Last Updated: 13-02-2013 - Patch version 6.1



Just last week when Maxis announced that they would be releasing the new iPhone 5 (new by so-called Malaysian standards), I was ecstatic and I quickly signed up my interest on their website. What I didn't expect that the sign-up rate was so great (30,000 sign ups) that Maxis closed it down the following day.

When I was confirmed that I would be eligible to get the iPhone 5, I was quite happy to state that I would line up for the first time in my life to get the iPhone 5 on the launch night. This meant that I would need to start queuing up at night and await for the official launch at 12 midnight 15th December. I guess another excuse I wanted was to get interviewed by my friend Melissa who was a TV presenter at NTV7. Talk about ulterior motives.

The night arrived and I was extremely excited. I was definitely lacking sleep as I had to wake up early for an 8am teleconference call, run around KL for meetings and then finally back to PJ to collect my car from the service center. After taking a short nap from 8pm-9pm, I headed to CAPSQUARE and started queuing at 10pm. That was a bad idea because I was already greeted by hundreds of other people.



It was a good thing that Maxis gave out free donuts and apples as well as hot milo, white coffee and water to the folks queuing up. After queueing for about 2 hours, I managed to get my few seconds of fame on NTV7. After watching it, I think I sounded like a crazed geek (prior to my interview, they also interviewed the guy who was first in queue who had started lining up since 10am that day and it was also his birthday).



So to cut the long story short, it took me over 4 hours to queue up and get my phone and finally back at home into bed.

Now after having lived with the iPhone 5 for the past couple of days, here are some of the things I loved about it as well as the things that I hate about it.

Love:

• It's beautiful form factor


• How light the phone is (comparing with my current iPhone 4)


• How fast it is and how apps respond  so quickly


• The extra space on the screen (being able to see more icons on the 1st screen)

Hate:

• Battery life. In short, it sucks! Sucks battery juice that is. I have to charge it at least up to twice a day. Lots of complaints about it here at the Apple forums (here, here, here and here). With the iOS 6.1 update as well as trying out several tips such as deleting general settings and network settings, the battery life has improved but I still have to charge my iPhone twice a day (pre 6.1 I used to charge around 1pm and post 6.1, I usually charge around 4pm).


• Maps, still always an issue and I know Apple is in the midst of getting it fixed. Until they do, it still sucks.


• Having to use the new lightning connector (the cable is RM69 whilst the adapter is >RM100). Now I have two set of cables lying around and to carry around, one for my iPad and one for the iPhone.

There were some issues regarding the phone as well but it seemed more from a carrier perspective. Here are some of the issues that has been reported.

• Able to make calls but not able to receive them (Maxis issue which has now been resolved)


• Showing wrong data usage and data available for each user (affecting iValue 2 users)


• Losing 3G, Edge and GPRS signal and not recovering back from it again. Post iOS 6.1 patch, this issue seemed to have started up again. Several folks mentioned it was a Maxis problem but it does occur for other networks as well. A tip which I followed was to reset my iPhone's Network Settings and it did manage to resolve it. 

I will definitely update this post as I go along. At the time of writing, these love hate relationship points were based on the iPhone 5 running on iOS 6.0.1. There is a new patch that was just released but I haven't tried it out yet.

If you know of any other issues, do post it here in the comments section and I shall add it up.

Updates - 13-02-2013 (iOS 6.1)

• Battery life has improved a little bit (lasts around 2-3 hours longer)


• Dropping of 3G signal seem to have reappeared but now it doesn't happen anymore. Some people have reported that Maxis was upgrading their network hence the cause of it but I followed a tip which was to reset the phone's network settings and it did seem to work.

Updates - 21-12-2012 (iOS 6.0.2)

• Cases have been reported that the new patch does indeed drain the iPhone 5's battery life. Read in a couple of forums including the Apple Support forums and found that one of the solutions is to reset your phone settings, Settings>General>Reset> Reset All Settings


• This does not wipe out your media and data 


• Currently testing this method now and so far, after almost 2 hours, I have only used 6% of battery. This is with service locations on for certain apps, mails set to fetch, wifi and bluetooth on.

 

Yes that's right! According to my colleagues and some of my friends, I have been deemed an Apple fanboy in their eyes. Little do they know that I just favour convenience over style (of course style matters a lot). Anyway, who says I am an Apple fan boy? I use an iPhone 4 on a daily basis, I have my iPad 3 with me which I absolutely adore because I watch movies on it when I travel, I connect to my PLEX server at home and I read all my Manga on it. I also have a 2008 Macbook Pro which is sort of dying and soon to become a permanent home server for me and a couple of iPods which I won last time. Who says I am an Apple fan boy?

So when I managed to convince my friend (he was currently using the Note 1) to get the new Samsung Note 2 after catching Tiger Woods at the CIMB Classics last weekend (Maxis had a booth offering the Note 2 for RM999 for Maxis One Club members), I only managed to get my hands dirty with it a couple of days ago (sorry mate, my hands wasn't exactly dirty and I know you put your phone next to your face). And boy, was I completely blown away. Mostly with the beautiful size of the screen, as much as a retina display supporter I am, the larger screen of the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 was just awesome.

Of course there were certain drawbacks. The phone was huge! Could barely fit into my tight work pants but definitely in my casual shorts. The phone was surprisingly light! But the OS interface seems a little messy and I feel that there are just way too many features which I think clutters up the whole screen. But that is just an initial feel, I felt the same way when I moved over to iOS.

I was quite convinced, the few apps which I use quite often are available there (mostly mainstream ones such as Facebook, WhatsApp, LINE, etc,etc,etc). Other than the cheaper price, I know the iPhone 5 would cost a lot more when it launches as well as not having a larger screen (compared to the Note 2), the pull of the dark side was really really strong! But seriously guys, why do you call yourselves the dark side anyway? Apple seems like the empire to me right now and since Disney bought over the Star Wars franchise, I can just imagine Storm troopers breaking out in song just before firing upon the rebels.

Anyway, back to my current itch. It was the 31st of October, the very last day of the offer by Maxis, I was still contemplating whether or not should I go for the Note 2. I am currently not bound on any Maxis contract and the last phone I purchased from Maxis was the iPhone 3Gs. Whilst sitting at my desk in my office located at KLCC, the Maxis store beneath Menara Maxis was but a 5 minute walk and I was comparing the current plans that I had versus the new 2 year plan I would need to sign up.

About 80% convinced, I shared this with some of my colleagues who kept on pushing me to go for it (especially those who are currently using the Android platform). Of course those who were true to Apple would still tell me to wait for the iPhone 5 which hasn't had had any indication on when it will be released in Malaysia.

Fortunately or unfortunately, it is currently my project's cutover period. Cutover is a word used to articulate how busy an IT person might be and is constantly one of the key and most stressful times of an IT project. Hopefully that gives an idea of how hectic it has been here at work where I was running from multiple meetings and discussions until I noticed my watch and it was already 9.00pm and I have missed out on the offer.

Oh well, I think my iPhone 4 (which I am officially borrowing from my mum) still rocks. Somewhat.

I feel like I am opening up a large can of worms here.

I was moving back and forth between Quill BMW located at Section 14 lately as I was installing my powerkit and had to send the car in for it's 30,000km service. It was during this period where I had a courtesy car to use over the week, which was the face-lifted BMW X3. During this week of travelling between home and KL as well as occasional trips to Bangi to visit certain clients and a wedding to attend at Cheras, I had my first taste of BMW's new 2.0 litre power plant with it's twin scroll turbo technology.

As I returned the X3, I spied the recently launched BMW F30 320i. Being the curious person I was, I wanted to try it out and have a go at it. Immediately after getting into the car, the few differences between the E90 and F30 can easily be noticed.

1. Key-less stop start system - This was one of the things which irritated me whilst I was driving the X3 as the engine would stop running every time I was at the traffic lights or stuck in traffic.


2. New steering wheel design - BMW has moved the cruise control functionality to the steering wheel rather than having an additional stalk compared to the E90.


3. No paddle shifters - Like the F30 320d, the F30 320i doesn't come with paddle shifters


4. 6.5" screen with no satellite navigation and DVD playback


5. 8-speed automatic transmission

Transmission
Personally I really do like the newer 8-speed automatic transmission, it feels a lot smoother versus the older 6-speed variant. It took me a lot of adjusting when I moved from a double clutch gearbox where shifts were extremely seamless and smooth to a 6-speed automatic. All I can say that the newer 8-speed feels very closely to the double clutch gearbox.

Power Plant
The BMW TwinPower Turbo four-cylinder petrol engine which combines twin-scroll turbocharger with Valvetronic, Double VANOS and High Precision Injection really does live up to all it's marketing hype. Those familiar with BMW's engines from the MINI series will be familiar with their latest engine in the F30 320i. Power delivery was fast thanks to the turbo and 270Nm of torque. I was very impressed with it's acceleration and couple that together with quick gear shifts, the F30 320i really did impress me. Definitely we will see people getting the 320i and then having a simple remap on the ECU should unleash even more horses from the car.



The car comes with the sports mode functionality whereby your throttle response is improved, your gear shifts are aggressive and your steering, a little heavier. In technical terms it means a gentle tap to the accelerator can be easily felt, you swap gears at higher RPM's and you get less help from the power steering making the wheel (steering) heavier.

Handling
The steering is definitely lighter than my car, the feel of it is nice and smooth and once you go into sports mode the steering gets heavier which is a feature I do like. But what you do lack in terms of steering is the feedback from the front tyres. You don't get to feel the groove the of the roads. This is a preference for different people, especially people who just want a car that is nice and comfortable, the steering on the F30 320i doesn't disappoint. But for those hardcore fanatics then they will be wondering what is it that is missing. It's like when Porsche recently included in an electric steering rack to their 911 which a lot of critics said that the car has lost it's soul. In this case, it really doesn't matter because the 320i is meant to be a comfort saloon car and not one would expect to turn it into a performance monster.

The suspension was soft on the model I have driven but that's because it wasn't the M-Sport model. So far, no tentative dates yet are available on when the F30 M-Sport models would be hitting our shores.

Priced at RM238,800 (recommended OTR), I would say it's main rivals would be the Audi A4 as well as the Volkswagen CC. Both the VAG cars have a 1.8 litre power plant but the A4 and the 320i are closely matched in terms of power although the A4 has a bit more torque (320Nm vs 270Nm) compared to the 320i but loses out in horsepower (170hp vs 184).

With the recent launch of the new iPhone 5, here's a look of what isn't available with iOS 6 here in Malaysia.

We DO NOT have:

1. Maps: Turn by Turn Navigation


2. Maps: 3D Buildings


3. Maps: Traffic (I rely on Google Maps' traffic updates a lot)


4. Maps: Business Reviews and Photos


5. Siri: Sports


6. Siri: Twitter Integration


7. Siri: Facebook Integration


8. Siri: Restaurant Information


9. Siri: Restaurant review


10. Siri: Restaurant reservations


11. Siri: Movie Information


12. Siri: Movie Reviews


13. iTunes Store: TV Shows


14. Dictations

From the looks of things, its no wonder that the Android OS is proliferating around Malaysian smartphone users.

 

Just the other day, on a fine early morning, me and my mates decided to have a very long overdue run up through the Ulu Yam route and man, was it completely different from my previous experiences. It has taken this long because time and time again I was pretty unlucky to have clashing schedules when my other group goes up Ulu Yam. So this time I joined some of my old VW "kakis" up the slippery slope of the mountain and drove up to Goh Tong for some curry "wan ton" noodles.

Why was it different compared to my other previous drives? First of all, its my first time driving up that route using a RWD (rear wheel drive) car. With the number of extreme bends we had to take, my first mistake was that I constantly anticipated for the car to understeer but I kept making that mistake. Another mistake I mad was that because of the new feel, I was braking like mad before every corner. Even my boss was mentioning that to me (yes my boss was following closely behind me).

Another thing I noticed was the hydraulic steering rack which BMW uses, makes it heavier compared to my previous ride which uses an electric steering rack. Good thing about it is that I get a lot more feedback from the tyres to the steering whilst the downside to it is that the steering feels a little bit heavier. That feeling seems a little bit more surreal in a sense that I was so used to the electric steering rack on a VW (ZF claims that they haven't sold a single electric steering rack because it doesn't break down).

Handling aside, the benefit of having a diesel engine whilst going uphill is that it is extremely fun! *cue to google up torque*.  The torque delivery at such low RPM is just awesome especially when you exit a corner which then leads uphill. The pure acceleration and thrill of it is something that an NA engine can't really deliver. And the best part of it is that I can average 800km on a full tank of diesel even whilst stuck in KL city traffic for about 2 hours on a daily basis.

After having a hearty breakfast, I then went up to the cable car station to have a quick photoshoot. Here are some of the photos I captured while I was up there.

Over the weekend I had the pleasure of celebrating an old friend's birthday at G3 Kitchen and Bar at Jalan Telawi 3 in Bangsar. Prior to this occasion, I never heard of the place and the only reason I might only venture towards Bangsar is to try out the banana leaf rice there.

When I entered the restaurant, I thought it did seem a bit casual as it was an open concept style and we were surrounded by bits and pieces of grocery items such as sauces, eggs and other food stuff. Anyhow since there were a fair bit of us in the group, we decided on sharing some of the food we ordered. I decided on trying out two pizza's there, a fishy variant (3 different types of fish with honey mustard toppings) and a spicy lamb and eggplant pizza.

The result was absolutely stunning! So stunning that I totally forgot to take pictures of the pizza as I was just too busy gobbling it all down. I even had a chance to taste a friend's Chicken Tikka Masala, the chicken was extremely tender and juicy!

Personally, I have always loved Italianies' salmon pizzas but now I guess I have found a new place to eat pizza from now onwards. Generous portions and the price isn't too bad as well.

One thing I did regret was not sampling one of their many scrumptious looking desserts which are displayed right at the entrance. I can definitely blame that on my account that I am completely overweight and I do have to watch my diet. Well, perhaps when I have lost about 10-15kg and I will definitely return there to eat some dessert. And perhaps during my next visit, I will remember to take at least some photos.

Thought the image above does show a very funny side of things especially when it relates to the Apple Store employees. This is actually referring to the context of this piece by the NY Times in regards to how Apple employees at their stores are faring against their peer groups in other retailers. I do encourage you all to read that piece as it was very well written and investigated and does bring an interesting insight to the life of an Apple employee who works at the retail stores.

 

Just last week I decided to catch a movie downstairs at my place. It has always been ultra convenient having GSC cinemas located below where I live and I really do will miss that convenience the moment I move away.

Anyhow, I was stuck at work and busy working so when I made the decision to get tickets via my iPhone GSC app, I chose Prometheus.

A team of explorers discover a clue to the origins of mankind on Earth, leading them on a journey to the darkest corners of the universe. There, they must fight a terrifying battle to save the future of the human race.

After reading a summary of the movie as shown above, I thought it couldn't have been such a bad show since it was directed by Ridley Scott, the same guy who directed Gladiator and Alien.

The story starts at the point where humans have already gotten used to space travel and now they are travelling far into space. But just think Star Trek with Jean Luc Picard exploring the universe but without warp speed. So yeah, they travel extremely slowly and with the usual "logic", we have to put humans into a stasis sleep in order for them to survive the ultra long journey.



Why are humans travelling into space this time around? Apparently to find out the true origins of humanity. Well apparently we were created by Gods hence through some historical find, we were created by aliens. Hence the whole super ultra long space travel to the distant stars to find our creators.



The movie was indeed action packed and the details and the graphics of the show was top-notch. Definitely an interesting storyline, of course there are certain weird questions that arises as the story progresses. Believe you me, you might end up having more questions after the movie.

At the end of the day, it wasn't too scary of a movie especially since somehow somewhere I saw the tag "horror" on the show hence my initial guess. But aside from the dark view of things, it ain't too scary and it does entertain you. Well, it did for me.

Also, I loved the ending! Made some sense to me.

Overall, I give this show a good 8/10 rating!

 

It's funny that I wrote this post title since April the 8th and yet here it is still in my draft inbox of my blog. Anyhow, this is going to be a short and simple review of the E90 320d. The version I drove is the M-Sport kit with the full i-Drive system which is all in all a very good package. Especially now that the F30 has just been launched, you still might be able to get good bargains and fantastic discounts.

Coming from a guy who has driven a front wheel drive car all his life (well I had experience with a 4WD car when I was driving my Perodua Kembara previously), moving over to a rear wheel drive car was a new beginning for me. Personally, I can't really tell much of a difference, I did bring my car up Genting for a couple of runs but the main difference I can feel immediately was the steering. I tend to oversteer now a lot more compared to my Golf previously which tend to understeer at corners.

Handling wise I haven't had the chance to fully utilize BMW's so called perfect balance of a 50:50 weight distribution but being a fat 100kg guy, I think I totally screwed that up the moment I sat in the car. Right now the car is completely stock and even with the M-sport suspension, the car is comfortable indeed. That is mostly also due to the 17" rims it comes with and with rims that size, the tyres are on the tad comfortable side of things.

Now before anyone asks, for the 320d, the d stands for Diesel and yes, the diesel engine does make a bit of a noise hence I call the car a lorry or a taxi at times (well the older taxies which ran on diesel now that all the newer ones run on natural gas). But the moment you step inside the car and close the door, you can barely hear anything. Ride comfort is good and you just have to get used to the engine noise when you accelerate. Its not the usual engine sound you hear but rather, the sound of a diesel powerplant pushing you all the way

I used the term pushing is because this damn car gives you 380Nm of torque on paper. I brought it over to Sunway to have it dyno tested and the results was rather surprising! It resulted in 171whp and 370Nm of torque. All of that on the wheel! I definitely would encourage those of you who have the 320d to get the powerkit which then pushes the car to over 200hp and 420Nm of mouth watering torque. But thats just me, a performance junkie, well in some way. I just love the thrill of the acceleration but I usually chicken out at high speeds.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="616"] Source: PaulTan.org[/caption]

Interior wise everything is as standard as what BMW can give you, comfortable leather seats, electric seats, a nice M-sport steering wrapped in leather, i-Drive with Navigation and DVD playback. All in all a good package. I really did like the bluetooth integration with my phone as well as the DVD player made me go out to buy a bunch of DVD-R to burn some TV series and Top Gear on them.

In terms of running or servicing costs, because BMW's come with their BS+RI (BMW Service + Repair Inclusive)  which basically means that your service is free for the first 3 years or 100,000km, that means you don't have to pay for anything when you bring your car in for service. And I mean everything including engine oil, brake pads, etc.



Compared to the F30, it uses the same exact engine but the F30 has a new gearbox. The downside is that at this point in time the F30 320d has quite bad specs, no navigation and the screen is only 6.5". The F30 is indeed a little roomier especially for the rear passengers but for the front seats, the seats are not the sportier type and its aimed more towards comfort hence the feel of a larger cabin space.

In conclusion, the car is indeed crazy, crazy that you have so much torque and crazy that at a full tank of diesel (RM1.80 versus RM1.90 for Ron95 petrol), I can travel more than 700km. Heck, at a full 100% city driving, I manage to achieve 700km even through the notorious KLCC traffic jams on Tun Razak. So if you are keen on getting a BMW on the cheap, head over to your nearest dealer to find out some of the fantastic deals they have.

Real-time Fuel Stats

You can check out the current fuel consumption of the 320d in the link below.


 

In 2008, I purchased a MacBook Pro laptop to help me with my photography editing to replace to old PC which I had since I was in university which was dated back to 2004. The Macbook Pro has served me well and it still does till today. So well that I am writing this blog post using this Mac.

Why am I writing this on my Mac when I have a nice spanking PC that I bought last year to replace my old one to play games such as Starcraft 2 and Diablo 3 but up until 2 hours ago, it just died on me. It refuses to start up and boot up so I am really hoping that the hard disk is ok. Its so frustrating dealing with PC's, constantly have to figure out whats wrong with it, frequently crashes (mind you I am running on Windows 7 and I don't overclock the PC at all).

Anyhow I am just venting my frustrations online now because I can't play my usual dosage of Starcraft 2 and perhaps put in a couple of Warden/Butcher runs in Diablo 3 (I kinda suck at Diablo 3 and I am now stuck in Act 1 in Inferno). Hopefully when I bring my PC into C-Zone tomorrow at Digital Mall, I should be able to get it fixed fast enough so I can also head over to Sunway for a talk by ATP Motorsports.

While I am here sitting at home being frustrated, I just wonder, since the games I play are also available on the Mac, it would have been the wiser choice to just use a fully Mac environment at home. Host my Plex server on a Mac (which is a lot more stable than my PC) and combine all my gaming and photo editing on a single platform. I was thinking an iMac but personally, I feel that the iMac can't deliver the power I might want especially on a  nice and large 27" sized monitor. But hey, an iMac is pretty pricey and since I just bought my PC not too long ago, so I will have to make do with what I have left.

Ah, it reminds me of the days when I was overclocking my PC and letting the cool 5 degrees celcius air of Sheffield cool my PC down. Now it is just a real bother to take my PC out and try to figure out and trouble shoot the errors.

Maybe I am just getting too old for this shit and all I want is convenience.

Over the past couple of months I started on a new project which brought me to a location where access to certain social media sites are blocked as well as the need for me to have more of my data with me when I go for meetings. In my previous project I managed that by using my iPad 1 and logging on to the wifi network. Now I have no wifi network to connect to so I've gotten a data plan for my iPad. Maxis came into my mind first because there was a Maxis store located so nearby. After a couple of minutes of signup and inserting in the new sim card, I was good to go. It did take Maxis around 30minutes before the service is activated.

Now a lot of people asked me why not I just tether the data from my iPhone and I did try that out for a month and realized that it was extremely unreliable as well as it drained my battery way too fast hence I decided against that method. It is a heck of a lot more convenient and a lot faster to search for data on the fly instead of quickly turning on my personal hotspot, trying to detect the phone with the iPad, restarting the wifi and then cursing why personal hotspot is so unreliable.

A good feature which I also enjoyed on my new iPad is the ability to take pictures with it. Definitely so much easier to take photos with it and then straight upload it to Facebook. It's really handy being mobile and with the iPad I find that I don't need to bring my laptop around so often. Just two weeks ago when I was at training, I loaded up movies into my iPad and the hotel provided a facility where I could just plug in my iPad via a HDMI cable and I could stream movies from my iPad on the hotel room's 42-inch LCD TV. Another good feature is to be able to present presentation slides using my iPad. Now I just can't wait for Microsoft to launch their MS Office for the iPad later this year.

Since I have been using the iPad quite a fair bit now on a daily basis, I feel that I need a keyboard to complement it and to enhance my note taking skills. Saw a couple of them I liked online but it's not available here yet.

The one above is a sleek keyboard which also acts like a cover. It connects the same way the Apple smart covers do via the magnets.

The other case is a little bulkier but it doesn't use any batteries but it is solar powered. Both these keyboard cases are made by Logitech and are quite new in the market. Hence I guess the lack of it's availability in our local stores.

I really can't seem to make up my mind.

I was so looking forward to a near season of Top Gear but alas, there will be no more episodes of Top Gear this year (except for the Christmas special). There were rumours of it flying about but Jeremy Clarkson himself has confirmed that via his Twitter account.

[caption id="attachment_3390" align="alignnone" width="534" caption="Sunday night is full of fat people singing"][/caption]

Personally over the past 3 seasons I felt as if they are repeating their same stunts over and over again that it has become cliché. Although I loved the India special which of course drew a lot of flack, I would definitely support if they did a Malaysia version since they covered Vietnam and India already. I fear if they tried riding their bikes here in Malaysia, they might get knocked down instead.

So it looks like fans will have to wait till 2013 before the next season of Top Gear is released.

The title says it all, if someone were to ask me what have I been doing with my free time lately, my answer is being tied up with renovations. Went to HomeDec 2012 last weekend and also during lunch time as well to check out accessories and good deals on furniture.

Then over the past two weeks, I have visited various tile shops to choose tiles for the house as well. Choosing tiles hasn't been easy, there are so many varieties, colours to choose from, brands and designs. All of these choices to make and then trying to see if it fits into my budget. From floor tiles, wall tiles, table top tiles, decorative panels and even more, it was a fun process although at times I might have been a little edgy but I blame that to lack of sleep rather than the process of choosing tiles.

Some of the shops that I visited included the Niro showroom near 3-2 Square, the Guocera showroow (Wisma Kemajuan) opposite Niro near 3-2 Square, Buimaco at Taman Megah, Hoover at Section 17 located at the same row as Kanna Curry House, Super Ceramic at Jalan 222, and Sing Mee at Jalan Penchala off Jalan Tandang. Personally I would say if you were a first time tile hunter, just head straight to Sing Mee and you can probably find your tiles there. I also visited Feruni and Better Living at their HomeDec booths but didn't like some of the tiles they had on show there.

[caption id="attachment_3368" align="alignnone" width="430" caption="Living Room"][/caption]

Overall, I stuck with 2x2 tiles for the living room, dining room and dry kitchen. I chose 2x1 tiles for the wet kitchen floor and 1x1.5 tiles for the kitchen wall. The toilets will be using a mixture of 2x1 tiles, 1x1.5 tiles and 1x1 tiles. Will snap pictures of them once they have been laid out.

With the house design, I have decided that I wanted a more spacious area for my living room and dining room. That was achieved by knocking the wall previously separating the kitchen and the living room.

[caption id="attachment_3371" align="alignnone" width="576" caption="Look ma, no more parquet flooring!"][/caption]

Another option I wanted was to remove the older parquet flooring and replace it with other types of flooring. From laminated flooring, vinyl flooring, hard wood and even engineered wood, I found that hard wood was my preferred choice. Hard wood is nice but it takes a long time (9 weeks) to get it all laid and cured.

[caption id="attachment_3370" align="alignnone" width="960" caption="Laying out the aircon points and piping"][/caption]

Learnt some interesting tips as well, once the wiring and cables have been laid, take a picture of them so that the next time when you want to do a bit of drilling or knock in some nails to hang a picture, you would know where the wires are located. Thanks for the tip guys!

[caption id="attachment_3369" align="alignnone" width="960" caption="Huge dumping site on my front porch"][/caption]

After experiencing fantastic water pressure at hotels, I really want to have the same pressure for my house especially since I will be using a rain shower head. Looks like I will be hunting for the water pump as well as the water heater for the house this weekend.

I really have to thank my parents for being so supportive and helpful with the house renovation as well as checking up with the contractors. Definitely wouldn't be able to progress this far at all without their help! Thanks Mum and dad!

Over last weekend, I managed to get an opportunity to shoot this beautiful car during an automotive workshop organized by Live Life Drive magazine. The entire workshop was held at the new Renault showroom over at Section 13. There were about 13 participants in total (I think) and most of the time, we never really had our alone time with the car.

Hence the lack of interior shots as well as the white Megane RS which was in the showroom itself. The instructor was Sherman who guided us through from shooting cars in an outdoor location, what are some of the tips that we needed to be aware of.

After that, we moved into the showroom where Sherman then explained to us about the things to watch out and what to be aware off especially when shooting cars in the showroom itself as well as in an indoor location.

In between shoots, I managed to have a chat with Sherman about shooting cars and what I thought about it. He did give me some insight about shooting cars and I learned that cars alone are as much as shooting a portrait session. Instead of looking at the couples as just another human being, we tend to learn more about them, find out their history, what their likes and dislikes are in order to capture "them". The same goes for cars, the history behind the car, what car is it, what does the car represent.

At the beginning of the workshop, the participants were also informed that there will be a winning shot competition where each participant would submit their best photo. I took this time as a challenge and made a complete fool of myself because I shot it RAW and forgot to change it to JPEG. Another surprise was that the image was going to be straight from camera so there was no Photoshop manipulation.

After shooting in the showroom, we moved on towards the back of the showroom where a Renault Koleos was waiting for us to photograph as well as the yellow Megane RS.

At the end of the day, this was the image I submitted.


Although the image I posted up here was a slightly touched up version as the original image had a bit of a yellow hose which was left on the ground where I cloned it out.


Photo credit: Live Life Drive Magazine

Here was a photo of my shot being displayed on the projector during the end of the workshop and when the judges were giving their comments.

A little bit of technical stuff here, I shot mainly with a Canon 5D Mk2 in full RAW. I used mostly the 17-40mm F4 lens throughout the shoot with the occasional change to the 50mm. I wanted to use the 70-200mm lens but couldn't get the right angle and shot that I wanted. All of the photos were shot in natural light, placement of the cars was done by the showroom guy so even if I wanted the car at a different angle, I couldn't.

At the end, I was glad as my photo was selected as one of the top 5, woohoo!

Photo credit: Live Life Drive Magazine

Thanks to that win, I received a small goody bag and of course a big boost in terms of confidence. I did recall that one of my projects last year was to start shooting more automotive themed shoots so this was one of my initiatives. Can't wait to shoot even more cars especially if the opportunity arises!

Do check out some of my shots below.
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More photos and information about the workshop is available here.
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.306430839427798.68914.199088550162028&type=1

It is almost the end of the first quarter in 2012 and this year seems to be looking fairly interesting. One of them mainly is that I will be renovating my house and I have been trying to figure out how to budget and juggle the budget so that I don't blow everything away. I have already received the 1st quotation on the heavy work that needs to be done and it really didn't leave me much to work with in terms of my initial budget.

I thank God for my mum and her slew of various contractors that I can leverage off otherwise things might just be too costly. Heck, it was an adventure driving deep into Klang just looking at a timber factory there to negotiate a good deal for some hardwood merbau flooring. Thanks to more recommendation, I have a few more leads on floor tiles and then I can start focusing on kitchen fittings and toilet fittings.

Diablo III has been slated for a launch sometime this year, although it might get a lot of people very excited about it, I kind of lost interest in the game. Heck, I even started to lose interest of Starcraft II even though I have been waiting for more than a year before their so called "expansion" would be released. If they keep on delaying all of their games, I really might just completely lose interest in it.

Also last weekend was the first time I played at the golf course for 2012. Decided to head back to the UPM golf course (University Pertanian Malaysia) since all of us haven't played golf in a long while. Thankfully there wasn't a crowd there on Sunday and we managed to play at our own pace. That game also marked my first use of my new R9 driver which I managed to "steal" last year. Definitely not an easy driver to use thanks to its super steep head angle. But if you hit a good shot with it, the ball just flies. Speaking of flying balls, I think I lost about 9 balls that day. Thanks to super long grass, huge ponds by the fairway and of course the dead dried leaves which litters the fairway (yes, fairway and not the rough!). Hope to play better in our next game.

The Volkswagen Club managed to pass 2500 members in the forum which I think was an awesome milestone. I guess with the launch of more VW models as well as the upcoming CKD Passat at lower prices, I can definitely foresee more and more Malaysians buying into the brand. Of course there were the usual rumour mills and reports that Proton was going to rebadge the VW Polo. I think it would be a good strategy for Proton as well as VW but DRB HICOM has already denied that so there goes that theory.

There hasn't really been any new TV series, I am still waiting for Game of Thrones Season 2 to start and I think the only TV Series which I am actually really following is How I Met Your Mother, Two and a Half Men, Modern Family and of course, Spartacus: Vengeance.

In terms of movies, I definitely can't wait for the Avengers. Other than that, there really isn't any other movie that I am looking forward to. Not too sure why but maybe perhaps there hasn't been any real hype for other movies.

Apple has released their new iPad, seems like a good upgrade for me since my iPad 1 is really suffering in terms of speed and I can hardly watch any HD movies on it thanks to its slow processor. This time around, I shall get the 64Gb non 3G version as I really hardly require the 3G data.

In the tech world, it's definitely tough especially if you are the CEO of HP and have to answer questions by shareholders such as, "Why HP isn't like Apple?". Definitely a high reach for even a giant like HP to achieve but it all takes is a visionary within the firm to push things through. Focus on the key business driver and be fantastic with it. Anyway I am just ranting away.

More to come in 2012!

Yes, this blog is still not dead yet. Why? That's because I am alive and have been a little busy. Busy with work, busy with interviews (conducting them), busy with more work, busy with renovation plans, busy with Munz's new business (I'll talk more about that later) and have been sick lately. Perhaps I haven't been drinking enough water.

In pops an email, automated as it seems, I was just about to trash it when I skimmed through the contents and decided that hey, it was something interesting. It was the newsletter for the upcoming KL Marathon and I am really contemplating running the 10km run. That means it would definitely force me to start training up for the run due in June. This might just be the push I need to lose some much needed weight. So much so that my nickname amongst the VW club members is now "Touareg".

So what else has kept me busy? Well I started my renovation plans already and am still trying to finalize some of the layout and design ideas with my ID. The hardest thing I must say is trying to stick within budget and I haven't even included in the furnishings and fittings! Why must it be so difficult! Also the target to move in is about mid year so yeah, that's gonna be tight deadline to meet.

I mentioned Munz's new business earlier and I am proud to present "Milestones.my". Milestones is basically her entrée into the wedding planning business and last weekend was her first customer's wedding which was held in Ipoh. So practically my entire weekend was spent in Ipoh helping her out. Do check out her website ok? Especially those of you who are thinking about getting married :)

Anyway, I haven't had much time to shoot and recently Canon also released their 5D Mk3. On paper the specs show a lot of improvement. But until I try it out with my own hands and test shoot it especially with the F1.2 lenses, then only will I consider that camera. Otherwise I would be more than happy to stick with my Canon 5D Mk2. I really want to take more photos of cars but finding a free weekend would be quite tough!

A couple of weeks ago, a bunch of us from the Volkswagen Malaysia Club embarked on a weekend holiday at Cameron Highlands. We managed to book a bungalow at Tanah Rata which was located very close to the bus station. In total there were about 30 of us but not all of us squeezed into the bungalow.

Due to unforeseen circumstances, I missed the convoy heading up to Camerons on Friday afternoon so I decided to take a drive up at night. Thanks to heavy rain, the journey was not an easy one. Besides having to avoid heavy traffic coming out of the Klang Valley, I am really thankful for the Guthrie highway which provided me an easy avenue out of the NKVE and straight towards Rawang. I initially wanted to stop at the Rawang rest area to fuel up and grab a quick dinner but thanks to the hordes of people camping there waiting for the rain to subside, I decided to continue on ahead.

By the time I reached Tapah, the rain had already subsided. After a quick bite at KFC, we then departed onwards to Simpang Pulai. I decided to try out the new route up to Camerons, instead of taking the usual route through Tapah, there has been a lot of reported landslides on the old route through Ringlet.



The new route via Simpang Pulai is a much safer route especially if you are travelling at night. The roads are newer and the uphill roads have dual lanes at quite a fair bit of points. Do note that the route is very winding so if you are going on a spirited drive especially at night, make sure you use your high beam lights throughout the drive. There are a number of very misleading sharp corners. Traffic up this route wasn't that heavy, I think I only encountered like 4 trucks on the way up.

This route will bring you through Brinchang and then towards Tanah Rata.

Upon reaching at our destination at Tanah Rata, a quick shower and a quick change and I was ready to join the gang for some "games", which involved cards, and lots of yawning away. Heck it was already 3am at night!

The next day we went out for scones and tea at the Lord's Cafe. Now if anyone asks where are the best scones in Cameron Highlands, I would definitely say, "The Lord's Cafe" at Tanah Rata. The jam that came with the scones were heavenly and I can definitely say that we all enjoyed ourselves at the place and even some of us brought back a huge number of scones for loved ones.

After scones we had more food by sipping tea at the Cameronian Valley and enjoying the view. None of us wanted to drive towards the Boh Tea plantation especially since we had so many owners with lowered rides and none of us brought a Touareg!

When night came, we started it all off with a barbecue and chit-chat which went on all the way till late at night.

The one thing I never did like about Camerons is that the traffic there is really crazy, because of the one way in and one way out, whenever we did pass Brinchang, we would get stuck in insane traffic. Heck on the way back, I was stuck for 40 minutes and over that 40 minutes I probably drove about 100m. I made a quick u-turn and then used the older Tanah Rata route back home. Overall it was a fun trip up Camerons and definitely would love to do it again when I have the time!

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I would like to wish everyone a very happy new year! 2011 came and gone and 2012 has a lot more to offer.

New plans and new focus is my target this year, not so much on resolutions because I know I tend to break all of them but I will try my best this year.

They include the usual, work, loosing weight, exercising, reading more, picking up new skills, shooting new things and travelling.

Chinese New Year as well is also very close by, just the other day I walked into the local supermarket only to have Christmas music playing at the entrance and Chinese New Year music playing at the check out counter.

Have a great year ahead!