sightseeing in midwest Ireland

Posted by Ronan on Jul 31, 2008 in Uncategorized | 1 comment

Last weekend I did a bit of sightseeing around Clare/Tip and Limerick with our Spanish visitors. We went to Bunratty Castle, Cliffs of Moher, Killaloe and the ‘Look Out’ just outside Portroe. The weather was fantastic which only made the views even more spectacular. I’ve a couple of more places to see such as the Poulnabrone Dolmen, Cragganowen, the caves of Doolin and maybe the Caherconnell Stone Fort before the summers out..

any other places I should see?

Asus eee v's iPod touch

Posted by Ronan on Jul 20, 2008 in ipod | 1 comment

The centre bought 10 Asus EEE pc so we could use them in our Azimuth Test chamber. I managed to borrow one and play with for a while. First impression – it’s small… and looks well.
Around the same time I bought an Ipod Touch. So which is better ? Well that’s a tough question.. is it even a fair question ?
Let’s have a look at the specs:

Specs for asus eee 701

• Display : 7″
• CPU & Chipset : Intel Mobile CPU & chipset
• Operating System : Linux System/ Hardware Compatible with Windows XP
• Communication : 10/100 Mbps Ethernet
• WLAN : WiFi 802.11b/g
• Memory : 512MB, DDR2
• Storage : 4GB S.S.D. (Solid-State Disk)
• Web-Cam : 0.3 Mega Pixel Video camera
• Audio : Hi-Definition audio CODEC, Built-in stereo speaker, Built-in microphone
• Keyboard : Qwerty UK keyboard
• Expansion: 3 x USB ports
• Battery Life : 3 hrs (4 cells)
• Dimension & Weight : 22.5 x 16.4 x 2.15~3.5 cm, less than 1kg

Ipod Touch

Display

• 3.5-inch (diagonal) widescreen Multi-Touch display
• 480-by-320-pixel resolution at 163 pixels per inch

Wireless⁵

• Wi-Fi (802.11b/g)
• Maps location based service

Power and battery

• Built-in rechargeable lithium ion battery
• Playback time
  • Music playback time: Up to 22 hours when fully charged
  • Video playback time: Up to 5 hours when fully charged

Charging via USB to computer system or power adapter (sold separately)

• Fast-charge time: about 1.5 hours (charges up to 80% of battery capacity)
• Full-charge time: about 3 hours

So both have (around) the same running time which is important considering you are buying these for travel. The iPod touch wins by a mile if only listening to music. Both allow you to check email, surf the web and play music. Ok the asus pc has a webcam which is great but other than that in terms of features the devices are pretty similar. The touch also wins in terms of capacity. Out of the box 8Gb vs 4Gbs.

The ipod touch does everything I need when travelling .. the real benefit over the asus eee pc is its size – in the pocket and off I go. I can pick up email, read rss feeds, listen to music, browse the web etc. For more heavy duty work like long blog posts, watching movies I have a laptop! The asus keyboard is just too small for my fingers (see picture below), where as with the ipod touch it’s quite easy to type with thumbs and fingers albeit at a slower pace! The iPod touch has a 3.5 inch screen and the asus screen is 7 inches.. still for real work, or watching a movie neither is well suited.

So is there a place for the Asus EEE in my computing-world? I’m afraid not.

I declare iPod touch the winner.

There’s a very good review of the Asus EEE over at Eirepreneur
To use his pro’s and cons
GOOD

• Size and form-factor: It really is a rugged, go-anywhere device and fits numerous places a laptop won’t go (eg. glove compartments, drawers, handbags, large coat pockets)
• AC-DC adapter/charger: This is more like a mobile phone charger than the usual dual-cabled brick. And with two meters of thin white cable it reaches just about every seat in the house.
• Webcam: Centered in the bezel above the screen it adds greatly to the feeling of eye-contact when Video Skyping.
• Boot-up/shutdown: So speedy it puts a Windoze laptop to shame.

BAD

• Battery life: At about 3 hours of normal use this is quite disappointing.
• Keyboard: Though not a problem for me many users will find it difficult to touch type.
• Linux: As user-friendly as the Easy Mode GUI is it’s still lipstick on a pig. And that’s coming from someone who was a Linux Sys Admin. In order to get Skype and Google Earth working satisfactorily I had to dust off a command line manual and reference online forums and wikis.

hmmm I think I'll have the bandit liver.

Posted by Ronan on Jul 20, 2008 in Uncategorized | 1 comment

From our hotel in Beijing..

Over way too early

Posted by Ronan on Jul 20, 2008 in Uncategorized | 3 comments

Galway are out. The hurling season that promised _so_ much is over.

Damn it!

Expensive posts

Posted by Ronan on Jul 18, 2008 in Uncategorized | 3 comments

.. I have a load of blog posts I want to get done such as the Asus EEE vs IPod Touch, or funny phrases, or some funny Chinglish I saw abroad.
They’ll have to wait until I get this off my chest.

My mobile operator has a new scheme call ‘Connect Abroad Daily‘ . Apparently I “signed up for this in the store” said the operator. What Store ?? I’ve bought ALL my phones online since 2001. “Ohh” said the operator. I could sense a quiver in his voice and panic beginning to set in.

So when I asked why I was charged 24 euros for 43kb of data while abroad they said “eehhh dunno – please hold“. I waited for 5 minutes for my intrepid customer care representative to get back to me – “That charge will refunded and you’ll be charged the rate of 5 euro per Mb.” I said I’ve only used 43kb and it wasn’t acceptable to be charged 5 euros for 1/20th of a Mb. They backed down on it and charged per 10kb – which I am happy with.

I wanted to end the call have resolved this problem but just then I noticed the requested change of tariff I did online last month had not gone through – he said they would “recalculate this months cost and refund the difference AND the 24 euros on the next available bill“.. which is: September.

I think this is the straw that has broken the camels back – I’m switching.
Dunno to who yet.. but I’m switching. As soon as all the refunds has come through I’m switching.
Any recommendations ?

So the warning of the day is : if you have passport enabled and/or Internet allowance on your account watch for the ‘Connect Abroad Daily’ shite that has just kicked in. Make sure you ‘opt out’ of it.. otherwise you’ll get hit for a hefty bill.

this is weird!

Posted by Ronan on Jul 7, 2008 in Uncategorized | 4 comments

can you believe square A and square B are the same colour?
Get a color catcher and you’ll find they are..