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Dell's MediaDirect disappoints

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on May 5, 2007

A while back, I raved about my Inspiron 640m.

Today, I have a MAJOR complaint about Inspiron’s MediaDirect.

MediaDirect is another Dell exclusive feature. It allows the user to play a VCD without booting from the OS (Operating System).

Two days ago, I booted into MediaDirect and started playing a VCD. Midway, it froze. So I force-shut-down. After that, MediaDirect will not boot at all.

I had a chat with Dell Support and they said the only option is to reinstall MediaDirect. That in itself is not too bad. The really bad news is that to reinstall MediaDirect, I have to reinstall the OS too.

That’s ridiculous.

I thought the whole point about MediaDirect is its non-dependence on the OS. Now when MediaDirect is broken, to fix it requires reinstallation of the OS ??!!

Not cool at all.

If that’s the only solution, Dell should drop their ‘Easy as Dell’ tagline .

I raised a ticket with them and will provide updates when they update me.

 

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Dell to offer linux notebooks/PCs

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on May 2, 2007

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Finally.

I have been looking for this for a long time. Before I bought my Inspiron, I was seriously considering buying a notebook that came preinstalled with Linux.

My main motivation was to get it cheaper. My Inspiron came with Microsoft Works, Microsoft Vista, some DVD burner software that I do not use at all. I inquired with Dell about getting a refund. They said these software were complimentatry ie no cost were attached to them. I seriously doubt this because I have read of cases of refund in Germany and UK. But I will one day sell this Inspiron and maybe the next chap will appreciate them.

Anyway, back to Linux, I was seriously considering a Linux notebook because I was hearing Ubuntu everywhere. The only option back then was IBM and it was not cheap (as I am cheap).

The other thing that held me back was that I currently use Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Money and X1 Desktop Search extensively and they run on Windows now.

Today I read that Dell is going to offer Ubuntu Linux.

I hope it comes with some migration tools – to help migrate my current Windows notebook to the new Linux notebook.

IBM sells MySQL database

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 27, 2007

 Innovative competition.

This is very very interesting. In normal competition, competitors bad-mouth each other (Oracle says SAP is losing market share….), competitors buy out competition (Oracle bought Siebel, Peoplesoft, Berkeley DB which is one of the MySql storage engine options) but here IBM says to MySql, “We’ll help sell MySql databases”.

What do I think of IBM ?

I think they demonstrate wisdom in competition – they recognise MySql’s strength (and thus threat) and instead of channelling resource to try to snuff them out, IBM sees an opportunity and partners them to help them sell.

Does it threaten IBM’s DB2 (IBM’s database)? I don’t think so. Big budget customers tend to go for costlier databases like DB2, Oracle, Microsoft Sql Server. Tech savvy or budget constrained customers go for open-source databases like MySql.

The partnership also gives IBM immense credibility.

Despite all the flak that SAP levels at Oracle, most people do not believe the stuff that SAP says about Oracle and vice versa. In the same manner, most people will also take SAP’s and Oracle’s claims with a pinch of salt. If you churn out marketing talk all the time, you can also be just ‘marketing’ your products.

When a big company like IBM acknowledges that a competiting product is good and announces a partnership, I tend to think that the guys have more integrity.

Innovative competition.

 

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Google releases recommendations based on web search history

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 24, 2007

 

 

 

 

Google released a StumbleUpon-like tool to its toolbar.

I briefly used StumbleUpon before this and it didn’t stick very much to me. A huge part of it is because the random websites were not interesting to me. They were just random. In a later version, they allowed user to specify categories that interest them to make the random websites more relevant. That was still configuration to do.

I like Google’s new service better. Zero-configuration. It serves up random websites based on the history of my web searches.

Some say this invades my privacy. This does not bother me. As the Cheers song goes,’.. sometimes you wanna go where everybody knows your name..’. Sometimes I want to go somewhere where everybody knows what I want.

Om Malik says Google got punked by eBay. I don’t understand this argument. Just as I do not understand how Yahoo won by buying del.icio.us. To-date, Yahoo still offers both its own bookmark service and the del.icio.us service. Just because del.ico.us is owned by Yahoo does not make it more Yahoo-ish or gives Yahoo some superior edge.

As a end-user, I like Google’s dice service better.

 

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Virginia Tech shooting

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 23, 2007

Another school shooting incident.

And as usual, the presses are covering the shooter from all angles possible – history, motive, last days, profile …

In the Virginia Tech shooting, the shooter also sent his last word and testament to a news company and the news company published, aired them.

Shooters shoot because they want the world to hear them. They shoot as shockingly as possible because the more it shocks, the more press they get.

As long as the media continue to give them airtime, more will continue this avenue to air their views.

The media has a great role to stop this. Stop airing the shooters’ story. Instead, write stories of the people who were brave during the shooting, the professor who tried to block the door to save his students. Write about the lives that the shooter took, the lives of families that he destroyed, the dreams they had.

When the press publishes stories of how the shooter was disturbed, how he procures his guns, the press is in a way, publishing a ‘how-to’ manual for school shooting.

Don’t tell the shooters’ story. He does not deserve to be heard or remembered. His deeds, last or early days are not of no public interest.

The heroes and heroines’ stories will do much more to inspire us and to make us better.

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Yahoo Mail – infinite storage, google's gmail infinity + 1

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 13, 2007

A few days ago, Yahoo announced that they will offer infinite storage for Yahoo Mail. A few days after that, Google announced their Infinity + 1 storage plan for Gmail, rolled out immediately.

Before Firefox, Internet Explorer was ‘tabless’, RSSless and clueless. Today, Internet Explorer has tabs, RSS reader and more clued in to what users want.

This is why competition is good and monopoly is bad.

With competition, the competitors keep improving their service/product to entice the market.

Here’s hoping we will see the same kind of competition in the desktop operating system.

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Dell Inspiron 640m, the best Inspiron thus far

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 12, 2007

I just upgraded from Dell Inspiron 600m to Inspiron 640m (Inspiron E1405). Before Inspiron 600m, I was using a Inspiron 4100.

I have used many Inspiron and Inspiron 640m is the best Inspiron thus far.

My first Inspiron, the 4100 was uncomfortable. It had very corners that ‘poked’ my palm when I rested my palm on the notebook.

My second Inspiron, the 600m was hot and creaky. The hard disk was right under the palm rest and when I did serious work, the palm rest heated up very fast. Its keyboard creaked and sank under typing in the center around the G, H keys and also around the ESC key.

When I decided to upgrade,  I was choosing between Inspiron 640m and Latitude D520. The Latitude was slimmer but it only offered max of 120G primary hard disk.

I chose the Inspiron 640m because  it offered a 160G primary hard disk and also a SD card reader built in.

When it arrived, I inspected all the previous fault areas. The corners were rounded, not sharp and the hard disk is under the keyboard, so the palm rest does not heat up. There were also a few bonuses that  I did not know when I chose this Inspiron. Its speaker is much better than the Inspiron 600m and it also came with a 1394 Firewire port. The DVD writer is an integral part of the notebook, not an accesory part that can be removed easily and stolen.

I am very happy with the Inspiron 640m.

It’s the best Inspiron by far.

 

Telekom Malaysia treats customers poorly

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 11, 2007

 

 

 

Telekom Malaysia (or TMNet) is launching its most generous promotion ever to woo new customers. In its super duper deal it doles out a lot of discounts and free stuff to new customers.

Leaving a lot of existing customers like me wondering, ‘What about me ?’. I have been a TMNet customer for more than a year. I subscribe to broadband and later also subscribed to BBPhone. What’s TMNet doing for its customers ?

Management experts are always saying, ‘It’s more expensive to woo new customers than to keep your existing customers happy’. TMNet is certainly keeping me happy with all these discounts to new customers but none for us.

The government just announced a couple of new players for WiMax services. These new WiMax service providers will hopefully be able to provide better broadband services that TMNet and Jaring. They are the current broadband service providers in Malaysia and both not very impressive in their customer satisfaction department.

This is no doubt TMNet trying to launch a preemptive strike to lock down customers for 2 years before the WiMax service providers come to market.

Well, TMNet, while you are busy trying to get new customers and ignoring those of us existing customers, when the WiMax providers, we  will certainly leave you even if they give similar or even slightly better value services than you.

You have been treating us poorly thus far because there is little competition for you.

With competition, you are treating us even worse.

Thank the Government for WiMax and for competition and for giving us a choice.

 

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Hello world!

Posted by Siew Kam Onn on April 10, 2007

Welcome to WordPress. This is your first post. Edit or delete it, then start blogging!

I started this at a very interesting time, when Tim O’Reilly and Jimmy Wales were proposing a code of conduct of bloggers and getting flamed for it.

I am not for or against the code of conduct because I have not read it and will not read it. I am just a beginner blogger and my sentiments or input will not affect the code of conduct.

But I sure would like to write something that generates so much interest (read traffic).

Well, maybe one day….

 Update in Aug-07.

I am setting a new direction/theme for this blog.

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