What is SME Domain-name Reservation programme?
SME Domain-name Reservation is part of the Infocomm @ SME programme which is a collaboration between IDA, ACRA and SGNIC and its registrars. This program will continue until further notice.

New or existing Singapore SMEs [ACRA-registered businesses] includes:

• Business
• Companies including Public Accounting Corporation (PAC)
• Limited Liability Partnership (LLP)
• Public Accounting Firms (PAF)

When you have completed your company registration, there should be a domain reservation checkbox to select. Once you have selected the option, follow the instructions from the image below(click to enlarge):

After you have completed this step, simply drop us an email with the following information:

• Company name and address
• NRIC of business owner or any shareholder/director
• ACRA Business/Company registration no. (e.g. 2011xxxxxA)

If you have any questions or encounter difficulties in reserving your domain name, please contact us and we will assist you to the best of our ability.

Here's a quick explanation to why there is a need for hardware reserved memory
(Click to expand)

While many articles has been written to say that there is no way to remove this limitation, it is actually wrong. Here’s a hacked kernel from  a programmers group in Russia to correct the limitation. In fact this is a known problem according to Microsoft themselves as the special version of Windows Server 2003 Datacenter edition in 32bit supports up to 64GB of ram. Geoff Chappell, a software analyst commented on his article that 32bit editions of Vista all contain code for using physical memory above 4GB, it is just that Microsoft doesn’t license you to use that code.

So all you have to do now is download the file below, follow the instructions from unawave.de and you are done! The file might get detected as a trojan on some antivirus software, when that happens don’t panic as it is a false positive. Simply add the executable file to your antivirus exclusion list(or disable it temporarily) and you should be able to open the program fine.

Below are some images of my own system’s resource monitor and computer properties, I have been using the hack on both my home and office computers, so far there hasn’t been any issues. Gaming, photo editing, browsing and general applications work fine together, the extra RAM space does really shine in multi-tasking especially on some days when I have over 20 chrome windows(instances) with multiple extensions running.

*Click on thumbnails for full-size images.

Here’s the good news for you peeps out there who uses your Macbook Air for multimedia stuff or gaming in particular. OWC has announced their latest SSD expansion option for Macbook Air 2010 edition, they called it Mercury Aura Pro Express, and even include useful installation videos to show you how to. As we all know Apple has stripped down the SSD harddisk into a piece of RAM-like hardware to make the Macbook Air the slimmest yet, however making it impossible to upgrade using conventional sized SSD harddisks. But that didn’t stop OWC from making their own version of the upgrade and they come in 3 sizes: 180GB, 240GB and 360GB to satisfy even the most demanding situations.

There is a catch though, these expansion SSD drives offered by OWC don’t come cheap. At US$499.99, US$579.99 and US$1179.99 for 180/240/360GB respectively, off my mind here are a few comparisons for the price of upgrades based on per GB:

Macbook Air 11″

• 64GB upgrade to 128GB(*Apple) – S$4.69 per GB
• 64GB upgrade to 180GB(OWC) – S$3.60 per GB
• 64GB upgrade to 240GB(OWC) – S$3.14 per GB
• 64GB upgrade to 360GB(OWC) – S$4.26 per GB

Macbook Air 13″

• 128GB upgrade to 256GB(*Apple) – S$3.43 per GB
• 128GB upgrade to 240GB(OWC) – S$3.14 per GB
• 128GB upgrade to 360GB(OWC) – S$4.26 per GB

*I could only compare the Apple upgrades according to the price difference between the models. Looking at the numbers, it makes more sense to upgrade to 240GB being the most cost-effective option. Note also that when you purchase OWC expansion options you get to keep the old Apple’s SSD drive and from what I’ve read OWC plans to offer a buyback option, though I’m not sure about international purchases. OWC also claims that their SSD drives(driven by SandForce SF1200 processor) are 22% faster than Apple default drives besides the other advantages listed below:

• Designed & built in the US from domestic & imported parts.
• Chip Based Data Encryption: 128-bit AES-compliant.
• Intelligent “recycling” for advanced free space management.
• Best in class error correction (ECC) and SandForce RAISE™ (Redundant Array of Independent Silicon Elements) technology provides RAID-like data protection and reliability without loss of transfer speed due to parity.
• SandForce® Processor with 7% over-provisioning maximizes read and write performance to greatly extend the endurance and overall reliability of the drive.
• Up to 100X greater data protection than what the highest rated enterprise class conventional hard disk drive (HDD) provides.
• SandForce DuraClass™ technology with Ultra-efficient Block Management & Wear Leveling offers highest endurance, performance and power efficiency in a SSD.

The ability to upgrade the SSD drives on Macbook Air 2010 is definitely a welcomed option despite the towering prices and that does somehow take away the perception of the Macbook Air having a small harddisk limitation. The OWC SSD drives are out of my budget for now but it would definitely become a possibility when prices do come down in the future.

P.S FYI, I have purchased and used OWC Extreme Pro SSD before on my HTPC in a previous article.

Chipset Full Copper Heatsink + Fan ($10)

Chipset cooler

Just so you know the fan is pretty loud, but it does cool a chipset pretty well. Not sure if it’s any useful on mobo these days though.

Motorola SBV5120 Surfboard Cable Modem ($40)

Motorola SBV5120 Cable Modem

I’m not sure why Starhub never takes back their cable modem when I terminates contract with them but this has been lying around for some time and works well. This is a voice enabled one and allows up to 2 telephone lines connected to it.

Creative Audigy 2 PCI Sound Card ($10)

Creative Audigy 2

Picture speaks for itself, last known to be working but was a couple years ago. Buy at own risk.

4 Port USB PCI Card ($5)

USB x4 PCI Card

As picture, brand new, never use before so I’m quite sure it’s working. Wonder why I bought it for…

Nvidia 6600 AGP Graphic Card ($10)

Nvidia 6600 AGP Card

Working when last tested a few years ago. No blown/bloat caps. Buy at own risk.

EPOX Socket A motherboard ($5)

EPOX Socket A mobo

This motherboard is faulty, and has a single bloated cap. Would probably work well if you know how to solder caps.

AMD Athlon 1.8GHz Palomino (AX1800DMT3C AGKGA) ($15)

AMD Athlon Palomino 1.8GHz

Last known working. Comes with Coolermaster copper base heatsink.

Belkin F1DF102P Flip 2-Port KVM w/Remote (PS/2 Connection) ($20)

Belkin 2 Port KVM

Works perfectly fine, very useful if you want to switch between 2 PCs. More information here.

Seagate Cheetah 18.4GB SCSI HDD with Adaptec 29160 64bit PCI(32bit compatible) SCSI Card ($50)

Seagate SCSI HDD w/ Adaptec Card

Works fine. HDD is a refurbished repaired.

SCV Terayon Cable Modem ($5)

Terayon Cable Modem

Old skool modem back in the days before Starhub acquired SCV.

12►

Skin-Mate Keyboard Cover for Macbook Air 11″ 2010

Skin-Mate TPU Keyboard Cover

For those dwelling on the technicalities of TPU over silicon:

• excellent abrasion resistance
• outstanding low-temperature performance
• excellent mechanical properties, combined with a rubber-like elasticity
• very good tear strength
• high elasticity
• high transparency
• good oil and grease resistance

Moshi PalmGuard Air 11 w/ Trackpad Protector

Moshi PalmGuard Air 11

Final Thoughts…

I’m glad to say Moshi and Skin-Mate both produce high quality products in this review, no complains whatsoever and I can definitely recommend them to anyone who wishes to protect their investment. On a sidenote, I didn’t go for the Bodyguardz casing protection film as anodized aluminium is pretty scratch resistant and having a glossy look on my Macbook Air is just… fugly.

[[Show as slideshow]]

Chapter 1: Choosing my hardware

Oh boy, this part is probably the most important of all. If you ain’t no adventurer, don’t even bother looking for individual hardware parts. Trust me, it’s gonna be quite a roller coaster ride if you do not research enough. Remember the parts I mentioned here are selected based on what I already have in my living room. So be prepared to do some heavy reading if you are serious about it, otherwise save the hassle and go for ready made solutions like A.C.Ryan Playon devices or Zotac Zbox. I personally owned an older version of Playon device and it is utter rubbish imo but hey I’m quite a techie geek here so don’t go sending me lawyer letters now. Here are my choice of hardware parts:

• Motherboard – Asus AT5IONT-I Mini ITX Non Deluxe version
• Casing – Lian Li PCQ09 Black
• Harddisk – OWC 40GB Extreme Pro SSD
• RAM – 2 x 2GB Kingston DDR3 1333Mhz
• Ext. Harddisk – 2TB Western Digital Caviar Green with Vantec Nexstar USB 3.0 Dock
• Keyboard + Mouse – Logitech Dinovo Edge
• Extra Fan – Scythe S-Flex 120mm 1200rpm fan

Chapter 2: Why these hardware?

Asus AT5IONT-I

Motherboard: I chose the Asus AT5IONT-I simply because it’s the fastest mini-itx form factor motherboard with integrated CPU and GPU. The processor is an Intel Atom D525, a 1.8GHz dual core processor(the fastest atom as of writing) and the GPU is a Nvidia ION2(GTX218) equivalent to the specs of a 9500GT. With this kind of specs, there shouldn’t be any problem running 1080p MKV movies on it.

Lian Li PCQ09 Casing

Casing: I wanted something decent to match the rest of my devices and the Lian Li PCQ09 fits my requirements perfectly immediately after spotting it and reading through a review on it. I have high expectations for Lian Li casings as I have set up a few before for friends but the PCQ09 falls a tad short on quality with some rough edges but I’m just nitpicking. It is small, horizontal and sleek looking not forgetting it also has 2 front USB 3.0 ports in front and a 120W brick power supply. There’s also a low powered silent 80mm fan to draw out some heat from the casing.

OWC 40GB Extreme Pro SSD

Harddisk: I initially wanted to get an Cosair F40 SSD but after reading through StorageReview.com leaderboard, its review and checking out the price on macsales.com(official site for OWC), I’m surprised to find the OWC 40GB Extreme Pro actually cost less than the Cosair F40 even after shipping included. Although you might argue there’s no warranty, it’s actually not true as they do offer 3 years international warranty but the downside is you have to send it back to them in USA, seriously what are the chances…

Kingston 2GB DDR3 1333MHz SODIMM Ram

RAM: The ram compatibility with this motherboard is quite tricky as reported across a few forums and reviews but I managed to get the system booted up using Kingston DDR3 with KTC ram chips. Ran memtest86+ for couple of passes without problems. I did not quite follow the QVL list provided by Asus but if you are buying this motherboard be sure to check it out.

Vantec Nexstar USB 3.0 HDD Dock

Ext. Harddisk: I don’t need the fastest drive for storing and watching my movies so I chose the Caviar Green, which supposedly is rated at 5400rpm and runs cooler with less power. Perfect for living room environment. Noise wise it as quiet as any drive I have heard. I chose WD simply because of their reliability, I had a lot of bad experiences with Seagate and Samsung. I really don’t mind losing movies but I totally hate the hassle of sending in the drives for RMA. For the dock, I was looking for Astone DOC-130 but it ran out of stock everywhere so I ended up getting the Vantec Nexstar, nothing much to complain about since I got it at the same price but if you watch a lot of movies in the dark, the Vantec dock can be a bit distracting with it’s huge power LED lights. I will probably rip it apart and disconnect the LEDs some day but right now I’m turning it sideways.

Logitech Dinovo Edge

Keyboard + Mouse: I got a refurbished Logitech Dinovo Edge off eBay for a decent price. It’s quite an expensive keyboard to purchase it brand new, a whopping S$340 if you can afford it. The one I got works fine, Logitech make fine wireless keyboards and this one comes with an integrated mouse touchpad on it.

Scythe S-Flex 120mm 1200rpm Case fan

Extra Fan: The Asus AT5IONT-I has a huge passive heatsink but apparently it is not quite enough to cool the CPU based on what I see on the temperatures. Without a fan, it can go around 50+ degrees on idle and 60+ on load. That is a bit worrying so I slapped on a 120mm Scythe silent fan and the temps drop a good 10 degrees on idle, haven’t tested full load with the 120mm fan yet but I will update when I done that.

Update: Watching movies/animes for a few hours and the CPU and GPU temps stay around 45 degrees but XBMC’s actually uses DXVA GPU acceleration and the CPU usage doesn’t go above 10%.

Chapter 3: Putting it all together.

120mm fan too close to top metal cover

After deciding on the hardware, there isn’t much to talk about other than assembling them altogether and booting it up for the 1st time. The only problem I had with this casing was adding the 120mm Scythe fan. I thought the fan height would fit into the casing but I was so wrong. I only manage to screw on the top cover after using some force, I’m hoping it doesn’t crush the processor over time. Also the metallic top cover is so close to touching the fan’s motor that if dust were to accumulate there, I’m praying it won’t jam up or damage the fan. I might change to a low profile fan in the future e.g. Scythe Slip Stream Slim but by doing that I will lose around 20CFM worth of air circulation.

Chapter 4: Choosing your software.

The choice of my OS is Windows 7 32bit. This processor is capable of running 64bit windows but since XBMC(the media center software which I will explain later) runs on 32bit, it offers no extra benefit at the moment. And if you are thinking my setup is limited to 3GB with 32 bit OS, there’s a nifty hack that enables 4GB ram or more on 32bit OS. I did ran into some issues when I tried to play some huge 14GB 1080p resolution MKVs initially, I have always installed CCCP with CoreAVC to ensure my GPU is crunching out the video and not just the CPU alone. Apparently it is a bad idea to do that on an Intel Atom setup. CoreAVC utilizes CUDA on my setup but it turns out it still uses processing power from the CPU for memory copy as highlighted in this thread:

“The CoreCodec CoreAVC codec supports GPU hardware acceleration, but it uses the NVIDIA CUDA platform for mathematical processing. The CUDA decoded content needs to be copied to GPU memory, resulting in higher CPU utilization”

With this problem hanging around, I get a lot of video and audio stutters and it nearly got me thinking if the motherboard was faulty or just not powerful enough to play 1080p videos smoothly. After reading through this separate article that reviews and tested software players on the same motherboard, I’m guessing it might be CCCP filters that didn’t use GPU hardware or that CoreAVC still require a powerful processor. I went on to install the standalone MPC-HC and XBMC as suggested in the article and it worked perfectly.

If you haven’t used XBMC before, this is probably the first and only media player you will want to install in your HTPC. There are a few reasons why I choose XBMC:

• DXVA 2.0 Hardware Acceleration – Similarly to CUDA, CoreCodec explains the key differences very well here. DXVA2 works well with my setup and plays 1080p content very smoothly.
• Ability to pass AC3/DTS signals through HDMI – This is important for my setup as I connect my HTPC through HDMI to my A/V receiver. It works perfectly the way I wanted.
• Multiple codecs - XBMC can support any kind of video formats you throw at it. I play a lot of MKVs and FLAC audio works on it as well.
• Clean simple interface – The default interface is user-friendly and easy to navigate. Organizing media is a breeze as well, no steep learning curve. There are tonnes of themes to choose around if you get bored of the default one after some time.
• Big open source community – With a huge community supporting and developing XBMC, there’s little worry on the stability and new features are always implemented to ensure the software is keeping up with the latest technologies.
• It’s 100% FREE!

Chapter 5: Sit back & enjoy!

Once you completed your setup and tested it thoroughly, it’s time to sit back and enjoy some high quality movies on your HTPC! Don’t forget the popcorn!

If you have any queries on my setup or if you run into any troubles with your HTPC, do contact me at my email laurent [at] howorks [dot] com and I will try my best to assist you.

12►

We often advice our clients to clearly state their requirements in the beginning of the project or campaign because while work is in progress, it’s downright frustrating when they change their requirements e.g. they spotted a better product, 3rd party opinions, etc. When that happens, it is Ctrl-Alt-Delete-back-to-the-drawing-board for us and that kills us because so much of our time and efforts are wasted. We can definitely work around small changes and minor fixes but it is simply asking too much if there are drastic changes.

I recently came up with a “Quits” checklist for our team, so that any one of us handling a project would ask these questions when met with the same difficult situation:

• “New” Ideas & Specifications – Has the client changed their requirements or push new ideas more than once while work in progress?
• Never-ending Deadlines – Has the client kept on extending deadlines even when they claim the project or campaign is urgent?
• Revisions – Has the project or campaign gone through revisions more than once?
• Trust – Has the client shown any doubts in the work done?
• Excuses – Did the client come up with unreasonable excuses even though objectives were met?
• Communication – Have we and/or the client communicated properly throughout the project/campaign work cycle?

Of course this list should be avoided, only to be brought up as a last resort in my opinion and most importantly keeping in mind that the root of the problem may not necessary be the client but also the contractor(us) as well. What’s your take on this, how does your company deal with unreasonable customers and is it possible to walk away without spoiling the business relationship?

WordPress is one of the fastest growing open source CMS  and millions around the world are already using it. One would be naive to think WordPress as only a blogging platform as many has transform websites under the WordPress platform into successful corporate blogs, interactive portals, media sites, powerful e-commerce websites, etc. We are also WordPress fanatics(heh, experts are a bestowed word not self-proclaimed in our opinion) and we have also been working with other CMS like Joomla and Drupal. Without a doubt all these CMS are powerful in certain aspects but we feel WordPress gives us the best flexibility in terms of web publishing development.

Apart from a newborn SWUG, where’s everyone else?

Points I keep in mind when planning for campaigns:

• Be very creative – Throwing discounts off the shelves usually is a hit and miss. Take a stroll down any shopping mall and you will be greeted with sales and discounts in almost every shop, it’s downright boring and if it is not believable anymore, buyers don’t buy it. The concept is the same with online surfers. The are a myriad of ways to attract buyers to a brand: re-launch an old product as new vintage, give out free samples, 1 for 1 coupons, mini contests and giveaways, etc. The idea is to be creative. If you don’t find it believable yourself, nobody will.
• Terms & Conditions – We were recently approached to promote a website with a product that has over 20 lines, half a webpage worth of terms and conditions. Perfect recipe for failure, I wouldn’t even read the the first line of the T&C after looking at it! If you are that paranoid with your users abusing your campaign, don’t do it.
• Keep it simple – Nobody likes a complicated campaign. Start a contest, participant must buy your product, tell 10 friends about it, ask them to buy it, then take photos and then post it to your website OR start a contest, give a free sample and ask participants to post a comment on your website after using it. I’m exaggerating but you get the idea, fight the hassle.
• Use different channels – Don’t start a campaign without planning which channels to publicize it. Imagine running a promotion on your website hoping someone will spot it. The impact is minimal, go big with social media and websites with huge traffic. Don’t be afraid to try and once you know which channels are effective, work with them closely on future campaigns.
• Don’t be cheap – Don’t overspend either, work with the right channels and reward them well if the campaign goes your way. If you try to squeeze them dry, don’t blame anyone if your campaign doesn’t get the deserved attention. Bandwidth ain’t cheap, and we know that best.

Once you get your campaign plans into action, it helps people like us understand them better to execute it cost effectively. Well, throwing us a million dollar budget works too.

While it’s hard to think how much different you can do with emails these days other than changing the fonts or adding a picture, Google Wave taps on gadgets within each wave to insert features into emails, for example you could add a poll into your wave, you could rewind your wave to see the modifications made to the original, play voicemails on it, translate to a different language in realtime, and many more interesting gadgets. There are tonnes of gadgets developed by Google or 3rd party users and companies you could utilize to create the ultimate email experience.

Or probably not. It’s a wonderful idea but many have quoted it as far too ambitious, and changing the way people are use to using their emails for work may just seem too much of a hassle. I personally have tried Google Wave even before the beta was released and although it feels like a good idea for techies, it is just too overwhelming to use for end-users. There isn’t a central where you can easily search for a gadget you want to use and it gets way too sluggish sometimes with the amount of data transferring in and out of Google Wave servers. The hassle for users to get used to Google Wave’s layout and feel maybe the reason for the lack of followers, everyone simply try it and once the novelty dies out nobody returns to use it again. It’s simply too revolutionary for it’s own good.

I do however wish Google hadn’t terminate the Wave project so early into the game, it’s barely a year since its testing phase and they have given up already. Reinventing the email, in my opinion, takes time and for that purpose alone it is still worth a shot to keep it going. Sadly, the results clearly isn’t good enough to keep developing it.