iPod Touch Review

Over the past few months I've acquired some fruity gadgets to bring a change in my life. I'm sort of a tech geek to some extent and I've always wanted a gadget or two to further improve and "enlighten" my life hah.

I'm a rather late player into the scene with gadgets updating like every few months. So this could be a rather bland review from the point of view of a beginner.

First I had this iPod Touch 3rd generation as a present from my sis when she went to US last year (thanks sis!). Interestingly this isn't my first iPod encounter, as few years back I had bad luck trying to sync an iPod Nano to my aging Pentium 4 desktop.

During my summer break back in Malaysia I've finally collect it after it's been waiting for me close to a year! Luckily it wasn't misplaced when we're moving house too lol.


This iPod Touch is meant to be a replacement for my Walkman MP3 player which I've filled up up to the last few MBs. I'm such a monster filling in my media player with tons of songs lol.

Unlike the Walkman, I took more effort filtering the songs to put into the iPod as throwing in entire albums is one of the reasons the 16GB Walkman was filled in so fast. Although this iPod is a 32GB model but I still have to allocate the spaces for other things as well.

After carefully selecting, audio still takes up almost 10GB space hmm....


Current home screen.


Right.... so here's the thumbs up and thumbs down factors of iPod Touch....

Thumbs-up:

(I) Internet connectivity

This incredible function helped me a lot back then in Malaysia where Internet connection isn't ready yet. It's very useful to hook up free WIFI abundantly available in KL's shopping malls and make quick check on mails, update Twitter and Facebook.

This iPod Touch btw, is actually my 3rd gadget that's able to connect to the Internet (2nd being my Nokia 5310, but limited to GPRS only). It also actually help to reduce time facing the computer too, thus reduce the reliance on computer to achieve tasks.

(II) Versatile Applications

a) Games
Let's face it, one of the main reason to get an iPod Touch are the games! Seriously....




These games had kept my occupied for some time back home when I'm bored. It's highly addictive and it's still remain entertaining today, where I'd take it out for a quick game or two in between breaks.

b) Productivity
As mentioned above, iPod + WIFI = unlimited potential.
Besides games there're also tons of useful applications out there....




Saying this, that iPod could've almost took over the daily chores or basic tasks that most people would do on their computer.

(III) Built-in Speaker

Not really a major shout-out but I do appreciate able to listen to music without putting on earphone, especially useful during bed time, a few songs before getting myself hyptonised into dreamland.

Thumbs-down:

Audio Quality

Although iPod's original purpose was music player, it doesn't really shine that well though.
I've read below-average reviews raving on the iPod's sound quality but I don't really bother much because everyone perceive things differently eh.

It wasn't until I tried to play a familiar song on the same earphone, and I noticed something seems to be "missing". Then again, when it comes to audio it's kinda hard to be described with words. So the best bet would be compare it to the Walkman.



Seems like the American company has yet to achieve the quality close to the Japanese company.

Small Screen

Although the 3.5" is bigger than my handphone's, I can't help but to find it tiny when viewing websites. Surely, it wasn't the most effective method to display a full-size website. It does however, perform rather well on mobile-specific websites or it's applications.
I guess that's why iPad gain vast popularity, as bigger screen = see more = improve efficiency.

Battery Life

Another minor thing I noticed bout the iPod is how fast the battery drains, especially running games.
But to be fair, running multiple apps do need adequate power to cope with the demand, battery-intense functions such as WIFI connectivity, GPS etc.

When compared to iPhone's battery life, iPod does score pretty decent though. 2, 3 days per charge compared to at least once per day.

---

The iPod seems to be getting outdated as the new iPod Touch 4G had been launched few weeks ago.
With better screen display and camera-added, surely it seems to be a worthwhile upgrade from the 3G.
But anyway, I'm happy with my iPod Touch 3G to serve as my personal media & entertainment device. :)

In the meantime, I might be doing further reviews on:
iPhone 4
ASUS UL20A

No guarantee but iPhone 4 is definitely will be going on!

Computer Games

In this post I'll talk about games that I've played since the very beginning on my father's old MS-DOS system, to the current Windows Vista-based laptop.

Looking back at those years, I'm amazed that how long I've been playing the computer.... Can't really remember when I started, but it should be sometime before 1995 as that time Windows 95 doesn't exist, yet!

The game that left a great impression on me was "Prince of Persia", the first instalment of the series.



Because I'm still a kid when I played this game, I know nothing much about the storyline, but pretty much is like killing the bad guy and saving the princess plot.
The eerie music used in the game makes me chilled and spooked as it sounds real bad (bad, in terms of the terrible atmosphere of the game where you can easily dead, the character I mean).



Until today I'm still amazed by the graphic of the game. You see, all the processing capacity of the machines back then are nothing when compared to modern computers, not even a handheld GBA unit! It certainly looks great back then, and still today.

Another MS-DOS games I liked was "Alley Cat".



The gameplay is simple, you move the cat around with the cursor keys, hop into the opening windows and play some mini-games.
After completed the mini-game, you're able to enter to a special level where you're to "wed" with another white cat (the cat you're playing is black).



It's quite addictive at that time, a great game to cooldown after the "Prince of Persia" game.

Some other MS-Dos I've played before were Tetris & Chinese chess. Not really fond of Tetris and as a child I definitely don't enjoy playing chess games against the computer, simply because I felt that it's cheating because the computer checkmated me almost everytime!

Ah well, I can't remember what happened to the MS-DOS PC then, got a new Pentiumm II at the year 1998. Was running Windows 98 that time, one of the most stable OS Microsoft ever created, way before Windows XP dominates.

I dunno how but I happened to got the game "Age of Empires" from a neighbour whom we consulted everytime for our computer problems. That time I'm not the boss of the computer, so whenever I wanna play the computer I must get permission from my elder sister.



"Age of Empires" affected me very much, I absolutely love all the geographical & historical details until now. I learn some of my ancient civilization history through the game's scenarios and campaigns. I still love it even until today!

Roman town in the Iron Age


Talk about this, I will try to install the game on this Vista laptop, not sure whether it's compatible or not.

Age of Empires II released shortly after the 1st AoE. I grab it immediately from the game shop after it's out. Because I dunno how the crack works last time, I actually bought 2 copies because I thought the earlier one was faulty.
Since then, every games pretty much need cracks in order to play.

You can see the huge difference between AoE 1 & AoE 2 in terms of the graphic.


AoE 2 takes place in the Middle Age, so I can refine my knowledge on the Renaissance & the development of the civilizations from the dreaded Dark Age to the glorious later eras.



I tried to install this on my laptop before, but the game crashes after awhile into the gameplay. Oh well, might try to fix this again sometime later.

Sometime in 2000 I'm hooked with The Sims series, yeah, so called the best-selling game at that time.



I remember very well, that I've purchased almost all of The Sims expansions and played every of it except the last "Makin' Magic".
At that time the Pentium II's 64MB RAM & 3GB HDD space couldn't support all the expansions well. :(

Since the Pentium II went busted (Windows crashed actually) sometime in July or Aug 2001, we've decided to move on to a next level of Pentium IV desktop, which I nicknamed Vikings due to the brand name.
With the specs of 2.0GHz processor, Windows XP, 128MB RAM & 80GB HDD, it's surely far better than the previous Pentium II.
I joked with my sis asking how much can we store in the 80GB HDD, and I got the answer few years later when I used up almost all the spaces with ~3GB space left on the HDD, the final state before I switch to this Vista laptop.

I played lots of games on the Vikings desktop unit, among a few memorable ones, might be The Sims 2.

When I heard that The Sims 2 is going to be released on Sept 2004, I asked my father for the permission to get the game originally, as my pre-PMR reward, and he agreed. Not easy to get the greenlight from father when it comes to getting games, but he did!



I can't really enjoy the game due to the fact that The Sims 2's requirement is a little too much for my computer to handle. But anyway I managed to build some nice stuffs there...



You see, as the time progress, the games look better and better. With the far superior processing power & graphical details over the previous generations, computers are getting better and better.

Somewhere in 2003 I tried my very first online game, Ragnarok Online, and since then I'm hooked up with the game until today. You can read what I have to say about the game in another post.

Busy street of Prontera.


I had the chance of trying out Civilization IV, a game that reminds me of the AoE series I mentioned above. Unlike AoE, Civilization is a turn-based strategy game rather than a real-time strategy game.



Another historical-based game, but it's fun to see how you change the history in the game, where you're playing as Queen Elizabeth of England but controlling the nation of Japan!

For now the games are pretty much stuck to a few that I'm still playing now, namely RO, Civ IV & The Sims 2. I switch games when I find one of them boring, to keep myself occupied.

I plan to get Age of Empires III collectors' edition that contains the core game and 2 expansions. It's a great game (though I haven't play it before) so I think there's the value for collecting it.



It's interesting to see how games evolved from MS-DOS to the current Windows Vista, and following this trend, games of the few years to come would be greater than what we've been playing today.

I actually want to play "Mass Effect" and "Assassin's Creed", but knowing that my laptop isn't meant for gaming, I might only play it when I can upgrade to a better computer in few years time.

It's been fun playing all the games since the early days of computing, I simply enjoy every moment trying out new games! :D


P/S: I'm not a fan of console gaming, I do not own any PlayStation or handheld game devices. I felt more comfortable hitting the keyboard rather than clinching a controller lol.

An update with a few stories

Finally.... I'm able to get rid of the RO addiction, for awhile. Heh, due to the server update the game is taken offline for the time being. Anyway, I've played for 8 hours straight since 5pm just now lol.

Few screenshots from the game.

Populated server, which reminds me of mRO long long ago.


Taken down by a bunch of mobs. Those who've played the game should know the reputation of Asura Strike....


Still not able to get hold of the crazy mobs although my level increased....


My character, which I named as Feraligatr. Pokemon freaks should know this name. :)
(I actually got this nick while scrambling my old Pokemon trading cards)


OK now, finish the story of Ragnarok Online.

Today I actually went to an education fair to look out for potential university to study in Japan, well, do the homework earlier to get myself set and prepared.

Of all Japanese university booth I visited, only 2 universities offered the course I'm interested in. So far I'm considering Shobi University & Tokai University.

Actually my aim is to get into either Tokyo University of the Arts (Geidai) or Kunitachi College of Music, but those 2 are the top school of musics in Japan, so it'll be kinda hard to get in. But well, I still can give it a try, it's still early to laid the conclusion. :)
At least I have some choices left in case I didn't get into either these 2 top universities.

Met a few friends in the edu fair. Kah Shih tag along with me wondering around the booths. That guy is a mystery really, I didn't know that he took up Japanese language course even when he's studying for STPM, and now he is level 2 JLPT.

Also bump into Gun Lam there, he's another guy planning to fly to Japan too, but he'll be doing the degree course since he has completed the Japanese language course.

Also spotted a few friends from college, say, Lai Mun & Chie Guan. Now is the time we hunt for the universities to study in. Can't really slack off totally after the course finishes, it's also the beginning for another course too.

I will still need to look further into universities in Japan that offers the course that I wanted to do.
Well, Osaka College of Music sounds good, but I haven't check there yet. I do prefer Osaka to Tokyo actually, in terms of the city. Kyoto seems to be another likely choice.

I don't really want to study in further north in Hokkaido though, heard it's freezing cold and I can't really stand sub-zero degree climate. Tokyo would still be cold of course, but not as bad as Hokkaido lol.
I might consider somewhere near Kyushu or Shikoku too. Southern part of Japan, a little warmer.

End of studying in Japan topic.

Tomorrow I'll be attending my primary school gathering. I'm the organiser for this event for some years already.

What I mainly do is decide the time, date and venue, then spread the news around to friends ask them to attend. Last year's gathering was a success, but this year the number will be shrinking as many couldn't make it due to various reasons beforehand.

This would likely be the last primary gathering I'll be attending, because next year I won't be around already, somebody else have to organise it on my behalf, or everyone would lost contact just like that.

From what I know, many friends are having their gatherings too. I've heard gatherings of Chong Hwa primary, Lee Rubber primary and my own Mun Yee primary. I dunno when someone will came up with a Chong Hwa secondary gathering though, most likely those Form 6 friends will make one.

Gatherings..... I'll try my best to attend it, because I dont know when I can meet with those friends again.

Ragnarok Online

This game is simply the best online game I ever played, it's the game that starts off my online gaming experience.
Besides RO, I've tried Gunbound & Maple Story too.

My first character, kinda mixed up stats though. This is from the legit Malaysian RO, English version (eRO).


Noticed the datestamp? This pic is dated say, 5 years ago? It's been a long time lol.

These few days suddenly got the urge to play this old game again, after abandoning it in 2006 as I open the music player and discovered a few nice BGM tracks from the game which reminds me of the game itself.

Chased by the Abysmal Knight in Glast Heim, one of the dungeons in the game.


So now I'm trying to reconnect to the game, but no longer in legit server. :P

Yesterday downloaded 1.23 GB worth of setup file within 12 hours, which is a good rate considering I've to wait for days to download a few hundred MBs sometimes.

The game is still patching and I'll see how things work up later. :)


P/S: The reason I quit last time is because playing alone can be kinda bored sometimes, and the server is not stable so I'll just give it up.

My First AMV

* AMV = animation music video, which basically is anime/cartoon video couple up with a music/song/score, thus making it like a music video.

[Link]

This is my first ever try to create an AMV. The music used is "RECOVER", from Gundam 00 OST 2. It's the theme of the antagonist in the series, mainly for their ace pilot Graham Aker. 

It's quite fun to play around with the vid, though to synchronise the video and the music requires a few rounds of trials & errors. 

The song length is not long enough to fit in the whole video so I've to trim it here and there abit. The conversation part between the 2 pilots had been shortern, and the main focus is on the battle of the mobile suits.

Aesthetically, I did not apply any much fancy effects this time. The only effects I used is Ease In & Ease Out, which are just zoom in and out respectively. This is to create a little different feel when the mobile suits are engaging each other.

Feel free to drop any comment on this vid, this should serve as a warm up for my upcoming movie-making project.  :D

Gundam 00 season 2

Just finished watching the raw video of the much anticipated 2nd season, 1st episode of Gundam 00.

00 Gundam, the protagonist of the series.

So... how is it? 

The first episode itself rocked entirely! Even if you haven't follow the 1st season, you'll still be impressed by the sheer quality of the anime itself, although you may have missed out a few key points in the storyline as this 2nd season carry forward what happened back in 1st season.

A lot of previous characters are reintroduced in the 1st episode, as well as a few new faces around. 

A Gundam anime wouldn't be completed if there wasn't any mobile suits battle. Believe me, the battle scenes in this episode rocks over the roof top!! There's such an excitement watching those machines fighting each others, heh.

The antagonist' mobile suits. The red AHEAD is a kick-ass stuff although it looks dull. The blue suits are previous season's antagonist, now obsolete suits.

Words hardly can express my feeling on this episode, unless you watch it yourself. 

The good news is, there's this guy who uploaded the entire episode onto Youtube. But the bad news is, sooner or later this account will be deleted, so watch while you still can!

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

The opening is impressive as well, great song and showcasing the characters and mobile suits from the anime itself, hinting possible upcoming battles with some old foes.

I'll be eagerly looking forward for the next episode! Oh yeah!

End of Olympic Games 2008

A glory night to set off the big game. China has defied all the odds & criticisms, and successfully held the great games of mankind!

The closing ceremony is not as eye-catching than the opening ceremony, but surely it's fantastic to watch it too. Lots of flying figures running across the stadium, a trademark style of the ceremony director Zhang YiMou. People might say that he's promoting his movie or so, well the style served the ceremony well.

There's the showcase of British flavors in the ceremony, as London will be hosting the 2012 Olympics then. Performers with umbrellas, transformable double-decker bus, Leona Lewis wit h Jimmy Page, and there goes the golden boy of British David Beckham.
I hate to say this but, the Brit's performance at the night was kinda disappointed. Maybe is because I'm not artistic enough, but I just can't feel the essence of their performance.

The world will be looking on London, how they going to host the games then. It should be getting better and better, and for now China has done the best, so it's quite a challenge for London to emulate China's achivements, and to further improvise the success.

Well, it's all over now. Lot's of excitement the athletes have gave us, Olympics at its best!

The ending theme for Olympics, "Hard to Say Goodbye" sang by a few Chinese artists.

Gundam 00 Season 2 mobile suits

Here's some pics of mobile suits that will be featured in the Gundam 00 season 2 anime.

Of course I don't need to introduce the good guys, the Celestial Beings. If you have no clue, their suits are in blue (00 Gundam), green (Cherudim Gundam), white (Seravee Gundam) & orange (Arios Gundam).

(click for larger pics)


Guys in red are, as usual, the baddies.



For the bad guys, their design somewhat stuck with the GN-X design. The red unit (Ahead, the weird unit without the lance) seems like an elite unit, but design-wise it's kinda disappointing.

Now that the mobile suits have been shown here, I hope that in the anime these suits will perform way better than it looks.


Source: SRW Hotnews

ZGMF-X666S Legend Gundam 1/100 model

Spent 3 days to complete this model as I've things to be settled in the intervals, either I'm going out for something or dinner etc. So yeah, finally completed the model....

Legend Gundam is piloted by Rey Za Burrel near the end of the Gundam SEED Destiny anime. This unit succeeds its predecessor the Providence Gundam in Gundam SEED, which Legend Gundam is based on. Legend Gundam was heavily damaged by Strike Freedom Gundam piloted by Kira Yamato, and was destroyed together with the ZAFT's fortress Messiah at the end of the epic war.

Comparison with my previous model GOUF Ignited. Legend is of course much bigger than the GOUF as the GOUF is just a mere 1/144 model, Legend is a 1/100 model. In the actual comparison the GOUF Ignited unit is actually taller than the Legend Gundam (19.2m VS 18.9m).

 

The DRAGOON (Disconnected Rapid Armament Group Overlook Operation Network) system. According to the anime the DRAGOON units can only be used in zero-gravity situation (the space) as it's difficult to control the DRAGOON units in earth atmosphere due to the gravitational force and the air resistance factors.

The DRAGOON backpack, heaviest part of the whole model.

Pose

Pose with the box.

The pilot, elite clone Rey Za Burrel of ZAFT.

This model is larger than the GOUF Ignited, so it comes with more parts, which means more details for me to cover, needed a longer time to complete it. If you ask me, I don't think it's that difficult with more parts to mess with, because after all this is still a HG model, not as detailed as MG so it's still OK. I've nothing to complain with the extra effort, it's worth it!

Overall I'm very pleased to get this model. It packs with lots of weapons to play with (it comes with beam sabers but I didn't show it up due to it's excessive length), great build up and most importantly, one of my favourite mobile suits from Gundam SEED Destiny.  

I guess for now I'll stick with this model, maybe I'll be getting another model after I finish my A2 exam in Nov. Making Gundam models is fun!  :D