to stupid boy interest like explosion, blood and gore, frat, cheap and nasty practicle joke. It was fun for the first 15 seconds, but then the fun simply weared off.

So here's the moral to myself: if I don't have a good story to tell, don't bother making a indie animation.

PC Engine game not running so well on SuperCard

Unlike GameBoy Color games and NES games which run smoothly on SuperCard, PC Engine games are not running so well:

- They are mostly contantly lacking in speed.
- Without sound, the result seems to be even worst.
- It seems to only recognize Japan ROMs.

So, forget it. No PCE games on NDS.

Hidden Gem, Stupid Me

I didn't realize that SuperCard actually has build in support for playing GB, NES and PC Engine games! And I can save state. That makes it super awesome!

To play the game, just put the .nes, .gb and .pce files in the CF card. In order to save, you need to clone an exisitng .sav file and rename it the same the game rom file. For instance, the save file for super_man.nes is super_man.sav, rocky.gb is rocky.sav .

Once you are in the game:
- Press R-Select to save the state/
- Press R-Start to load the state
- Press L-R-Select-A to Save all the state info to the CF card.

Totally awesome.

5.20.2006

Shitty bank credit card

The bank that my mom applied home loan with asked her and the one with the loan title (that's me) to each apply for one 中銀信用卡 credit card. I found this ultra stupid. First of all, what does freaking home loan do to the stupid credit card application. Second, how could they ask my mom to apply for a credit card when she has no income at all? Third, the application form is so tiny that my mom couldn't read the form itself, not to mention all the fine print (which makes me wonder if that's their exact intention). Fourth, the requirement of getting all the card application gifts sound nonsese to me.

I am sick and tired of all these credit card application trip. They all milk on people's greediness. Sick. Shitty sick.

"The Giver" the book

The Giver is a book about ... oh well you read it yourself. Sounds a nice book.
- From Amazon
- Study Guide
- Google book link

And there's gonna be a movie adpotation. (IMDB Info)

I am a Mac and I am a PC ad

Apple's ad agency skillfully avoid saying anything as fact in their "I am a Pc and I am a Mac" commerical, instead it simply hint a lot of features that makes you feel like Mac is superior. Nice move, although I am not getting a Mac yet. (Cannot afford taking care of another machine)

Got a spyware, and it's all my fault

Today I got a spyware because I naively executed an .exe file that I downloaded form the Net. I scanned virus using the AVG Antivirus and it didn't show any sigh of a virus. But since it's not really a virus but a jackass spyware hiding itself, AVG didn't picked it up.

The result?
- Task Manager got disabled
- Unable to run tools like regedit
- Spybot process got aborted
- msconfig.exe got deleted/
- An process called meeting, which is actually c:\program files\winupdates\serialno.exe was trying to access the Internet (Luckily my ZoneAlarm picked it up and stopped it. And in fact it was the ZoneAlarm that gives me a hint where this asshole spyware is.
- serialno.exe tried to run in background everytime the system bootsup.

And maybe there are some other syptoms that I didn't figure out.

My solution?
- First use ZoneAlarm to see where that asshole exe is
- Use Hijackthis to remove the entry from registry
- Reboot, delete that jackass serialno.exe
- Update Spybot, run it, and clean the rest.

Now my machine is back to normal.

So next time when I run strange exe, I will run it in VMWare.

Writely, what's up with you?

I was a bit frustated by the fact that Writely, my favorite Online Word Processor, is still not accepting new user. I really want to have saperate account to saperate my work related writing and my personal writing. So please, Writely, faster!

MacDrive 6: solution of reading Mac partition on Windows

Now that Macintosh is starting once again gaining stenegth, it maybe time to worry about the issue of accessing Mac formatted drive on your PC. Specifically, if any one of the following situation applies to you, you need to concern about the solution we suggest at the later part of this article:

- You need to access a Mac formatted harddisk base iPod
- You need to transfer huge file between Mac and PC using external harddisk, and you know that you cannot use NTFS or FAT32 since NTFS cannot be read by Mac what-so-ever and FAT32 has a 4Gb size limit
- You need to access a Mac formatted drive on the network.

MacDrive 6 is your solution for all these problems. Go try it and you will love it.

And please don't even think about using those mainland China site to grab the software. It's evil.

Lousy NDS case protector

Remember a lot time ago (like last year) I was talking about the $25 case protector for my classic Nintendo DS? Well, I finally concluded that it's a crappy purchase for several reasons.

First of all, the plastic case does not really did a good job of protecting my NDS at all. I can clearly see the scratch caused by the friction between the NDS and the plastic shell. Second, it's too heavy. It's about 1/4 of the weight of NDS. It might not sound like a big deal until I started to intensively playing some platform games like Super Mario 64 DS and New Super Mario Brothers DS. The extra weight actually caused my arm hurt. Third, which is a reason related to Mario gameplay, I cannot play Mario 64 DS with the plastic shell on. The extra shell size makes it extremely hard to use the pointer on the screen as analog stick.

But then I don't want to just leave the NDS in my bag naked. So until I find a better solution, I will continue using that plastic shell.

And speaking of my NDS, I found my wrist hurting these days as I played New Super Mario Bros and Mario 64 NDS intensely. To a certain extend I am totally the one to blame since my grab the controller too tight when I was tense. In fact, this may be a great reminder for myself to loosen up as a whole since playing video game is more of less like dancing (.....): the more relax you are, the better you perform. I really should train myself to relax and loosen up.

5.19.2006

Best option for my x50v to watchh DL.TV

I found out that the experience to watch DL.TV is to choose the DIVX option. That's the biggest one, but also the best one on my Pocket PC.

5.17.2006

All my crappy DVD-Writer drives

Since I sent my Pioneer DVD Burner to repair shop, I DO NOT any DVD Burner at home that can reliably burn DVD+R disc that can be read by all other drives that I can get a hold on with.

For instance, I tried burning DVDR disc with my LiteOn DVD Burner. The drive can read it's own disk, but the LE drive failed to read it, and so is another NEC drive I accessed at work.

And the LE DVD Burner was even worse since it CANNOT burn DVDR disc properly at all.

So I have to either wait for the Pioneer DVD Burner to be fixed, or go get another DVD Burner.

On the other hand, I used the NEC DVD Burner on my office desktop to burn the same set of files at 2x, and both my desktop and the file server's NEC Burner (different model) has no problem recognizing it. Still I need to bring it home to test reading from my LE and LiteON DVD Burner.

What a headache.

5.12.2006

Finally DeathNote ended

DeathNote ended. What a relief. I was worrying that it got keep dragging along.

Among all the comics download site, this comic.kukudm.com seeem to be the best since it's Teleport Ultra friendly. Get the link of each volumn, like the volumn 104, and then also match "http://c3.kukudm.com/death*" and you got the whole episode.

I tried GoComics but the link doesn't work with Firefox. Tried Comicer but it requires password. Comic iBox seems find but it's not Teleport friendly at all. Waau has the same Teleport unfriendly problem. And it has quite some missing episodes.

By the way this mainland China indie comics site looks awesome. The mainland China comics scene really worth paying attention.

5.08.2006

New Super Mario Bros for Nintendo DS

I am so very happy today since I can finally play New Super Mario Bros for Nintendo DS today. Yeah!!!!!

Cannot wait until after office hour so that I can start playing ..... waiting ... waiting ....

Sound Forge 8 does not support green/portable version

Actually both Sound Forge 8 and Acid Pro 4 are not green/portable friendly. You cannot run them in portable or green mode.

Enough said.

5.04.2006

Running IE 7 beta 2 as standaline

- To download the IE7 offical installation application
- Hack 1 - Working great
- Hack 2 - MInor glitch