Gearing up for Driving Test

Countdown is almost over, 2 more days now. Over the last 2 weekend, I have spent time to digitize the test route I found from DVLA website into Google Earth. This method helped me to familiarize the route as there are 15 potential route the driving instructor might ask me to follow.

I've my driving license since 1995, but to sit for a British driving test, it isn't as easy as I initial thought. I need to follow the route, the actions as the instructor expected, not as simple as driving from A to B. One of the challenge is I decided to take a manual car test, having not driving one for 12 years. I found a website, that contains clips on driving lesson, as well as question the instructor will ask me to perform before the test. Pretty useful site.

Swindon has 2 tricky roundabouts, Magical and Coate Water (picture above) roundabout. As long as I follow the right correct lane, check the mirrors before I signal, shift gear before approaching turn, look at the blink spots, not exceeding speed limit, not too far below speed limit, know where to stop the car when needed be, there shouldn't be a problem to pass the test. All should be done within 1 hour and not fall into one of the following category.

Driving Test Failures Top 10

• Failure to act properly at road junctions 149,439
• Reversing round a corner incorrectly 119,617
• Failure to make proper use of steering 101,318
• Problems with parking 94,728
• Failure to make proper use of gears 76,945
• Failure to make effective use of the mirrors 66,270
• Driving too slowly 64,942
• Failure to act properly when turning right 64,215
• Causing delay by not pulling out promptly at junctions 62,221
• Failure to move away correctly from stationary positions 56,086

Freezing cold morning

Although in average the temperature at night is about -1 to -2 degree, this morning the temperature is 0.5 celcius, which is first time for me. Luckily the frost was not thick to scrap.

TV shows that interest me to watch

Alright, straight to the point. It wasn't due to the poor tv shows on the 5 UK channels (minus Freeview, minus SKY) but it is the reality shows (US version) accompanying me for a few years (Amazing Race, Project Runway, Apprentice, American Next Top Model, Survivor) that I missed the most. Perhaps SkyOne is showing more US shows, the 5 UK channels (BBC1&2, ITV1,Channel 4,Five) are lacking US shows. There are a few good UK shows I like as they are original: Top Gear, GadgetShow, Dragonsden, F Word, Property ladder, Jamie At Home, and Hotel Inspector. UK version of Apprentice is suck. X-Factor, UK version of American Idol is pretty ok, yesterday Leon walked away as a winner. On top of this, Big Brother is aonther interesting show I watched not long after I landed in Swindon.

Every week until today, I download the latest show of Amazing Race s12, Survivor S15, Project Runway S4, American Next Top Model S9, Heroes S2, Prison Break S3, Taiwanese singing competition MillionStars S2, Anime Gundam 00, Amazing Race Asia S2. I'm pretty up-to-date with the shows most people watching in Asia.

Mouth watering Asian buffet dinner in Swindon

Yesterday, we went out with a group of chinese friends to a newly opened buffet restaurant, Cosmo. However they have time restriction for dinner, only allow customer to eat for 2 hours. Anyway, we think their foods are delicious, with a lot of variety. The restaurant were full with locals. Here were some of the dishes I ate.

black pepper mussels, prawns, siew mai (dim sum)

roast duct, crackers, crispy seaweed

crab claws, fruits

Teppanyaki Bar: prawns, fish

Desserts: Banana Fritters, Marshmallows in Chocolate

Last Amazon deal has ended

Amazon had their last round of discounted gift vote closed yesterday,

but the story remains the same, I still not being picked for the discounted gift I choosen. Sigh :(

HP 10% deal & HTPC consideration

I came across a discount code for HP, with free delivery until 31st Dec. This s3230 slimline is ideal for HTPC, but 2 points I dislike about it: AMD and no HDMI output.

My second consideration is Dell Vostro 200Slim, but its dimension is a little big, with depth about 43cm. A 10% discount code only applicable for purchase price more than £599 :(
Both doesn't come with a remote controller, no hdmi output and no TV card. It is definately more expensive for me to build my own, so I might decide to get anyone of these 2 by the end of the year. Ideally, I want to put a low profile graphic card with HDMI output, but there isn't any to choose from, although i found a few result in google.

Habitat furniture 20% coupon for AMEX cardmember

Well well well, another 20% offer from Habitat. We bought quite a few stuff from Habitat using voucher in Elle Deco magazine on 29/11. This time, they goes with AMEX for 1 week sales. Cherlyn statred to grin and scratching her head what she want to buy next...

Best way to stay update about your friends' blog

Well, this is not new anymore, but just want to share with you where I spent most of my time everyday, not any website, but my RSS reader. As you might came across most of the news sites like BBC, CNN etc has a small RSS or XML icon on the bottom right of the page, it is a link for you to subscribe to their website to read the latest news headlines without .

There are plenty of free rss reader, in google mail, yahoo mail even on your Vista Widget bar. For me, I use FeedDemon. It serves all my need.

Anyway, I'd been reading RSS for 2 years plus, but I have never in my mind to subscribe to any friends' rss. It could be there are plenty social networking site like facebook, friendster out there that lead me to think i would get my friends' latest update there. Frankly speaking, i'm not very active in those networking site now, since my company blocked the access. Then the idea to subscribe to my friends' blog site struck my mind. By default, every blog has its rss, to subscribe blogspot rss, use this link http://[username].blogspot.com/rss.xml while Friendster blog rss link is http://[username].blogs.friendster.com/my_blog/index.rdf .

Right, from now, I'll be more update about my friends now :)

Dell 12 Days of deals, end on 16th Dec

I was searching for a PC deal, and came across Dell 12 days deals which end on 16th Dec. But I seems to missed out the first 9 deals.

The 20" LCD deal look good, but I only need a normal 19" for my future PC. I'll pass for this time.

Company Xmas gift & Lunch

Back on October, company sent out an email to let us select our xmas present, either M&S gift set or Wine, which are equal value. I didn't picked, and was default to wine. Yesterday I got the wine box, according to my colleague, it contains 3 red and 3 white wines. I don't know the brand yet.

Update:15/12 - These are the 6 wines in the box.

At lunch time, I ate roast breast of turkey, with home made sausage meat stuffing, chipolata sausage wrapped in bacon and roast potatoes.

My colleague exhibited their crappy art talent... tower of paper crown :()

2nd round @Amazon.co.uk result out

Well, as expected, the most voted gadget is TomTom One, follow by Toshiba HD DVD and Creative Zen. Unfortunately, I still don't get to buy at 25% off as I wasn't ramdomly picked. Another round to come, finger cross harder.

2nd voting round for discounted gadget @Amazon.co.uk

2nd round Amazon voting is open. I'd voted Toshiba HD DVD. Finger cross this time I will be randomly picked to buy in discounted price.

Free Microsoft product

Do you want any of the following Microsoft product as gift (you don't get to pick which one) ?

• Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate (32-bit and 64-bit DVD)
• Microsoft Office Ultimate 2007
• Microsoft Money Plus Premium
• Microsoft Student with Encarta Premium 2008
• Microsoft Streets and Trips 2008

Goto http://wfp.microsoft.com/Welcome.aspx and register yourself for either automated feedack or survey feedback. The feedback last for 3 months. To eligible, you need be US residents of 18 years and older. I tried my luck to register, and Microsoft sent me a confirmation email to participate the feedback. I'm not sure will it get my gift at the end of the feedback program.

Update: 15/12 - I'd uninstalled the feedback program, as I noticed there wasn't a product for me to choose from after I completed the previous survey. It might just open to US resident only.

Get your DivX Pro for free, limited time only

Fantastic deal for DivX bundle v6.8 (player, web player, movie, converter). You need to register DivX Converter after a trial period, but with this deal, you can get your very own serial code form DivX, not an underground keygen. I got mine at http://www.divx.com/dff/index.php?version=win . Just follow the instruction in the link.

It cost about £12.99 to buy online, but if you click the link within DivX's limited period (who know when), you will save some quids for your expensive petrol. Diesel is now 105.9.

Consideration for a HTPC

HTPC, stands for Home Theather Personal Computer, some prefer to call it Media Centre PC. I guess when this is mentioned, everyone know why I need onem to put a PC next to a LCD TV.

I've been stuggling to design/settle for a new PC for my new house/home networking, and I'd studied the market for almost 2 months. There are neither 1 solution that fit my needs nor cheap. A HTPC suppose to be a neat and stylist PC like Aopen Mini or Mcubed Macro








but the downside of that is, you can have a good graphic card and limited expandable PCI slot. I can get 2 PCs, 1 for HTPC, 1 for my study room. But, we already have a HP laptop, and a company Dell laptop. Having 2 PCs are redundant. A good HTPC is expensive, Niveus Rainer is one of the top notch HTPC. It is also called Media Centre Extender.

Then, game console come into the picture. Initially I want a PS3 as it supports DLNA, an industry standard for media (audio,video, photo) sharing within concept of a digital home, which able to stream video from a DLNA compatible device/software. I can use TwongkyMedia , a software for PC to stream between PC and PS3 (or XBOX360). Although it can streams Divx, Xvid encoded file, photos and mp3, it doesn't play p2p tv such as ppstream or tvuplayer. And, eventually we think Wii is a better console as we can sweat and exercise at home.

There a few devices other there that archieve my basic needs, such as EZFetch, Linksys DMA 2100, HD Mediabox, but they can't play p2p tv. The latest XBOX360 dashboard did mentioned about P2P tv, but that is subject to ISP content.

So, I need to find other alternative. I do come across this device, Avrio HDMI Over Cat5e/6,

but I don't have a ethernet link at home. I sent an enquiry to the sales team, as I curios whether i could extend the ethernet over Powerline device, such as Netgear HDX101

But they have no clue what i'm referring to :( Then I came across Remote Desktop solution. RD is not something new, it is common if you connect remotely to terminal server on Win2k or Win2003. Depends on the concurrent license you purchase from Microsoft, that's the limit how many users can access the server at the same time without kicking other user from their session. Windows XP and Vista only support single remote desktop session, if you allow other user to remote desktop your pc, you will be kicked out from your session.

Fortunately, I found a great link that allow concurrent access to Vista (Home Premium/Ultimate) version, but required some hack to the registry and a dll replacement. With this hack, it means I can get 1 HTPC for my TV, while using it to watch p2p TV or downloaded drama, I still can remote access it to process my photos (ideally) or play games (not sure my bandwidth is sufficient, maybe with powerline product or draft n router will not be an issue) using my laptop.

Well, this is all I could find/think of at the moment. Home network connectivity can be simple (if you have a lot of money to spend), or complex (under budget constraint, or want to reduce power consumption).

Free Russell Hobbs Aqua Filter Jug @ Amazon.co.uk

Not long ago, i came across a freebie from amazon. By entering a promotion code during checkout, you can get Russell Hobbs Aqua Filter Jug for free.
I ordered mine at http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/B000VRZSJK and still waiting for the delivery. The deal has now expired.

Vote your deal @ Amazon.co.uk

Yesterday Amazon is giving away nice discount on 3 game consoles, PS3, XBOX360 and wii for fastastic offer at £69,£69 and £49. However, only the highest voted console get to enjoy this discount, and the runner up get lesser discount. Each console only has 250 units to offer and it is giving out randomly.

I voted for PS3 and the result today showing PS3 got the highest vote.

Unfortunately, Christmas didn't come early this year. Oh well, I'll keep my eye open for the next best deal.

Google Earth for Singapore

I like to share with Singapore Google Earth kmz files, click the link and download the file. The current version is 4.70 Singapore KMZ BBS

Signed Renovation loan

Today we signed renovation loan at RHB cecil street. The financier, Shawn taugh us to disburse the first payment near end of the month as first installment start the next month after disbursement. This mean we will pay lesser daily interest for the disbursement month.

Prima Midah Height

My sister brought me a letter from the developer, saying my condo is ready. All i need to do is pay 3 months advance service payment. So, we will be back on this weekend.