New Neighbours - Samuel and Joyce!

On the friday that had just passed, I've got new neighbours! They don't stay next nor opposite my house though, but the seats beside me in my office.

Samuel and Joyce - both graphics designer, had shifted from 3rd floor office to the 6th floor so that we could work together easier on certain projects.

My Powershot A95 - Damaged and Fixed

I've got back my camera! Got it back from my sister-in-law after her Taiwan trip. I'm not sure due to what reason, which I highly suspect it is the fault of the CF card, which it makes my A95 CF slot pins got slated. 2 pins are slightly slanted and 1 pin totally bended like a rainbow.

As a "born engineer", I've started to disassemble it as soon as I found the fault in the very Friday morning. And that make me late for work, it was not a good day for me, as I'm upset over the possibility of either changing a new camera or send it for repair, which both will cost pretty much.

Well, anyway, I try my luck and see if Canon will sell me the parts. I emailed them:

Type of Enquiry: Help
Specific Enquiry: Cameras
Product Model: A95
Enquiry:
My A95's CF card slot's pins are slanted, probably due to the CF card
insertion/rejection problem. Would like to know how much will it cost for a
repair to replace that part?

Alternatively, am I able to purchase the particular part (CY1-6357-000) so
that I can do the repair job myself as my camera is no longer under
warranty and I don't wish to spend much.

Thanks!

Apparently, I've manage to get a pdf copy of the service manual and thus the part no.

Canon is pretty prompt in response, I've got the email on the day itself in the evening, and it read:

Thank you for your enquiry.

Without having the opportunity to check the camera we are unable to
determine the cause of fault.

We advise you to send in the camera to our Customer Service Centre for
checking.

The service charge are $60.00 excluding gst & spare parts.There is no
assessment charge for checking and it will takes about 5 to 10 working days
depending on spare parts availability. There is an additional express
charge of $42.80 within 5 working hours and $26.75 within 3 working days.

PS: Based on the description given below, the estimate cost of repair is
$90.00 inclusive of gst and service charge. We do not sell spare parts and
please bring in the camera for servicing.

So, that's a whopping 90 bucks that I have to pay to have it repaired. Certainly, as it isn't a very big issue, I believe I could have fix it by bending the pins back. So, my repair work started that very night. And I carefully bend the pins back to the best near original style and test it with the CF card that I have.

As I'm very eager to get the camera disassembled in the early morning, I've not recorded down the positions of the screws that I've unscrewed from the camera. Apparently there are many different sizes of screws! That is one of the reason why I would want to quickly get it done that very night, while my memory about the screws are still fresh!

So, all together it took me about 2 hours to get it back in one piece and I've got it back working perfectly as before! Well, its image quality was not affected although Jacky told me that the electronics are very sensitive and once opened it is gone case.

A lesson learned is.... to use with extra care! and never force push in the CF card if you feel something is stucked, it gonna be something wrong, stop and check on it! I've also found that the design is really genius, all the parts in the camera are well designed to be in place and secure nicely by design.

And now, I'm back shotting!

Sunny day, laundry time.

It was a sunny saturday! The sun is superb bright and it brighten up our day! So we started our laundry activity.

My living room curtains, washed and sun dried all within the few hours around noon time. We've also got our blankets and pillows under the sun as well to have them screened under the ultra violet light that kills whatever that is harmful.

My Bike -- still alive after a year

That's the Martini bicycle that I've forgotten to bring it over when I shift my stuff to my new place. It had been abandoned there for a year now! (plus a few months!)

I'm glad that it is still alive. The picture is from Richard, who just shifted to nearby block. :-D... There's where he'll start his new phase of life staying in Singapore and taking 160 from custom straight back to Jurong East.


It seems like they've even repainted the wall and still my bicycle is nicely placed at the same position.

Annoying Facebook Applications - ignore all requests!

Yes, I've a facebook account. But... I'm not doing anything with it except that my friends have so and invited me. It is primarily used to network all my long never meet classmates and friends.

Well, although as a guy that write computer software, I admire and appreciate the facebook platform that allows developers to create many wonderful "applications", I'm really get fed up with all the invitations. Every now and then, there is an email coming into my mailbox, which reminded me that I still have a facebook account and there is an invitation!

The problem is not me being "anti-social" in the cyber world, but it was those annoying facebook applications that do not much thing and keep spreading in the wild. The fact that you couldn't view about what application is that without accepting the invitation and allow the application to access your profile is a real big pivacy worm in the wild!

Picture says a thousand words, with 3 clicks on my mouse button, I've ignored 182 application requests/invitations.

The "aftermath" of petrol price hike

These are some photos contributed by my colleague, Richard! Long queues at every single petrol kiosk. He queued for one hour to get his turn to pump.













What to expect next? with electricity prices and food prices on the rise, life is not going to be easy.

Malaysia Petrol Hike - Time to ride a bicycle

It finally came true. The Malaysia government had been subsiding all the petrol in the country by about 50%. While it was still "affordable" for the government to do so in the past decade, it is no longer feasible.

Today's breaking news in Malaysia was all about the petrol prices. As our Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi declared, pump prices of petrol will rise by about 41% (RM0.833) from RM1.92 to RM2.7 per liter and diesel will rise by about 67% (RM1.00) from RM1.50 to RM2.58.

Follow on the announcement, the locals responded with long queue at all petrol stations nation wide. This wasn't surprise, it did happened during the last revision at the beginning of the year.

2 months ago, similar queues were seen in Japan as well, but that was due to the tax bill being expired and it could get in time to reinstate. Japanese rush to the petrol kiosks to pump petrol at the before tax prices.

As of now, it seems that the petrol prices will continue to rise to the market price and fluctuate by August, that will mark the end of cheap petrol in Malaysia.

The government however, is giving out rebate for car owners when they renew their road tax. An annual cash rebate of RM625 for owners of cars with engine capacity of up to 2,000 cc and pick up trucks and jeeps of up to 2500 cc. Owners of private motorcycles of engine capacity of up to 250 cc will be paid a cash rebate of RM150 per year, according to the minister's announcement.
(And I think my dad's over 2,000 cc cars will only be entitled to a RM200 rebate annually)

I was joking to John though, that his parent's shop business will boom! Because his parent operate a motorcycle and bicycle shop. I do believe so, it is a good time for everyone to own a bicycle and cycle in replacement of petrol-fueled car.

Well, my dad manage to fill all his cars' tanks except on that had run out of battery.

How about you?
How long did you queued and how much you've saved as compare to the price after the hike?

It would be interesting to see if you post your comments on, as so far I've heard of some giving up the long queue, some complaint about the government and some isn't much affected by it.

StreetDirectory.com's Annoying SPAM

StreetDirectory.com starts to send out these spammy messages some long time back. The very first time when it was sent out, it was with all broken links and broken layout. And well, although this time it was a quite ok layout and simple, it went straight to my SPAM box in gmail.

Every email that they sent out, seems to have the same type of links, promoting the FlowerAdvisor, wines, champagne or last time was some french restaurant. And worst of all, it was sent via Gmail, I don't care if it is from gmail server or not, but the from field is Gmail. What a terrible marketing.

Maybe I should simply unsubscribe from the list...

Just ask "Dr Google"

This caught my attention while reading thru the email from Synovate In:fact newsletter.

Just ask 'Dr Google'

So if doctors are losing ground, just who (or what) is filling the healthcare information gap?

At least one quarter of our respondents relied on primary sources of advice other than doctors. To compound this, about half agreed that they would only take the medication prescribed by their doctor if their other research backed it up! Most passionate about this were the Malaysians at 82%.

And true enough, although I'm not among those about who took part in the survey, I exercise that behaviour. Certainly, doctors are not super beings that knows 100% of your condition and infact you know the best of yourself. But provided you have the relevant and applicable knowledge to make decision on yourself, you better follow the doctors.

Another possibility that the survey result didn't study on is, the integrity of doctors. Many Malaysians may have lost their respect for doctors as the news reports many incidents of doctors incompetency as well as faud cases.

You can read the full article at Synovate In:fact May 2008.