We wish all our readers a Happy and Prosperous Diwali.

Image Credit

Below are some of the photos that I took, the complete set can be found in my Flickr Set.

Let us know your Diwali experience.

All of you might have wondered that what might have happened to me for the last 3 months as there was not a single post from me? Before telling that I would first apologize to you guys for not posting and for not reading your blogs. (I won’t write any big story for not blogging )

The past three months were very busy for me so I could not post anything here. Actually I am based out from Chennai, India but now I am in Mumbai, India and for the past one month I did not have access to my computer as I had little problems in settling down here. Now that I have all the facilities to be online, now you can expect posts from me. Even though now also I am bit busy, but I have made my mind to put a minimum of three posts per week which you can expect to be posted in weekends.

Thanks to John and Ashish for helping me out in upgrading my wordpress to the latest 2.1.3.

Update: Now my mom is doing fine. Thanks for all your well wishes which has made her recover.

My mom is suffering acute malaria for the past 3 weeks and she was hospitalized for more than 11 days. She was discharged today from the hospital and now she is doing fine and the doctor said that the complete recovery would require some more time. I could not blog all these days as I was busy nursing her, now that she has returned home I may find some time to blog.

I request all of you to wish good luck for my mom to recover from malaria.
Stay tuned to my blog as more interesting stuff going to be put here soon.

At last I have got myself a Intel Core 2 Duo based laptop, I had ordered Dell Inspiron 6400 on 29.09.06 and it arrived on 14.10.06. I actually had two laptops in mind and it was pretty difficult for me to decide between these two; one was Dell XPS 1210 with 12.1″ widescreen and Dell Inspiron 6400 with 15.4″ widescreen. The confusion in my mind was cleared by Arun and Techz and I thank these guys for giving me their valuable suggestions. Dell XPS 1210 is a good laptop except for the screen size of 12.1″ which is a bit too small where as Dell Inspiron 6400 is real good laptop as it has everything one would require at present.

So here is the Configuration of my New Laptop:

• Intel Core 2 Duo Processor T7200 (Merom Core) @ 2GHz, 4MB L2 Cache, 667 MHz FSB
• Intel 945 Chipset Family Motherboard
• 1GB (2 X 512MB) DDR2 SDRAM @ 533MHz in dual channel mode.
• 256MB ATI Mobility Radeon X1400 Hypermemory Graphics Card
• 15.4″ Wide Screen XGA TFT Display with Truelife: 1280×800
• 120GB SATA Hard Drive at 5400 rpm featuring 8MB of cache
• Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Combination Drive with dual layer write capabilities
• Integrated 10/100 Fast Ethernet
• Integrated Sigmatel HD Stereo Sound
• Internal Dell 87 Keys Keyboard (English)
• Internal 56K Modem
• Dell Wireless 355 Bluetooth Module
• Intel PRO/Wireless 3945 Dual Band 802.11a/g 54Mbps Wireless Mini Card
• 1 ExpressCard Slot
• 9-cell 85Whr Lithium Ion Primary Battery
• 90W Primary AC Adapter (110V/220V)
• A/V Cable Kit
• DELL Large Nylon Case
• Microsoft basic optical mouse

[eminimall products="dell, laptop"]

Right now I am benchmarking and reviewing the laptop so by this weekend or by early next week you can expect the complete review of this laptop along with photographs and I hope my laptop doesn’t explode when I am using it.
Click on the image to enlarge

My trusty Lite-ON SOHW-1633S DVD burner has retired (it died) from my killer rig. Now I am left with only ASUS DRW-1608P2S running at Pioneer DVR-110, so I need to get myself a another DVD burner. I have two drives in my mind they are Benq DW-1650 or Lite-ON drive models that came after SOHW-1693S.

My friend QwertyManiac recently got Benq DW-1650 and he swears by its performance, but getting a Benq DW-1650 in chennai is very difficult because if you go and ask the dealer all you get to hear is, “Go and get yourself another brand as we don’t have the stocks of this drive”. Now it looks like I may end up getting a Lite-ON drive if I am not able to get the Benq drive. If you have any suggestions please do let me know.

I have replaced my old trusty Samsung keyboard with iBall Power Key Designer Keyboard. This keyboard is real good as the keys are very soft and now typing feels lot more easier than before. I will be putting a review of this keyboard in few days so keep your fingers crossed for the verdict.
Have a look at my Keyboard:
(click on the image to enlarge)

After Dad’s Nokia 2300 got retired it was time to buy a good phone; so I suggested him to get a smartphone instead of plain vanilla phone and moreover we had to get a 1GB memory card for our digital camera. Doing shopping in Chennai’s gadget market is the best thing I love to do.
So we went to Chennai’s gadget market and got these things:

1. Nokia 6680 Smartphone
2. 1GB Dual Voltage (DV) RS-MMC Flash Memory for Nokia 6680 as 128MB standard card is insufficient for today’s multimedia requirement.
3. Nokia BH-200 Bluetooth Headset for Nokia 6680
4. 1GB Sony Memory Stick Pro for our Sony Cybershot DSC-F88 digital camera.

So what can you expect now?
I will be reviewing Nokia BH-200 bluetooth headset and benchmarking the 2 memory cards. I will not be reviewing the Nokia 6680 as there are ‘n’ number of reviews available already.
Click on the images to enlarge

Gadgets that we got yesterday

The new Nokia 6680 along with its companions.

Guys as you know recently I got myself a new computer, along with that I got myself a 250GB SATA ll drive. But due to some strange reasons (which god alone knows) it developed bad sectors. So I took it to Seagate service centre in Chennai. There I deposited my drive and got it after a week, but to my surprise they handed me a 300GB SATA ll drive. When asked why I was given 300GB instead of 250GB, I was told that there was no 250GB replacement hard disk so they gave me 300GB. For the past one week I was benchmarking and doing tests to make sure that there is no problem in this drive. I feel that lady luck is partly smiling at me.

Since I have gained 50GB of more disk space here is my total storage capacity:

Seagate 300 GB SATA-II 7200 rpm with 16 MB cache Hard disk drive
Seagate 200 GB PATA 7200 rpm with 8 MB cache Hard disk drive (Working as External HDD)
Seagate 160 GB SATA 7200 rpm with 8 MB cache Hard Disk Drive

Total Capacity: 660GB

This is how my 300GB Seagate ST3300622AS SATA II drive looks like:

Click on the image to enlarge

Let me introduce TechnoBytez forum to you, TechnoBytez Forum provides Bloggers a place to meet other Bloggers, review each other’s blogs and to discuss about Blogging, Making Money Online, Technology, Web Design and anything they wished to talk about.

I was actively participating in setting it up for a past few weeks and now we have setup the forum completely. For the past few weeks it was only open on invitation basis and now it is open to all.

We are in need of contributors for the forum and moderators are required to maintain. So people head right now to TechnoBytez Forum.

Hope to see all you guys and gals contributing in Technobytez.

I have upgraded my internet connection from Airtel 128Kbps unlimited plan to 256Kbps unlimited plan. I started using Airtel connection from april 06 and found it very reliable when compared to the crappy Tataindicom Broadband connection. I used this crap Tata Indicom connection for over an year, out of 30 days in a month the connection would be down for 10 days on various accounts justified by TataIndicom. Well now I am a happy man because according to Indian government’s specification I have a broadband connection.

Given below is the Indian government’s definition of a broadband connection:

“An ‘always-on’ data connection that is able to support interactive services including Internet access and has the capability of the minimum download speed of 256 kilo bits per second (kbps) to an individual subscriber from the Point Of Presence (POP) of the service provider intending to provide Broadband service where multiple such individual Broadband connections are aggregated and the subscriber is able to access these interactive services including the Internet through this POP. The interactive services will exclude any services for which a separate licence is specifically required, for example, real-time voice transmission, except to the extent that it is presently permitted under ISP licence with Internet Telephony.”

Well I benchmarked my connection and here is the result,

Well what internet connection do you have and what is the speed of your internet connection?

Hi People….

As you know that my mainboard went down last week so instead of replacing the motherboard I upgraded my PC to a dual core one. I am truly amazed now at my system performance, as it has improved tremendously. Now I shall resume my binary life as usual.

Here is my new killer rig:

Intel Dual Core Pentium D 930 @ 3.0Ghz 2x2MB L2 Cache @ 800 Mhz FSB
Gigabyte 945G chipset based, GA-8I945GME MainBoard

Transcend 2×1 GB DDR2 RAM (Effective 2 GB) @ 533 Mhz in Dual Channel Mode

Seagate 250 GB SATA-II 7200 rpm with 16 MB cache Hard disk drive
Seagate 200 GB PATA 7200 rpm with 8 MB cache Hard disk drive (Working as External HDD)
Seagate 160 GB SATA 7200 rpm with 8 MB cache Hard Disk Drive

Asus DRW-1602P2S @ Pioneer DVR-110 DVD Burner

Lite-On SOHW-1633S DVD Burner

Samsung Sync Master 793MB 17″ True Flat Monitor

Sony Floppy Drive

Samsung Multimedia Keyboard (same as Qwerty’s Keyboard )

Samsung Optical Mouse

Creative 2.1 Speakers

10m Bluetooth Dongle

4m Infrared Dongle

Powered by Two 600VA UPS

Connected to the world wide web via Airtel 128kbps unlimited connection

This what CPU-Z reports:

I conducted benchmarks on my pc using Everest Ultimate Edition 2006. The report can be viewed here. (Please Note: Open this link in IE).

Please give your feedback.

I won’t be able to update my blog for a couple of days as my computer’s motherboard is dead. I am in process of repairing it and it may take a few days for me to repair it.

So my binary life right now has come to halt. I hope my computer should be fine in a few days.
All you guys and gals please bear with me for a few days.

Yesterday I got another 512 MB DDR 400 RAM module for my killer rig. Now my ram capacity is 1 GB i.e 1 gigabytes of memory for RAM alone . I used to work with 32 mb when I first got my pc way back in 1999. Now see my killer rig’s updated spec:

My Killer Rig:

Intel Pentium 4 2.40 GHz (Northwood Core) OverClocked to 2.8GHz, On Asrock P4i65GV Mobo, 2×512 MB (1GB)Transcend DDR 400 Mhz, 160 GB Seagate SATA HDD, 120 GB Samsung PATA HDD, GeForce FX5500 256MB GFX Card, LG GCE-8525B 52x32x52x CD Burner, Lite-On SOHW-1633S 16x48x32x48x16x DVD Burner, Creative 2.1 Inspire Series, 17″ Samsung Syncmaster 793MB True Flat, Powered By 2 Microtek 600 VA UPS, 1 GB Portable Flash Drive, 10m Range Bluetooth Dongle, 4m Range Infrared Dongle, 25 in 1 memory Card Reader, Image Capturing: Sony Cybershot 5.1 megapixel DSC-F88, HCL Web Cam, Cooled By 9 fans, Running Windows XP SP2 and Windows 2003 Server (Enterprise Edition)

I just wanted to tell the world about the song which powers me. The song is none other than “Losing My Religion” by REM. I do not know how many of you would have listened to this song. It is one of the greatest hits given by REM. It is my favorite right from when I was 15 years. The song is very inspiring, whenever I get upset or depressed I listen to this song. Want to know more about this band see here.
Lyrics:
Life is bigger
It’s bigger than you
And you are not me
The lengths that I will go to
The distance in your eyes
Oh no I’ve said too much
I set it up

That’s me in the corner
That’s me in the spotlight
Losing my religion
Trying to keep up with you
And I don’t know if I can do it
Oh no I’ve said too much
I haven’t said enough
I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try

Every whisper
Of every waking hour I’m
Choosing my confessions
Trying to keep an eye on you
Like a hurt lost and blinded fool
Oh no I’ve said too much
I set it up

Consider this
The hint of the century
Consider this
The slip that brought me
To my knees failed
What if all these fantasies
Come flailing around
Now I’ve said too much
I thought that I heard you laughing
I thought that I heard you sing
I think I thought I saw you try

But that was just a dream
That was just a dream

If possible check out this song its simply great.