Got a letter few days ago that my Singnet broadband speed has been upgraded to 3Mbps from 1.5Mbps without any additional charges, maintaining the usual subscription at about $58/mth. This came very much as a welcome in sharing the bandwidth among the few ummm, 7 computers at home. It’s not the first time I’ve got a free upgrade – I remembered they’ve previously bumped up my old 256kps to 512kps and then up to 1.5Mbps previously, presumably to remain competitive with Starhub (aka ol’ SCV) cable who also have their own fair dishing of free upgrades on their own.

Remembering the old days, come to think about it it’s already more than 10 years since I’ve been a subscriber with Singnet, in fact about 13 years already since the ol’ Singtel “Teleview” days with those noisy but “cutting edge” 14kbps modems (yea- cutting edge… I always go laughing when I read dated computer magazines I’ve stashed from the 90s). Those were the days. I guess one can never appreciate broadband if they weren’t a 56k’s subscriber before – which I unfortunately have to put up during my growing-up years. Still can’t believed that was enough for Counter-Strike and Starcraft multi-player games back then. And laughingly, the whole house would be quiet whenever anyone is up online as no one can ever call through!

Singtel Mio
I had been considering the Singtel Mio for few months now and almost committed to it as my Net contract had expired sometime ago (sparking lots of annoying marketing calls from SingNet as well). Seemingly the Mio, 3.5Mbps Broadband, Home line and Singtel mobile line all at a low rate at $68 basic++ is indeed a very tempting offer (as the acknowledged by the horde of crowds at singtel stores at it’s launch). Though my current Net and Mobile bills alone are averaging a slight $20 margin above the basic Mio $68/mth package, I am considering putting Mio off as my current gateway modem and set-up is the most reliable I have to date- no DCs or home network crashes, so why fix anything which ain’t broke? So as I’ve learnt, Mio too have it drawbacks:

• Gateway modem have to be ON 24/7 or no phone line
• Cannot use existing VOIP software (for free overseas calls) with Mio
• Mio Mobile can only be used on “approved phones”
• Modem not exceptionally reliable (feedback from friends & acquaintances)

Besides chalking up your electricity bill for the modem, do take note that you cannot make calls (especially emergency calls) in the even of a blackout or power trip. Though that’s not very common in Singapore, but something you have to be aware of in such an event. The most disappointing thing is the limited number of phones which can be used for Mio Mobile- I mean $15/mth for unlimited wi-fi calls is a sweet deal and technically any phone with built-in wi-fi CAN make VOIP calls through Mio Voice, so why limit it and maintaining the partnership monopoly of “approved phones” to few Nokia phones only?

Mio is good, but it seems that I might put it off till something better comes by.

One of my ram modules presumably went kaboom few days ago, as my “workstation” desktop system meter reads 510MB ram instead of 1024MB previously. so I am very much left with 50% of my available capacity with me now. As an analogy there are 2 ways to deal with a faulty car fan belt- you can choose to open the hood and fix the problem or you can simply just turn up the radio and continue driving. Seems that I am choosing the latter, until I can actually find time to troubleshoot.

With hardware prices coming down fast, finally I can look forward during the coming school vacation to get my quad-core system built and move away from the single-core and AGP era to something more respectable. Why quad-core? Well, everybody’s using dual cores now right?

New Items to purchase:

• CPU: Intel QX (6600/6700/6800) series Quad Core CPU
• Mobo: Asus Vista-Plus Mobo with Remote
• Ram: 2x1GB Kingston Hyper-X DDR800 Modules
• New HD: Hitachi E7k500 500GB harddisk
• Graphics: Geforce 8800GTS 320MB PCI-E
• OS: Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit OEM

Having used MSI, Gigabtye, Intel and Via motherboards before, this is my first with Asus, so hope they don’t let me down. Estimated price of all these components are $2000SGD currently, in time it will be within my budget not exceeding $1500, with the biggest chunk from the processor/mobo bundle taking up more than 50% of the total price (approx $1100SGD).

And no, Simlim square hardware prices are actually not affected by the “Great Singapore Sale”. Generally $1000-$1500 is my personal set limit on hardware, not that it’s “expensive” or stingy, but it’s just not worth to spend so much money on something which will be dirt cheap in a few months time, just like handphones, hardware prices will always drop- I’ve seen people spending $200+ on 2GB memory cards or equivalent one year back, and come crying back when it costs only $20 now. My point is that even if you have the cash to spare, it’s wiser to spend it on something else, given the opportunity cost.

Enough said, now here are the things I can savage from current system:

• Thermal Take SOHO casing
• 500GB and 2x250GB Hitachi harddisks
• Sony DVD-writer
• TDK CD writer
• WinTV Tuner/Radio
• Audigy soundcard
• 32-in-1 Media Card reader
• Antec Truepower 480W

Technically combined, the eventual system is a Quadcore system with 1.5TB Harddisk space with 2GB DDR800 ram. It seems that once you get a decently well built PC casing, you can stick with it as long as the ATX revisions are unchanged, so I generally advise anyone to get a good casing if you DIY and it can even last you a lifetime.

This system should be able to last me another 5-7 years till the next major upgrade, just like what I anticipated with my current system built in 2001, (with the exception of it already on it’s third motherboard!).

Ever always wanted to own a Tablet PC for ease of notes and penning down handwritten notes in lectures, but always don’t seem to be able to afford one? Well look no further, the word is out, Dell will be releasing their first Tablet PC late this year in their Latitude Laptop range.

Dell usually waits for a particular product to become mainstream and then they look to develop a product and own the market. Dell feels that since Vista will have the tablet features built right into the OS that the corporate world will embrace the tablet on a large scale. The reps at Dell said this will be especially true once service pack 1 is out for Vista. They plan on releasing their tablet to coincide with the release of service pack 1 for Vista. (The date is roughly Q3/Q4 2006 for Vista SP1 too)

I personally use a Fujitsu T4020 tablet which actually set me back a considerable sum of money few years back but it’s worth it I say – rocking big time in lectures and penning down quick notes with ease while the rest of your peers go frantically tippy-tappy – a highly recommended tool for students, not to mention the Wow factor it has when you swivel the screen for use flat on your seat.

With the exception of the HP Pavilion tx1000z being the most capable all round and value tablet presently for students, it seems that Dell will always rock their products in terms of price – the biggest deciding factor for us students. Only time will time now whether the relocation of the Dell PDA department to Tablet PCs will bring things up.