On the next working day, UNIFI Support Team gave me a call and both of us agreed on an appointment. On the said date, they did come sharp on time; 1.30 p.m. and they spent the next 3 hours trying to pin down the problems. They started their investigative works from the UNIFI box, outside my apartment. Later, they moved up to the SERVER room inside my apartment, and also next, to the CABLE room at my apartment’s level. Unfortunately for them and me, none of those troubleshooting has worked. Finally, they came into my house with the old VDSL modem (white and bulky). He quickly completed the cabling and voila, the internet was back online! He then quickly swapped my black HUAWEI modem with new unit to verify the finding, guess what…. It really worked! It was clear that the culprit was the HUAWEI modem. Hampeh! He was also shocked to discover this. According to him, most UNIFI users would only have problem with their orange DLINK router.

So my prior concern was valid. Unfortunately, I neglected my concern and assumed it would be OK. Serve me right, kan? Hehe
Learning this lesson the hard way, I have thought of some ‘cool’ idea. In fact, it is cool, literally. Thanks to the USB port in front of the DLINK router. The next day, during lunch hour @ Ampang Park, I stopped by computer shop to get the USB-powered notebook cooling pad! The price was a bargain, only RM6. Trust me, it is THAT cheap!
Check out my previous UNIFI setup:

And now, it is cooled by the CHEAP, yet COOL cooling pad! Haha!

Please take note of this, the brilliant USB PORT (red-circled below). I likeee~~ Without this useful port, I would find problem to get the juice for the cooling pad. Hehe

So guys, I am advising and recommending those UNIFI users, to install this simple, yet effect cooling solution. Both devices are now running cool, yet quiet. You may need to bear with the blue LEDs, or perhaps you could scout around for the LEDless pad. Hint: PC Fair is coming soon in April ’11.

In my opinion, although the VDSL modem unit has lifetime warranty, I would prefer proactive solution than active solution i.e. waiting for them to come and fix it. No downtime please.. That’s all!

Cheers!

Image credit (1): USB Port

It all started last Friday, when suddenly I received a ‘talian-hayat‘ from my colleague, Azy.

“Aku nak anta NOOP to contractors, tapi masalahnya dalam tue ada costing details.”
“Oh, aku cadangkan ko, scan as PDF then email”
“Tapi nnt besar la plak kan”
“Oh, tak2, ko pakai PDF compact, it should work! Takpe2, nnt aku balik opis, aku tolong k”
“Okeh”

When I got back to my workplace, I found that “scan-to-pdf” approach is no longer practical, as the total page is a whooping 73 pages. And, as far as I know, to be able to edit the PDF, is using Adobe Acrobat Professional.

“Hmm, pc ko ada internet access?”
“Ada2!”
“Cantek, meh ke tempat ko“

Next, with the help of my all-time-favourite-search-engine, GOOGLE, the “search-and-pin” operation begun. Yes, I found not one, but many of them. Unfortunately, all of them are shareware (read: you need to buy it to access full features), which is pretty useless.

I was about to give up, when suddenly I found wikipage that compile all the softwares related to PDF. NICE! It suggests three sites; PDFescape, PDFfiller and PDFVue. Of all three, only PDFVue manages to pass through the proxy.

I was so excited to finally, discover PDFVue; it is user-friendly, working and most importantly, it`s FREE !!

So, friends, if you happen to have a PDF that requires some editing (rotating/deleting page, or even putting comments), I highly recommend PDFVue. What you need to do, is just to upload your PDF file and do the editing online. Right after you save the changes, you can click DOWNLOAD button, and within minutes (well, still depend on how fast your connection is.. ;p), your edited PDF is ready in your PC. There is no need for installation or any sort of payment. Good luck guys, and happy editing!!

p/s: Feel free to give a try on other two, and perhaps you can share your experience here!

It happened last week, when suddenly, without any reason, my main portable harddisk failed. I tried several apporaches; connected it through different pc, using different cable, and even different way of booting pc. All of them led to same ending; I couldnt access it.

Just when I was about to give up, I remembered something important; a very useful DOS command!

CHKDSK

I used this particular command, extensively back in UTP, as power breakdown happened regularly, resulting in windows error during startup. CHKDSK if used properly, will check for the harddisk file structure and repair if any. Simple, yet brilliant command. I like it!

Quickly, I plugged the portable harddisk back and waited patiently for the windows to assign the drive letter. I purposely left it before going lunch, just to make sure the sytem stabilized. Next, through command prompt, I performed the ‘operation’ on my beloved portable harddisk (inspired by my wife’s favourite tv series, Grey’s Anatomy)

Alhamdulillah, the ‘operation’ went well.. The ‘patient’ has been saved.. and still breathing as we speak !

So guys, whenever your harddisk becomes inaccessible, don’t simply throw it out. Berusahalah dulu ya !

Ganbattene ! ~

p/s: I managed to revive Afifie’s harddisk too last week, Alhamdulillah. So that’s TWO!

LRT (RapidKL – Kelana Jaya / Terminal Putra Line)
Being the second last station doesn’t guarantee you a hassle-free trip every morning to KLCC. I started to notice the hike in number of commuters soon after government decided to increase the fuel price few months ago. And ever since, it is getting worse, with no sign of efforts taken by RapidKL to resolve this. So, as the old saying kept saying; if you can’t beat it, you have to join it. And, with that thinking in mind, I have thought of my own way/strategy to get onboard. Muahaha! Here’s the drill;

Typically, LRT station will have two platforms; Platform A where the train heads towards Terminal Putra (TP), and the other one is heading to Kelana Jaya (KJ). Being orthodox’ers, people would just go to Platform B, provided you start queuing before 0715, otherwise you could just waste your time standing waiting there. For the unorthodox’ers, they would proceed to Platform A without any hesitation. If you happened to be one of those unorthodox’ers, congratulations, you have made a wise choice for the first part of this cheat strategy.

Next step? You could just simply board any incoming train, and keep your fingers crossed that you don’t have to get down in TP. Alternatively, you could take my advice here; make use of deterministic approach (purely based on my experience since last year) or, analytical approach (which sometimes works better than the former).

My so-called “deterministic” approach assumes similar concept with bus; we know where the bus is heading, based on the numbers located above its windscreen.. LRT has three digits; first denotes whether it`s the front or back coach, while the last two digits are the one that we should look for. They could give us ‘hint’ whether the passengers need to step out @ TP.  Compiled below, is the list of numbers of good, 50/50 and bad trains. (Again, sometimes it works and, sometimes it doesn’t)

Good (high chance that you DON’T HAVE to step out @ TP)
02, 08, 09, 10, 11, 12, 15, 17, 18, 19, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27, 33

50/50 (this train has both good and bad record, so give a try at your own risk)
03,06,10,21,34

Bad (high chance that you HAVE to step out @ TP)
04,05,16,31

On Platform A, you guys need to understand the mechanism on the rotation of LRT; they move in circle, connecting TP (Gombak) and Kelana Jaya. With respect to our case now,one needs to guess understand the situation in TP. Maximum number of trains that could be in standby mode is two, so if the other train is being emptied, the other one will surely will be filled up.  So, if there is one train heading towards TP (from Platform A @ TM station), and somehow, there is another ‘empty’ train on standby mode, then you are on the right train (as in, you dont need to disembark the train and re-queueing the long queue). The trick is to spot for this ‘lucky’ train. What I usually did, is to observe the train arriving at Platform B. If there is a ‘ghost’ train (empty, yet doest not stop @ TM, purely to serve W.Maju station onwards) then you are advised to board the train arriving at Platform A. The chance that you have to disembark at TP is LOW, but don’t come back to me if it doesn’t work later. Haha. Well, at least you have some strategy, rather than pure gamble

My take on this? I love this train-guessing game… I surely do miss it especially since I’m no longer one of TM residents.

As of tonight, MSDN and TechNet Subscribers will have access to the Windows 7 Beta. Starting January 9th – everyone else will be able to go to the Windows 7 page on Windows.com and download the Windows 7 Beta. The Windows 7 Beta will be available in 32-bit and 64-bit flavors. The Windows 7 Beta will be download-only – we will not be sending physical media out.

On January 9th, the Windows 7 Beta will be available for Windows enthusiasts to download via the Windows 7 page on Windows.com. The Windows 7 Beta is going to be available download-only (we’re not sending out physical media) and available for a limited time to the first 2.5 million people who download the beta.

Quickly, I went to The Windows  Blogsite for further instructions on being part of the beta programme. Within minutes, the next thing I know; I was redirected to this page.

Yeahhh !! I am now, one of those 2.5 millions beta users of Windows 7. I will be writing review soon. So, do put your anticipation high

p/s: downloading now.. 2.44GB in size