My iPhone 4 White Adventure

28 April 2011, Singapore - Last night (Wednesday), I saw from my twitter news feed that the iPad 2 is confirmed to commence on sale in Singapore on 29 April (Friday) - 1am online and 10am at the retail stores. What caught me by surprise was that the iPhone 4 White is going on sale today - 28 April (Thursday). This is the much-anticipated release and Singapore is one of the first countries that will get it.

Silly as it may sound, I waited past midnight and checked the Apple Online Store in hope that I will magically see the iPhone 4 White model available for online purchase. I slept at almost 1am, woke up this morning, and checked the online shop. Still nothing.

During lunchtime, I went to Parkway Parade, and following the list of authorised iPhone resellers on the Apple website, I asked them for iPhone - I didn't even mention the white version - but they said only telcos sell them. I wanted to get a contract-free unit because I would only save less than $200 if I were to keep my existing mobile plan and do an early recontract with 7 months remaining.

At about 2pm, the Apple Online Store went offline, signalling that a change is coming, obviously on the iPhone 4 White model. I waited in anticipation, but after 2 hours, the store was still out of service. With each passing moment, the chances of getting the online order before the long Labour Day weekend grew slimmer.

What happened next was privileged information, but in essence, I was offered an opportunity to purchase the iPhone 4 White from a specific authorised retail outlet, but at a small premium over the Apple Store. I grabbed the opportunity and by 5pm, I had the iPhone 4 White in my hands:

And was I glad I did, because when I checked the Apple Online Store which went back online, the iPhone 4 White is merely "coming soon".

Why was I so anxious to get the White unit? Because wifey has been waiting for it for the longest time. It was supposed to be her birthday present (last September), then Christmas, then Valentine's. So here, on the very first day of worldwide availability, I have it.

While my iPhone adventure comes to an end, the iPad 2 buyers' adventure have just begun - less than 3 hours to the online availability and less than 12 hours to store opening. Enjoy!

- 10.40pm (GMT +8)

iPad: 2nd Generation

Last year, I applied leave just to queue for the iPad. I was the last person in queue to secure the iPad 16GB Wifi at BEST Denki City Square outlet. iPad was out of stock island-wide by the end of the day, only to be restocked 2 weeks later.

This year, iPad 2 will be launched in Singapore on 29 April. This time round, you can order online from 1am, or purchase from the stores directly when they open for business.

I have little reason to replace my current iPad, as the 2nd generation offers little new features (faster processor, camera, thinner and lighter) and all of the same iOS limitations - limitations that would not affect the majority of the casual users. At only S$668 for the 16GB Wifi version, the iPad 2 will easily be the top selling tablet in Singapore, and I am happy to recommend it for entertainment use and to perform some specific tasks that iPad is known to be good at.

But if you plan to use iPad 2 as a powerful multi-tasking mobile computing tool, then think again. I would recommend you think Android.

My Blog, My Experiences

Oops! I have been blogging so much about Samsung products that someone working in a PR agency mistook me for being their brand ambassador!

Indeed, at this moment, I am surrounded with Samsung-branded gadgets. Quite often, friends who know of my interest in gadgets have asked me for recommendations on phones and cameras, and my current answer would be: the-above-brand. And I do not blindly recommend products just because I am offered incentives. Blogging about the review product is an obligation, but actually recommending the product to personal friends is a privilege.

Currently, I have been keeping tabs on the influx of new Android tablets releases, and very soon I will be getting my fingers on one particular model (it's not the-above-brand). And you shall soon learn about my experience on this tablet that the community has been raving about.

Note to advertisers: if you would like me to mention your products/brands liberally, then give me a chance to experience YOUR products!

Samsung Galaxy S: Some Simple Fixes for Minor Bugs

Do you face the following problems on your Samsung Galaxy S? If yes, then these are some simple fixes so that you do not have to waste time rebooting the phone:

#1
Problem: sometimes, the phone notification or ringtone is played through the ear speaker rather than through the back speakers.
Solution: make a call to anyone, e.g. voice mail. Select "Speaker" mode. Then hang up. Thereafter, audio will revert to the back speakers.

#2
Problem: sometimes, apps that require data connection cannot connect online, and therefore all live feeds stopped. This happened to me on Whatsapp.
Solution: turn on "Airplane" mode. Wait a while, then deactivate "Airplane" mode. Soon, apps will start to receive data feeds.

#3
Problem: When turning on Wifi, it hits error, or hangs. Pressing "Wifi" checkbox a few times might get it working, or it might return the same error again.
Solution: turn on "Airplane" mode. Wait a while, then deactivate "Airplane" mode. After a while, the "Wifi" option will be available for you to try turning on again. Note: sometimes I find this method does not work consistently. But I would try again after a while and it would work.

If you never face the above problems, good on you. If you do, this is how I get the phone running again without rebooting.

My phone firmware:
- Froyo (Android 2.2 I9000DXJPB)
- SpeedMod kernel K13E

For the record, as of 26 April 11.30pm, my phone has been running continuously without rebooting for more than 8 days 13 hours.

How Could We Live... Without Technology

Last Thursday evening, I was at Bugis Junction Swensen's having dinner with friends and was attempting to check-in to Foursquare, without success the entire evening. Today I read from CIO-Today website that Foursquare servers hosted at Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) was down during that period.

It's scary how online content consumers around the globe rely on a bunch of computing machines to live their lives. I can't imagine what I would do if Google servers crashed and every of my 14000 emails for the past 6 years unrecoverable.

For most people (except many of our parents), technology is becoming part of our every day lifestyle. We store all our contact information online, we keep track of our tasks on smartphones. If these equipment malfunction, if our data is lost, can our lives still go on? Would you still remember who your "friends" are if your Facebook account is deleted? Would you have other means to contact your friends or followers if Twitter is inaccessible?

What would we do if communication systems go down? No Internet, no mobile network?


Perhaps we should reduce our reliance on technology. And if we do, make sure there is a backup for important data.

So, what did I do since I couldn't access Foursquare? I put my phone aside and enjoyed my company of friends at Swensen's.

Samsung updates the NX-series Lenses Firmware for the first time

After more than a year of launching the NX-series, Samsung offers their first public firmware update via their Samsung website.

What was the enhancement?
1. Changed the manual focus ring focusing direction.
2. Reduced power consumption of the lenses.
3. Improved focus accuracy with "Fireworks" SCENE mode.

List of lenses that can be upgraded:
• 18-55 mm (NX10 kit lens)
• 18-55 mm_i-Function (NX11 kit lens)
• 20 mm
• 20-50 mm (NX100 kit lens)
• 30 mm
• 50-200 mm
• 50-200 mm_i-Function

Download firmware


After downloading and unzipping the files, you will find several folders named with the respective lenses. Within each folder, there is a file called "lens.bin". Copy the correct file corresponding to your lens type into the SD card, insert to your NX body, mount the corresponding lens to the NX body, then go to the "Firmware Update" menu item. If you own several lenses, then you have to update one at a time by copying the respective "lens.bin" file from the computer to the SD card, mounting the corresponding lenses to the NX body, and run the firmware update.

Samsung NX10 NX100 Important Firmware Update

Samsung NX10 and NX100 owners rejoice! The latest firmware update offers important functions that improves your experience with the cameras.

1. Adds Panorama function, selectable via SCENE mode. With this update, Panorama is no longer exclusive to NX11.

2. Movie recording AF mode is defaulted to Continuous AF (CAF). Another important update, now your movie recording will auto focus continuously. To toggle to Single AF mode during video recording, press the preview button.

3. Improved Movie recording algorithm so that AF is more accurate and faster under low contrast or low light conditions. I don't notice any observable difference, but I suppose under extraordinary circumstances, it would show improvements.

4. Added OIS menu so that new lenses without hardware OIS buttons can be used on these legacy NX cameras to select OIS.

5. Updated i-Function on-screen guide, similar to NX11.

NX5, the other NX-series model, is excluded from the above updates.

Firmware update link here:
http://www.samsung.com/sg/support/download/supportGlobalDownloadPrdDetail.do

This firmware update certainly extends the desirability of NX10 and NX100. Cheers to Samsung!

Air Video: Stream Any Video Format to Your iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch

There are a few iPhone or iPad applications that allow you to stream multimedia from your home networking PC to your iOS devices. In this post, I would like to share with you Air Video, one of the first few apps I got for my iPad.

It's really easy to use: just install the app on your iPad/iPhone, download a free Air Video Server to run on your desktop. specify all the folders that you want your Air Video to access from the server. On your iPad/iPhone, you will be able to see the folders and all the supported video files appearing.

Air Video supports all kinds of video formats, even full 1080p MKV. It will convert the video on the fly so that you can watch it on your iOS devices. Or you can choose to convert offline, and be notified when the conversion is done. The latter is required only if you find that the streaming cannot keep up with the real-time conversion, but you can improve the streaming by reducing the display resolution for the real-time conversion. The video quality might not look as good, but it sure beats being interrupted.

Air Video saves me trouble of converting and uploading iTunes-supported file format into iPad before I can enjoy the video. Air Video works best within your home networking, and can even work over mobile network, though performance is limited by bandwidth.

Try the free version and experience the convenience before you buy.

In summary, what I like:
- stream videos real-time, so I don't need to convert my video collection into iTunes-compatible format or upload to iPad just to watch it
- ability to adjust the conversion resolution to suit the bandwidth of the home network
- restarts the video from where I left off
 
For now, Android users are still looking out for the equivalent of Air Video.

Blogger New Dynamic Views - Preview Phase

Hey, have you heard? Google just enabled dynamic views on your Blogger blogs for "preview".There are 5 dynamic templates available:

- Sidebar: the default template when you add /view/ behind your blogspot URL. All your posts are displayed at the side bar, and you can easily load the post by clicking the title.

- Flipcard: your blogs are neatly displayed in thumbnails, and mousing over will reveal the title and the date of post.

- Mosaic: your blogs are randomly displayed in Moisaic style, and mousing over will expand the image and reveal the post title.

- Snapshot: your blog images are displayed in polaroid frames, and mousing over will expand the polaroid and reveal a 5-line preview related to the post.

- Timeslide: your blogs are displayed in chronological order spread over 3 columns. The first column contains on blog, the second column contains 3 blogs, and the last column contains the rest of the blogs within the specified timeline.

Which is my favourite view? It depends on what I am looking for when I am checking out the blog. Each template has its own advantages, but all of them have one fabulous consequence: rediscovering old blog posts has never been so fun. Using Timeslide, I get to scroll my past blogs based on time periods easily. Using Snapshot, I can easily view all the images I have posted on my blogs. Mosaic is a random and attractive way to showcase my blog articles, but I do not get to choose the size of each blog presence. Flipcard gives each blog equal importance as they are displayed in thumbnails. Sidebar is the cleanest as it lists all blogs on the sidebar.

According to Blogger Help, you need to do 3 things to enable this feature:

Your blog is public. Your readers don’t need to sign in to view your blog.

Your blog has feeds fully enabled. In the Settings | Site feed tab, you have enabled either Full or Jump Break for your Post Feed.

You have not disabled dynamic views. In the Setting | Formatting tab, the option for Enable Dynamic Views is set to Yes.

The last thing that you need to do is to wait. Dynamic views rely on feeds to generate the views, so if you have just recently enabled the site feeds, it would take some time for the feeds to be propagated.

For now, the views are not customisable - guess that's why they call it "preview".

2Player: Remote Home Networking Music Player and Controller for Android

It is always a pleasure to share some of the apps in the market that are so empowering to the consumer and yet simple to use.

I have 2Player installed in my Samsung Galaxy S for quite a while. It's the app I use when I want to listen my entire music collection stored in my desktop from my Android phone via WiFi Home Network.

2Player allows me to select the source device where you want to choose your music from, and to select the target device where you want to play out the music to. With that flexibility, I can select music from any supported device and playback the music from any other supported device!

Making 2Player work would be easy if DLNA or UPnP are already running in your devices. These services basically ensure your devices are already enabled for media sharing, and with that you should be able to select them from your 2Player source/target lists. Many of the high-end TV sets come with built-in DLNA feature. For the PC, if you run Windows 7 OS, just run Windows Media Player which already comes with the capability to support remote media streaming. Once started, all music files under "My Music" folder will be visible for your remote enjoyment. If you don't have Windows 7, you have to install third-party DLNA or UPnP software.

Select "Stream" and enable the streaming options

2Player supports widgets so you can see the current song title, pause the playback or go to the next track from your Android homescreen. 2Player app status is also visible from the notification screen but pressing it will only pause the playback and not open the app. Do expect the music playback to break up occasionally when your Android device is busy, though I hope they could optimise the data streaming, because no one likes their music to be interrupted.

2Player is currently free for download, but you can pay the small fee to remove the ads.

Accidental iTunes Purchase? Report a Problem!

I was trying out Angry Birds Rio on my Android (free download, yeah!) and was getting past level after level rather effortlessly (I hate it when I get stuck in one level and would give up on the game thereafter. So game developers, take note!). So the next day, I asked my wife excitedly if she would like to try the game. To keep the excitement going, I quickly went to my computer, opened iTunes, searched "Angry Birds Rio". I saw the price: US$0.99. OOH CHEAP! I clicked on the "Buy" button, downloaded the app in less than a minute. I plugged my iPad to the computer, synced the app, and started it.

And I saw this:

Oops! I bought the iPhone version by mistake!!!!

Well, what could I do, I thought, so I expanded the screen, passed to wifey, and let her play. It looked awfully pixelated, but well, it would do.

After I tweeted about the mistake, I received a tweet reply that I could actually ask for a refund. Hmm, why didn't I think of that? And the best part is that there is already an existing process in place to do that. Simply go to iTunes, access your purchase history (Store -> View My Account), retrieve the app in question in view. When you click "Report a Problem", you will see the phrase "Report a Problem" appearing in every line item you purchased. Click the specific app that you want to report the problem about, and iTunes will load a new screen to allow you to describe the problem nicely and submit for their consideration.

After I submitted the request, I got a courtesy email response within 24 hours, informing me that they were unable to process the refund until the purchase was processed, which took about 3 days and you would know it when you received the purchase receipt via email. So there is no rush to report the problem.

OK, I got the refund. One question: how would Apple stop me from using the app that is already in my iPad? I guess they never could, but they sure would easily detect abuses to the process, since all purchases and refunds are tracked - even "purchases" of free apps

Meanwhile, I am a very happy customer.