Updates

From my last post, here are the significant things that I have gone through:

Taiwan and Ondoy

Me and my family has gone back to Taiwan last August to September and I returned to finish the job from September to October. I didn’t have enough time to renew Nina and Matt’s visa, so I had to use my US visa to enter Taiwan again and had to leave them behind for a planned 2-week tie-all-loose-ends trip.

In that span of time, the tragedy that was Ondoy happened with me far away from my family. Thank God they remained safe in Parañaque through that rainy Saturday, when I asked my dad to pick them up the day before so Matt can have a check-up. The more important concern was Riverfront, and out home – would it be adversely affected by the floods? Pasig – everyone knows most of it went under. And by its name, you would fear the worst with Riverfront…

Sunday, Nina decided to come home. I specifically asked her to check out the surroundings if there’s mud around and water still remaining. But when they arrived, she told me there was no mud or water around. Thank God Riverfront was not that affected. Whew. Looks like the location is pretty good – despite the fact that it is THAT close to the banks of the Marikina River.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t that good for my Tita Ida.  Their house down in Antipolo, near Marcos Highway was flooded with waters as high as a person! Thank GOd also that they were able to leave just as the waters began to rise. They took refuge at Project 4, QC, at Tito Rody’s relatives. We recently had the chance to visit them and she was able to recount their harrowing experience, not just with tackling the dillemna of leaving or staying, but on the recovery and clean-up after. Yesterday, after coming home from San Pablo to visit the grave of my Lolo Fabio, we wen to her house and was surprised that there are no traces of the Ondoy tragedy in their village and in their home. She was helping her wonderful daughter, Cheri, with her project. I have always admired her strong spirit.

Facebook

I started Facebook in September.

Now, I’m a confessed Cafe World and Farmville addict. I don’t know how they did it. Maybe it’s how these games prey on your need to be better than your friends when you level up. Maybe it’s how they prey on our need to escape and live out our dreams of being just a regular farmer or restauranteur, devoid of all the stress in the regular day-to-day tedium. And don’t forget that need – no, the itch – to express who you are.

Gundam Fever

I also picked up a hobby in Taiwan (it was probably the last trip there too).

Ever since I was introduced to Gundam 00 by my officemates – I got hooked. I finished the 1st season before the latest Taiwan Trip and saw all the Gundam they have, I just had to go get myself a real gundam.

My first purchase – Gundam Exia. Before I left, I had to get the designer version of Gundam Arios. And I didn’t just buy the kits – I bought the WORKS – paint, paint containers, brushes, files, sand paper, and a semi-gloss finsih spray bottle. Nina’s not that happy with it, though, money-wise

Now, I also bought myself mini versions of both Gundams in Toy Kingdom. I’m glad they are available here in Manila as well. Oh, and you can get to see Exia in my Facebook page. If you want to add me in Facebook, just leave a comment and I’ll send you details.

Riverfront Living

It was only last month that we can say that we are now fully ‘on-line’. Got a few furnitures (thatnks to Nina’s mom who gave her the share from a sale of a property), got the service area workable with the washing machine, got cable installed, and, got cable internet installed!

We chose SkyCable Select (Sky has conrnered this project’s cable TV needs) to get Playhouse Disney for Matt and we only pay PhP 650.00, less than SkyCable Silver! Well, not just Plyhouse Disney. Nina and I decided which channels are a must and ended up with a very good selection. Now, I get to watch some History Channel stuff in the morning, while I prepare to go to work.

With SkyBroadband, we get a 15% discount on the cable charges and, I have not have a single complaint in the service. Got to set-up a wireless network as well, so we can use Gizmo and HQ anywhere in our home! I now plan to check if I can set-up a wireless printer connection when I buy a new printer.

Now, living on our own is much sweeter than our early days of eating while squatting on the floor on a cushion.

Hope to post some pics of our humble abode soon.

BLUE Radon W310 – A User’s Review (Part 1 of 2)

Finally, I now have the time to buckle down and start my user’s review for Gizmo, my first ever laptop. I must agree that a laptop is a big investment, and one has to be sure about whether they are getting their money’s worth. Needless to say I poured a lot of time doing research about the subject and scouting on what available brands/units/specs are out there in the Philippine market.

In the end, I took home a 13.3″ Core Duo notebook in shiny silver Al-Mg alloy casing, with enhanced video power from its ATI X1300 Mobility Radeon chip. It’s from BLUE, a Filipino brand from Axis Global, Inc., though further research on the notebook PC revealed it’s original manufacturer to be Arima Corp. of Taiwan (who produced laptops for one of the bigger Amaerican brands). Its model name is Radon [W310], and I have christened it MyToy Gizmo (well, if you’ve read this article, it originally was named as ‘MyToy’ – this will give you the reason why I renamed it to Gizmo).

Gizmo on a laptop riser I bought from Octagon. If you look hard enough and recognize it – it’s the intro sequence of Rome:Total War

A quick rundown of Gizmo’s specs:

• 13.3″ WXGA Display 1280 x 800
• Intel Core Duo T2400 1.83 GHz processor
• 1 GB DDR2 RAM
• ATI X1300 Video Card with HyperMemory (256 MB max.)
• 60 GB SATA Hitachi Harddisk
• Built-n Intel Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.0
• SD / MC / MMC Card reader
• PCI-E Mini slot
• DVD +/- RW

It runs WindowsXP SP2, but is fully Vista-capable. I won’t be upgrading to the new Windows OS yet unitl I get confident that it will run all games I’d like to load up in it.

Oh, and I’d like to calrify that this review is from a user’s perspective. I’m a typical engineering worker in need of a mobile computing device which the office has not given out yet. So I decided to get one. I’m a newbie techie now engrossed in the world of computers since one of my passions is all about computers and graphics and performance – no, not software programming – gaming! hehehe… I’m a PC gamer since my Mom sent me an IBM PS2 when I was in highschool. I’ve had one more PC to use before I bought a desktop in 2005. It has always been my dream to have a laptop and, thank God for the graces, now that I have one, I’d like to share my experience with it to those who would want to have it for themselves as well. <As a disclaimer, I don’t work for the company who sells this PC nor do I intend to sell this kind of laptop. I’m just a user.>

Size Does Matter

As a gamer, I wanted a bigscreen laptop – the bigger the better! so when I checked out the available stuff @ www.laptopking.com.ph, I filtered out all the small stuff. I thought I’d go for the ASUS S96J Whitebook – since it’s a 15.4″ Core Duo wonder with an ATI X1600 Mobility Radeon chip that’s just perfect for the highend games of today (and half of tomorrow).

When I got to see how big it really was, I couldn’t imagine myself lugging it around to meetings. It’s just too big! <sigh>. I browsed over to the otehr 14.1″ laptops available at the store. But I still found the size too big. Finally, they showed me the Radon, and I knew it was the perfect size.

The 13.3″ WXGA latchless screen is just perfect – a bit smaller than a regular 14.1″ and not too small as a 12.1″. It gives you the right resolution and clarity for work-related activities, or for gaming. It’s maximum resolution is 1280 x 800 pixels. For games, widescreen support is growing these days although there are still those that gives a setting of 1280 x 768, instead of x 800, which, when selected makes no difference.

To give an illustration about its size, the laptop is as big as an 8 1/2″ x 11″ paper, and a little less than an inch thick. It’s lightweight and very portable.

Pentium M or Dual Core?

When I bought it last December, Intel has just introduced their Core 2 Duo processor. I knew it was time to buy me a dual core processor. But the proces for the Pentium M laptops are still attractive and it may be enough for me. But realizing the benefits of a Core Duo system, especially during multiple applications operations, I went with teh Core Duo. My office PC is now choking whenever I use it for work coz of all the apps I run on it simultaneously.

And the Radon just had that. As far as I know, it doesn’t come with any options. So that’s another check on my list.

One side effect of having a dual core processor for gaming is this – the AI gets smarter. Honest! Aside from quicker loading times, I feel the difference on how the AI reacts to my gameplay when I’m using the desktop and when i’m using Gizmo.

First Impressions

When I examined the design of the laptop, I thought it to be logical and well-thought-of. It has 2 USB ports on the left, adequately spaced for those fatter-thatn-usual flash disks, and one on the right side. The USB on the right is usually used for the mouse.

LH Side – shown here with a USB DirectLink cable I use to hookup my desktop and Gizmo

RH Side shows the optical mouse and the power cord plugged

The exhaust vent is on the left, while the optical drive is on the right. I find this logical since it’s easier to operate the optical drive with my right hand (being the right-handed guy that I am). The left side has the Card readers, Mini PCI-E Card Slot, the Firewire port, and the S-Video Out. On the right, aside form the drive and USB port, the jacks for the headphones and mike are located forward of the drive, and the power socket at the far end.

The LAN and modem connections are at the back, as well as the VGA output socket.

It’s cool design features include:

• Latchless
• Touch-sensitive keys

The touch-sensitive keys are located at the upper left part of the keyboard area:

It’s for turning on the bluetooth and wi-fi, instant Internet Explorer launch, and instant E-mail launch.

There is a down side to he Radon’s overall design. It’s how it handles the heat. The left side of the touchpad gets really hot, especially if you’re running some graphics heavy stuff. That’s where the processor and hardrive is. But even with this flaw, the Radon’s design copes with it aptly – it’s on the left side. Most right-handed persons would use their right hand navigating via touchpad and the adverse heat will not affect them that much. That’s how I’ve been using it and the heat on that part of the notebook PC is not a problem.

MyToy -> Gizmo, PLDT myDSL

I admit that I could not muster the courage to call my laptop (a Blue Radon W310) MyToy in public. As my wife commented, it’s too obscene. So, I’m giving him the nickname of ‘Gizmo’… yes, as in that furry Gremlin. I’ve been referring to it as Gizmo already, in lieu of, ahem, MyToy.

I’m late in  giving a user’s review of Gizmo. As always, I promise to do it soon….

Especially no that we’re powered by PLDT myDSL! They just installed it this afternoon. I’m still swept away by the speed (coming from a 37 kbps connection and now to a 200++ kbps this afternoon and 400++ kbps tonight!!!)

I’ll now have more reasons to update and play with my blog.

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Here’s our Speedtest results: 

A Looooong Week That Was + Another New Toy

The Loooooong Week… 

The past week was exhausting. It was inevitable, since we are now in the midst of having our maintenance program approved by a foreign Aviation Authority (read: the US). Hectic preparations were made weeks ago, but as of yesterday, it seemed like it was for nothing. There were still tons of work to do.

It’s bad enough that we have half-day Saturday work, but to be recalled to the office after your mindset is intent of having to enjoy the precious afternoon with your family edges me to the brink. But, what can I do? If I don’t report for work, I know there will be unwritten consequences. Yes, and couple that with the fact that I’m just a couple of minutes away from the office won’t help any excuse I can conjur. Besides, my manager was in a far worse condition. He was the one who called me up and asked me to report back. Everybody was being recalled, he said. Just after our AVP has met with the Denizens of the High and Mighty Authorities. I had to comply. Worse still was my colleague who was asked to go to work, when he was on vacation leave! Geeezzz…. I thought he’d be spared.

Oh, and did I tell you that I had to wait until around 9pm Friday night just because our Maintenance Provider couldn’t give us the dfocuments we needed earlier? Ho-hum.

There I was, explaining the situation to my wife, who knows I can do nothing… and then Matt comes up to me to hug my thighs and declare “Dada!”. We had to break the sad news to matt gently. When Nina told him I had to go to work, the kid cried. It tore my heart. It’s a good thing that Matt’s at an age where we could talk to him. So we told him that I’ll be back soon. He agreed, but still whimpering and sobbing.

I packed my laptop, just in case it would be more effidcient to have two displays in front of me, and hurriedly put on my clothes. When I got to the office, a briefing was taking place on what exactly were we to do. Everybody knew that we had to move this thing forward, or all our heads will be on the chopping board. In the end, I never got to use MyToy. It just sat in my bag the whole 5 hours I spent, looking at the hard copy of a task card and the monitor for checking what the hell is wrong with it.

We had a small feast of barbecue for dinner, but there was still uncertainty as to what will happen even after I left.

And the story will continue this week…

A New Toy

Although I refuse any Zoids model to be called a ‘toy’, I had to concede to the label. We got a very very late lunch at Robinson’s Place Malate today. Our main objective: to find a pillow replacement for Matt. We bought him a flat hotdog pillow at the same store. It was originally for Nina when she was pregnant with Matt. But when matt was a baby, he claimed it for his own.

The pillows were near the toys at the department store and Matt saw the Thomas trains, different sizes, on a rack. Nina and I knows that the kid has been obsessed with Thomas ever since my mom (who’s in ‘the land down under’) sent him a Thomas train set. I also wanted to make up for the lost time last week, so when we saw the small Thomas look-a-like train for an affordable price, we had to buy it for him. But I planned on using my card to pay for it (since it’s near sweldo, the previous sweldo has dwindled to a point where I have to ensure there is sufficient cash to run the house for a few more days). But I feared that they would require a bigger amount for me to use my card.

And thus we got…..

Buster Eagle! (I know it’s a weird name, but that’s what this Zoids is called)

And now, it’s the new banner for this blog!

I’ve set my sights on this zoids whe I first saw it around 4 years ago on the Japanese website of the Zoids toy line. And, I got it with around a 40% discount!

It’s a good ‘power up’ to keep me going for another hectic week.