Linora Low » Techy

The Dell XPS

Linora Low — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 20:26:09 +0000

People say hello to my new at latest TOY!!!

After all the mucking about with the HP Pavillion which i had originally wanted really badly. I ended up buying the Dell XPS…I know one friend of mine who used to work in Dell under sales is gonna smack me (pls don’t smack me ) I personally love the cool packaging.

Oh and cool part was they did a tie up with Creative and I got free Creative earphones which sounds great . Oh and Dell went the extra mile by giving a CD cover for all your Dell and other laptop drivers. And yeah… they needed to make their own XPS cloth for cleaning the monitor.. I’m grateful

So why did i finally pick the DELL XPS?

For starters, it has much better specs than the HP Pavillion D6715tx plus it is cheaper, by a good 1000+. The HP dv6715 was around RM5999 in comparison with the DELL XPS M1530 which is only at RM4600. I was with my brother at the time and he had tried his utmost to convince me to not get the HP. Btw he’s a young kid, that wanted the XPS quite badly for reasons that I think didn’t really justify why he needed it when he had a desktop – which granted is spoilt at the moment. Anyway, I had weighed the thoughts of getting the Dell Monster and the Prettiness of the HP Pavillion. I mean really the HP Pavillion is a gorgeous looking laptop as some of you would remember in my previous post. But he and Mister G had a point I’d save at least a good RM1000 over by buying the Dell. Cheaper and specs like so:

Intel Core 2 Duo Centrino T7500 2.2 GHz
Windows Vista Home Permium
Nvedia GEForce 8600 GS 256 Dedicated graphics
2gb of DDR2 Ram
250gb HDD
15.4 inch screen
A slid in DVD reader and burner
3 usb ports, HDMI port, SD/MMC/MS/PRO card reader, SIM card reader at the back for 3G surfing.
Webcam and Mic Integrated into the laptop
Fingerprint reader (although i think a bit redundant)
Bluetooth and WIFI built in
Touch pad Media controls
2.6 kg (pretty light)

I’m pretty happy with it overall Very happy at the performance and the keyboard is great, it has this really soft touch in comparison with the HP which is tad stiff for me, which i had denied because i still wanted to get it before. The aluminum finish for the palm rest is excellent too. Doesn’t make the laptop as hot as it would be because heat is dispelled more due to the material. Cons though First I’m not crazy about the slide in cd slot. Because it’s slide, i can’t pop in a mini disc anymore. I know not everyone uses it but some of my applications do. So a bit annoying. Plus i don’t really like how the XPS touchpad mouse on the laptop is nearly the same level as the keyboard and palm rest. Because of the level, my finger tends to keep brushing against it, causing me to make even more mistakes then I already do.Â Unlike the HP, which has a button for you to turn off you touch mouse pad and is slightly more dented than the palm rest. But i will commend in with the Dell application for the touchpad that allows the touchpad to be disabled the minute a usb mouse is plugged in. So good cover. Yeap, i don’t regret buying it… and Thank God they had installment plan… pheww

Installing WordPress Locally On Your Desktop

Linora Low — Wed, 05 Dec 2007 18:05:53 +0000

Ok… whenever I need to test out something, the best way I would do it is to try and install it on my desktop. Meaning I get to see who my whole blog, site, cms works without being online. Good thing.. but sometimes i forget how to set it up. So here what I have decided to share, is how to install it directly on to your desktop. I got this article from a blog called GeeksAreSexy. They did a marvelous job of explaining how to set it up locally on your computer. So first before going there.. go get XAMPP (auto installation) or XAMMPLite (manual installation) which helps you installing apache and mysql on your comp. Download the latest WordPress here. And get ready for the process. Here’s the actual link to geeks are sexy installation guide.

In the past few weeks, I’ve tested a few blogging platforms for the upcoming launch of Geeksaresexy.net, and right now, I hesitate between 2 alternatives: WordPress and Textpattern. I’ll be fooling around with both in coming weeks to familiarize myself with them. I have now been running WordPress for a week or so, and I must say that I am quite impressed by its ease of installation. Running a local version of your blog Here’s a little guide that will help you install and run WordPress locally on your XP box in less then 10 minutes: 1- Get XAMPP lite for Windows. Choose the exe version, and install it at the root of your C drive. is very useful because it lets you fool around with themes and plugins to your heart’s desire without having to risk breaking your live blog.
2- Browse to C:\xampplite and double click setup_xampp.bat
3- Once that is done, double click xampp-control.exe and start the Apache and Mysql services.
4- Open your browser and go to this address: http://localhost/. 5- Now that the interface displays a language that you can understand, click on phpMyAdmin (on the left column once again) 6- Enter “wordpress” (without quotes) in the “Create New Database” Field, and select utf8_unicode_ci in the drop down box in the next field (as shown in the picture below). Click on Create. The Xampp setup is now complete. From the menu on the left column, choose your preferred language.
7- Download WordPress and unzip it under c:\xampplite\htdocs. 8- You should now have a wordpress folder under c:\xampplite\htdocs. Browse to the folder, and you will see a file named wp-config-sample.php. Open it in your favourite text editor // ** MySQL settings ** // define(‘DB_NAME’, ‘wordpress’); // The name of the database define(‘DB_USER’, ‘root’); // Your MySQL username define(‘DB_PASSWORD’, ”); // …and password (needs to be empty, just for local install) define(‘DB_HOST’, ‘localhost’); // 99% chance you won’t need to change this value and replace the default values by the ones you see under this paragraph. Save the file as wp-config.php (under the same folder). 9- Open your browser and navigate to http://localhost/wordpress/wp-admin/install.php , follow the instructions, and voila, you are done. That was easy wasn’t it?

Well have fun ^_^

N82

Linora Low — Sat, 17 Nov 2007 14:14:07 +0000

The phone that I have been waiting for in the market for a long while now. That I went to even the extent of asking Nokia’s Vice President Tapio Hedman, his thoughts on it…. which in a way I am embarrassed.. lol… but I was curious. The N82, is a candy bar version of my N95 and after much tying to sell the phone and no buyers. I ended up using the phone and I absolutely think its a very handy phone to have. Dang it… thats a phone!!

Specs are:

Symbian S60 OS
5 megapixel cam, carl zeiss lense
Wi-Fi
GPS system
Supports N-Gage when it relaunches next month.

Sigh… what more can I ask for. Here’s T3s video on it. That said though. I hope the battery is gonna last longer and also I hope that the camera has better quality now. I have no complaints on the music quality. The down side of the phone by the looks of it though are the keypads.. my gosh they are small!! They look just about the size of the tip of my nail. It’s already bad enough with the n95 that i feel stunted when trying to send an sms. Also looking at it sideways.. it looks a tad thick….then again it can’t be any thicker than the N95. What I do love about this phone are the S60 applications. There are some really handy stuff and best of all NOT i repeat not as irritating as a PDA! I absolutely can’t stand the PDAs.. which reminds me, that’ll be another entry… PDA vs Symbian phone…

My Comp Died

Linora Low — Wed, 14 Nov 2007 05:21:29 +0000

Not too long ago, my comp died! I was so entirely ticked… I was playing Guild Wars for a while and next I know… my screen turns all static and then it goes black. It happened once and i dismissed it while praying it won’t happen again. Next day… it went to all static again… in a span of 5 times in one hour and shutting down after each black out!…. Here’s a glimpse of what it looked like before I called over my friend to help me reformat it. See my pain and horror! I would’ve gladly done it myself but there was an issue. He had combined to physical harddisk into one.. SO meaning my pc read the two hard disk – one 80gb and another 120 gb – as 160gb. Cause of that reformatting it becomes very complicated. Thank God for the company’s laptop. Sigh… ok considering that my comp is sorta old now.. it’s three years now I think.. plus with me leaving it on like forever I can see why it died so fast. I over worked my comp I feel bad for doing it and wasting all the energy too. Sigh but downloading… downloading… it’s like a must man. But now I only do it when I need to. The good part about it, is at least parents are gonna help me upgrade it…. It’s time…. I did op for a laptop at one point but currently since we have one in the house it’s alright. The HP Pavillion laptop is doing very well… minus the fact that it is Vista. It’s nice but it has a lot of security issues that is a real annoyance.

Photoshop World Asia Pacific 2007

Linora Low — Tue, 06 Nov 2007 16:31:35 +0000

Today was Photoshop World Asia Pacific 2007. Held at Mandarin Oriental, KL at an unforsaken 8.45am in the morning, of course that was just registration and you know what? For the first time ever in the history of me being Malaysian…the event started on the DOT! We were actually on time for once! Hahaha.. Anyway the day was more of presentation of what Adobe Photoshop CS3 and Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended could do for you. And I tell you… the way how Adobe has grown and grown over the years to becoming a fascinating tool… not to mention a tool that is so widely used it practically dominates the creative market. Having said that the event was presented by three speakers: Marion Young, Michael and Christine Serks, who all know their stuff with Photoshop…. don’t “pray pray” with em’. I won’t go through a long article on what are the latest cool things on Adobe Photoshop CS3 and the Extended version (what is this a movie?). But briefly I shall say that it has made being a graphic designer a lot easier. Even in terms for people who use it for web designing, video editing and would you believe it these people use photoshop too: doctors, sonographers, engineers and interior designers (which is what the Photoshop CS3 EXTENDED, is for) How so? Firstly one it has an option for creating 3d images out of static flat 2d images. Secondly, you know how for some scientists they have to count every single cell underneath a microscope and they could lose count? Under the ruler option, there’s a new feature called the count tool. Which helps you to number the amount of items you wish to count on your image. Also the ruler allows u to measure just about anything even accurate measurements for the human anatomy.

The best part about Photoshop fans, is that it can even allow you to create simple video animations. Like so. And it’s sooo cool.. you can WARP a video!!!! WARP!! and ADD normal blending effects to the video like any other layer on Photoshp. At the end of the day, Adobe was giving away 1 Photoshop cs3 and 2 Photoshop cs3 Extended. The crowd went nuts! Since it was a lucky draw, everytime someone’s name was called and no one answered, the crowd immediately screamed….”TAK DAAAA” or “NOT HEREEEE” or “GONE HOME”. Sad to say I didn’t get one Ah but having said that.. it still support Adobe… They ROCK!

GigaCities

Linora Low — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 16:09:29 +0000

Dear readers, I was going through a few of those free hosting sites and I came across one particular one with space that drove me up the wall, not to mention that it had a bundle loads of applications that came along with it. The free hosting provider is Gigacities. And guess how much of space? 20000MB = 20GB ………………………. Mygawssshh that’s huge for a free site. This is their Free plan Package which is very easy to sign up for. Not too bad.

20 GB Space 300 GB Bandwidth PHP 5 MYSQL 5 FTP 99.50% Uptime Simple Control Panel Free – no ADS! And if you want more go ahead and check out their premium service which is up to 200GB worth of space. The Premium Package 200 GB+ Space 2000 GB+ Bandwidth PHP 5 MYSQL 5

No file type limits No filesize limits No PHP restrictions No downtime

No FTP user limits ULTRA fast page loads No ad’s on your pages CPANEL 11 (premium control panel) Currently now, I’m giving the free plan a try, since it’s MORE than enough to satisfy my web upload and creative designing needs. Give it a try and if there really are any problems with it, comment on it. It’ll be good to know since I’m using it anyway.

My Sony NW-A806

Linora Low — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 08:24:43 +0000

Ok truthfully I’ve been considering to get an ipod nano….. Yes I’m mad! But I have reasons…. and all reasons that someone will shoot me down for. SO nevermind, I shall talk about my Sony Gadget and hopefully come up with a helpful review for those of you out there, considering it. I think it is one of my favourite gadgets to date! Why.. simply because of what it is. It’s a Sony! Lol not helpful. Lets break it down. What I like about it? Tech wise

Sound quality from Sony is never one to disappoint. It’s GREAT!
Easy to understand in terms of their technological feature. Referring to menu here, it is laid out in grid format and there is a button for you to keep pressing back, to go to whatever page you were originally on. Like say i’m on my playlist page i can just keep pressing back till i get back to the main menu.
Memory size is reasonably good. Ranging from 4GB to 8GB. They are enough for whatever songs and videos that you need on the go. Come now, you aren’t going to listen to everything anyway.
The Video is also just as good, with good definition… as good as you can get on such a tiny screen.
The equalizer si very useful and you can of course mix and match your own.
Battery can last for a bout 30 hours.
The earphones that came with it are the most comfortable pair I have ever tried in my life.

Looks wise

The fact it is incredible small, slim and light. Fantastic for taking it anywhere and most importantly for gyming!! Must!
It is matte, with a not so easy to scratch finish. The only parts that are metal and most likely going to be scratched are just the sides, but very minimal.
Colours are very attractive. All of them – white, black, purple and pink. All reasonably nice colours

Acessory wise

The earphones that came with it are the most comfortable pair I have ever tried in my life. Giden thinks so too.
U can by a plastic clip for it which is very handy for clipping to your clothes for those on the move
Either that or u can buy those leather casings.

What I dislike about it?

The SonicStage software. I absolutely HATE IT! I had a humongous issue with it in transferring songs. Beats me on why but I couldn’t seem to get the music part working for my Windows XP. And I’;m sorry but the people at Sony weren’t very helpful either. All they could say was… it’s working on ours, don’t know whats wrong with yours…yeah very helpful. But surprising the SonicStage Audio worked with the Vista program.
Price, I wanted to cry when I saw the price, but Thank God for installment plans. So the blow is not so bad.
The buttons are maybe just a bittttt small.. But can’t really complain. I was just too use to using my Nessa’s Ipod and the touchwheel.
The earplugs are just a tad bit short, which is why they give u an extra extension…. =S
No radio… aww…

Boils down too… A fantastic gadget for music lovers and those who want instant video on the go. But it serves its purpose and i’m glad i got it. You can read a full review on it here at CNETasia.

The Zit Zapper Gadget

Linora Low — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 07:57:53 +0000

Is this thing for real???? According to Cnet asia, this lil device will actually zap away the zits on your face or wherever. Seems that Zeno (that’s what it’s called anyway) will “utilizes precisely controlled heat to destroy the bacteria that causes common acne, dramatically reducing the healing time of pimples”.

Made by Houston-based Tyrell, whose mission is “clear, smooth skin for all”, the device features a microprocessor that adapts “not only to your individual skin type, but also to the heat absorption characteristics of the location of the pimple”. The Zeno costs US$150 if you buy it from the company site, and according to a good sampling of Amazon.com reviewers, it actually works.

Seriously??? Can this work? If it does I’m all for getting it man. Dudes I’m sure you all know the headache of pimple issue. Form going on a date, to your wedding (think Alba in F4) and heading out for performances. It would be really helpful. And oh the after math of scars… Oh gosh the blemishes. But the price is really gonna kill me. Besides how long can this thing last?

Windows Live Messenger Mail

Linora Low — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 09:27:09 +0000

I just downloaded the latest Windows Live Messenger… and it came with some extra bonuses. I was already loving the new Windows live Messenger, but I really am impressed at their new tools especially Windows Live Mail (WLM). It is absolutely handy. Think of it as outlook, but the nice part about it, is now I finalyl get to check my hotmail and my gmail at the same time without having two applications running which was Gtalk and MSN. Gtalk still unfortunately can’t integrate other chats with it… hmm. gee i wonder why. But no matter. Back to WLM, it has not only a fantastic look, but is very friendly for the not so savvy and thoroughly savvy geeks. Hehe. What i like the most is instead of having to go online allll the time to check my hotmail, and I hated hotmails interface. It was super unfriendly. WLM in this sense takes over the old hotmail and instead you can have it on your desktop, read your mail at any point. Very smart Windows. Find something that integrate everything, will definitely get you points. So to recap why I like WLM

Customizable layout – reading pane, searchbar, navigation panel, inbox
Easy to search for mails
Able to integrate gmail and any other email one may have
Look is simply web2.0 sleek
Easy to see all the different emails

Gorgeous ain’t it. Bare in mind it is like outlook. Google do something like this!!!

Twitter wins in my book

Linora Low — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 16:28:52 +0000

Heh, quite a while back I had written a port on twitter vs pownce. And finally I think i’ll writemy conclusion. I LOVE twitter! I use to think that it was completely irrelevant and dumb, but I think it is a brilliant application. Brilliant in the sense that it allows you to just connect with your friends or update them on whats going on with you. It is pretty cool… So Gavin hehe nope i disagree on twitter being dumb lol. It’s just great for social networking. The one-sentence-blog-tool, lol. Anyways I went around searching for plugins that will accommodate my twitting lifestyle. And found a few that would be quite useful, for wordpress blogs and also as a desktop application. WordPress Twitter Plugins After going through a few, I found these to be very handy and kudos to the guy who made it. (Clap, clap, clap) [Taking off from Quickonlinetips, I'd like to try breaking down the twit tools that worked for me.]

Twitter Badge – Twitter of course already came up with their own official badge javascript codes that displays what you are posting on Twitter. Just what I don’t like about it, is that everyone has one lol. It is like a huge Twitter icon. But it serves the purpose.
TwitThis is an easy way for people to send Twitter messages about your blog post or website. When visitors to your website click on the TwitThis button or link, it takes the URL of the webpage and creates a shorter URL using TinyURL. Then visitors can send this shortened URL and a description of the web page to all of their friends on Twitter.
Twitter Tools – A complete integration between your WordPress blog and Twitter. Bring your tweets into your blog and pass your blog posts to Twitter, done by Alex King. I really like this tool, as I can even twit while I’m writing a new post up on my blog. So it’s real handy when i just want to state something, in the midst of my lonnnggg winded posts.
Twitter WordPress Sidebar Widget – As it says, it’s a twitter sidebar widget, which allows you to customise the number of twits you’d like to show and you can even style the css of it, though I haven’t tried.
Twitt-Twoo – I really wish I could use this plugin, but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to settle well with my layout , but it is, if it worked, a prettya nd simple twitter plugin, which even has a pic of you on it. It is AJAX powered and allows for quick and easy status updates.
SimpleTwitter – If you want something that is simple, fast and easy to install, this is for you. No coding ofdesign and what not, just plain text.

Twitter Tools on the Deskto Twitteroo - currenly I’m trying this one out. and it looks fairly good. Update and find out what your twitting friends are saying all on your desktop. And it’s not sore on the eyes too.