HTC Desire

It was hard to get a good deal when I tried to sign up for a new mobile phone contract. I've just finished my current one-and-a-half-year blackberry curve 8900 contract that costed me a monthly fee of £25 for 600 minutes and unlimited text and Internet. It was a fairly great deal I had from o2.  Unluckily I did not manage to get a bargain again this time when I tried to renew my o2 contract. Instead they offered a bad deal; a less cool HTC smart mobile with unlimited text and internet but only half of the minutes allowances from before for the same monthly fee. It is, in my opinion, a total rip-off cause the HTC smart mobile could be purchased from pay as you go (PAYG) plan for only £90. At the end of the day, I finally decided to close my existing contract, bought the phone from Ebay and use PAYG sims instead. 

I bought a HTC Desire, one of the latest phone from HTC that uses Android as its operating system. Lots of reviews believe this Android phone is an IPhone contender and I kind of agree with it, cause this phone is honestly quite impressive. It delivers the same intuitive features as IPhone. The only drawback with HTC so far is the less sensitivity of its touch screen, I kind of struggling a bit when typing words because of that.

Just to mention that I did quite a 'homework' before made up my mind to go for HTC Desire. In comparison, IPhone has a better design and many extensive apps to choose from. On the other hand, hardware for HTC is better with 5M camera, 1GHz processor and most importantly cheaper in price.

Below are links of details specification for HTC and 3Gs for comparisons

http://www.htc.com/www/product/desire/specification.html

http://www.gsmarena.com/apple_iphone_3gs-2826.php

I made a comparison with 3Gs cause these two phones are within the same price range when you sign up for a £35/month contract for 18 months with 300 minutes allowances, unlimited text and  internet. Nonetheless I would say it to ultimately depend on the individual itself. If you got a deep pocket, it would probably be the antenna problem's Iphone 4 :). Else, try seeking a better phone deal that would do a fairly similar job as IPhone.

I also uploaded the unboxing of HTC desire on Youtube and definitely in due time I will upload a new video about the phone performance and features. So folks stay tune and enjoy the video!

London

We went to London last weekend (19/6/10-20/6/10) to have a weekend getaway and visit a friend of mine before he going home to Malaysia. Our initial plan was to pass a HP laptop that I bought for my youngest brother to him and to do some shopping in Oxford street. Fortunately we managed to have some spare time while in London and thus decided to go to London Eye and ate a yummy waffle there. If you know the place, the waffle stall is the one located next to the London Aquarium.

After we had our waffle, we took a stroll along the river pedestrian path and on our half way through, we saw a lot of street performances starring from street magician, clown and dance group. Here I uploaded a dance group video and I would say it is a smart way to get famous cause some people do take photo with them. The area is a bit busy too with other activities like a group of teenagers playing skate board. I managed to capture a few great photos with my Leica.

The sale in Oxford Street was not bad either. Unlucky for us, most of the items we bought were non-sale stuff. Only GAP shop offered a better deal, the rest would probably be average. Overall, we had a great weekend but it costed me a big hole in my bank account ;). Anyway it is good to sometimes visit other places but I honestly do not prefer London's hectic life. Hope everyone enjoyed their weekend as much as I did. 

I'm 28 this year!

Yesterday is my birthday a week after my wife birthday and it does remind me that I'm getting older. It does shows that time running really pass, unnoticeable and untraceable. This year is my 6 years in Britain and last year of my PhD. What a scary thought when I'm keep thinking of it, however I don't want to spoil my good day so I decided to write about a great birthday present ever from my beloved wife.

As a sign of getting older my body does feeling ache sometimes probably due to lack of sleep. I always bug my wife by asking her to give me back massage but she did a brilliant job by getting me, my own massager. The compact percussion massager from Home Disc is a brilliant tool to do the job. It have 3 different massage setting from soft to hard but the best bit is it does add one setting that massage with heat. The massager is easy to used and only required 24W so it won't cost your electricity bill very much however the heat massage only can be used up to 15 minutes only to avoid skin burn.

I really love this gift and hope I get it sooner. Thanks to my wife for lovely gift and cards you make my day and love you so much!

Modern Warfare 2 PS3 Controller Faceplate

Just want to share with all PS3 owner out there a cool stuff to make your PS3 controller look even cooler!. Here  Madcatz Officially Licensed Modern Warfare 2 PS3 Controller Faceplate from Play.com. The faceplate is a slot or clip type and easy to attach to the controller. I would say it is not an essential accessories but it does add some additional x-factor. The faceplate does add very little weight to the controller however I would not recommend it if you have a docking charger. The main reason is it won't fit and you need to do some modification to the dock. Overall, I'm quite please with the item and high recommended to all, anyway it just £2 and surely it won't break your bank account ;)

Unboxing HP Laptop

Just bought a new HP laptop for my little brother and honestly I'm quite shock to see the drop in current laptop price within the last 3 or 4 years since I got my Toshiba. I still remember paying more than £600 for the Toshiba with only basic specifications. Now I could use the same amount of money to get a super laptop. I, however, still manage to get a good price for this HP. At the price tag of £400, I would say it as a bargain price considering the good specs.

Size: 15.6" with LED HD Display

Processor: Intel core i3 at 2.1 GHZ.

RAM: 2G DDR3

HDD: 250 GB

It uses Window 7 Home Premium as the operating system but I'm gonna upgrade it cause I got the professional version as well. I am satisfied with the laptop and hope you guys enjoy the video!

p/s: Really sorry about some blurry occur in the video due to my camera setting.

Happy Birthday Love!

Yesterday is my wife birthday and unfortunately, we unable to celebrate it because  she really busy on her ACCA exam preparation. Therefore, I  plan to postpone it to next week. By the way I just want to say that I love her and hope she will be in good health and happy always.  Hope she like this video and God bless! HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR!

creativeLIVE Site

Here I would like to share a brilliant and useful website know as creativeLIVE. This site is recommended by one of famous and genius photographer called Chase Jarvis. The site provide a useful video course regarding creative photography and movie making techniques. Some of the courses are free but some of important and special course you need to pay for it. Overall I will say the site is awesome, brilliant and amazingly will benefit us all. So give it a go and hopefully we all can improve our photography technique soon. Enjoy!

http://creativelive.com/courses/digitalphotography/

D-lux 4 Custom Grip

I bought a D-lux 4 custom grip last month, made by Richard Franie's. I came across this grip in one of my flickr-buddy's page and I just want to try it before recommending the grip to others. I do agree with a lot of people that Leica brand is expensive, not only the camera itself but also extended to its accessories. No need to mention the M series like M8 and M9 which can cost up to £5K but since I used D-lux 4, I dare to say that investing in this brand is worth every single penny. Now I am starting my new saving pot for leica M and hopefully one day I can own one.

Without the grip

Back to the grip.. I would say it as a genius way to provide D-lux owners with an alternative way to spend their money ;). This grip just cost around $35, equivalent to £24 and it is far more cheaper than the original Leica grip which could cost £80. I bought the grip from a seller in US so there is another $5 for the postage cost. The grip is made from aluminium, feels very solid and comfortable to handle. However it is not a screw mount type like Leica grip so the only way to attach it to the camera is by using a special double-sided tape which can be removed and reused again in the future. 

With the grip on

I do like the grip because it is easy to use and does add more security feature when I am holding my camera. Besides, considering the price, I would say it serves its purpose and I did not need to blow out my pocket to own  an original one. I attached here some related links and hopefully it would help other D-lux users who are looking for an affordable grip :). Lastly, I would like to thank Tetsu for sharing his knowledge and Richard for his great service and fast delivery.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/tetsu_sawamura/3624392127/in/set-72157604813009805/

http://www.kleptography.com/rf/#camera_dlux4

Cokezone Rewards

A good news to all COKE LOVERS out there, you can get cool stuff from your fuzzy drink habit. A website called cokezone allows you to collect points from each of your coke bottles (500 ml and 1 L) and later redeem cool prize from the site. You can collect points by simply entering a 12 digit-codes marked on the bottle, but you need to have enough points before claim any prize. To be honest, it takes ages to get a really cool rewards like X-box 360 console which needs at least 800 points, equals to 400 drinks of 500ml coke bottles. You can still, however, get other good stuff that need less points like DVD. Ironically, I would advise not to get too attracted with the rewards because it is actually not worth your precious health. Anyhoo, just give it a go and enjoy the cool rewards later!  

My recent reward