Toshiba Folio AS100 – ruining their own reputation?

Posted on November 10, 2010 by sipp11

I was expecting to grab AC100, but unfortunately Toshiba Thailand decided to stay put releasing AC100 indefinitely. Nonetheless, they, at least, are in a hurry having AS100 on sale (hoping to get some market share from Apple iPad, perhaps.) 10″ slate tablet powered by promising nVidia Tegra 2 and Android. It does look good on the paper indeed. Unfortunately, it’s doomed to fail hard.

Not a single thing is right. From cheapy chassis; half baked Android Froyo; ugly look. Checkout photos below if it’s true.

A pixelated screen isn’t from the camera. The screen looks worse in person, believe me. Touch sensitivity isn’t responsive as it should be. On-screen keyboard is just plain stock Android, no optimization to suit large screen like Samsung or Dell did with their tablets. You may see that all menu is tweaked for menu + key which is supposed to be for AC100. Tweaked UI like home button on top left is pretty small, not even suited fingerprint touch. It seems like everything isn’t for AS100 at all. Actually, in other words, it’s failed since the screen is off. When screen is on, it’s even worse.

It definitely gets 0 rating from me, failed miserably.

Popularity: 4% [?]

PDF reflow on Kindle

Posted on November 4, 2010 by sipp11

Although the latest Kindle is capable to handle PDF file with some good tricks: zoom & contrast. It doesn’t have a reflow feature which is needed for regular size Kindle (I have no comment about Kindle DX since I don’t own one.) which most of PDF file is in letter or A4 paper size. At fit-to-screen zoom, everyone will have problem reading freaking small text size. Zoom isn’t natural enough to read comfortably also. Fortunately, Amazon realized this issue and have a way to solve this issue. Amazon will convert PDF to reflowed kindle own format for you for free (or a small bucks via Whisper sync)

What do you need to do?

Add your email in “Your Kindle Approved E-Mail list,” if you don’t know where to find this, go to amazon.com -> your account -> manage your Kindle
If you want to do this freely, then set Maximum individual charge limit: $
If you don’t do this, then you have to make sure that you use you Kindle’s email with @free.kindle.com domain only. By setting as $0 limit, Amazon will switch from @kindle.com to @free.kindle.com automatically.
Prepare PDF file; attach this file; send by e-mail in approved list to Kindle’s email address [with @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com if you set limit to $0] with subject convert
Wait and see the magic from Amazon. If you do have WIFI on, this document will get in your Kindle less than few minutes. If not, then you can grab the file in replied email from Amazon.

What will you lose? Unfortunately, you will lose something figure or format, but all I can say is it’s much better than I expected.

Is there any alternative? yes, there is. Auto Kindle is a project that converts PDF file to mobi format which is able to re-flow in Kindle. But as I tested, output is not as good as Amazon’s way.

Now, I’m only waiting for Moleskine to release a cover for 3rd generation Kindle, I would be all set!

Popularity: 15% [?]

Better Firefox toolbar in Linux

Posted on October 30, 2010 by sipp11

While it looks just right in Windows, default toolbar in Linux just looks way too bulky: gap & padding for buttons are just too big. However, none can’t be customized. Here is what I configure mine.

For Firefox, it will read userChrome.css for custom UI. It’s located in /home/<user-name>/.mozilla/firefox/<random>.default/chrome/ You can just create one.

/* Menu Bar - Shrink and Fade Text */
#navigator-toolbox .menubar-text {
	font-size: 70% !important;
	color: #999 !important;
	}

/* URL Bar and Search Bar - Shrink and Fade Text*/
#urlbar, #searchbar{
	font-size: 85% !important;
	color: #333 !important;
	}

/* Tabs - Shrink Font and Height*/
.tabbrowser-tabs {
	font-size: 80% !important;
	height: 20px !important;
	}
.tabbrowser-strip {
	height: 22px !important;
	}

/* Bookmarks Toolbar - Shrink Font and Size*/
#PersonalToolbar {
	font-size: 90% !important;
	padding: 0px !important;
	margin: 0px !important;
	max-height: 20px !important;
	}
	/* Seperators - Remove */
	#PersonalToolbar toolbarseparator {
		display: none !important;
		}
	/* Toolbar Buttons - Reduce Margins */
	#PersonalToolbar toolbarbutton {
		margin: 0 -5px 0 -1px !important;
		}
	/* Toolbar Icons - Shrink and Reduce Margins */
	#PersonalToolbar .toolbarbutton-icon {
		max-width: 12px !important;
		max-height: 12px !important;
		margin: 0px 2px 0px 0px !important;
		}

This will reduce button size into what it should be. Surely you can adjust suiting your preference easily with a bit knowledge of CSS.

Popularity: 4% [?]

The day flip phone surprises me

Posted on October 15, 2010 by sipp11

Samsung V200 In a day that smartphone rules the world of a living, iPhone, Android and such are just outperforming all featured phone. I have been using so-called smart phone since Treo’s day. Before that, I never was a fan of all in one kind of things: PDA and phone specifically. Then I was super happy Tungsten T2 + Sony E T-630. I could access internet by connecting via Bluetooth. Now, I’m with Nexus One. Is that good? yeah. Am I impressed w/N1? absolutely. However, recently I have been forced to have 2 cells. One with unlimited data plan—on N1 surely–and the other with cheapy voice plan; the combination works. Things get more interesting from that.

Nowadays, I find myself using N1 as just PDA back in the day. It’s much more powerful than T2, of course. I love it. The biggest surprise Samsung V200 is a sammy flip phone. Nothing is special at all by today’s standard—back then it’s the very FIRST POLYPHONIC ringtone capable phone LOL. Lucky me that it is still rock. What do I find? I find that it’s very very easy to pick up the phone and surely nothing bothers if I tap on the virtual button or NOT. If I want to answer the call, just open the phone. If I want to hang up, just flip it back. If I want to make a phone call, just type the name. T9 sucks I must admit, but swiping through 300+ contacts is worse. Oddly enough, I never find Treo is less effective in phone ability to any featured phone. I, nevertheless, have yet to find any easy-to-use/real productive in phone for touch phone at all.

In short, are we running toward a wrong direction? possibly. I can see that Samsung flip phone just gives me more productive as far as phone call is concerned. Although it doesn’t give me any extra service like N1 can provide, touch phones by all means ain’t a good phone either. I wish I see a good new cellphone again one day. It won’t be so soon until touch trend is over; but on that day, I’ll be eagerly waiting.

Popularity: 1% [?]

3G UMTS Band fact for choosing phone

Posted on October 12, 2010 by sipp11

Although 4G is coming to town—well, at least in the US, considering purchasing phone for worldwide usage, it’s tough.

Band I (W-CDMA 2100) in Europe, Africa, Asia, Oceania (ITU Region 1) and Brazil (part of ITU Region 2)

Band II (W-CDMA 1900) in North America and South America (ITU Region 2)

Band IV (W-CDMA 1700 or Advanced Wireless Services) in the United States (T-Mobile USA) [It’s 1700MHz upload link + 2100 download link; need dual band to work properly)

Band V (W-CDMA 850) in America, Canada, Australia, parts of South America, parts of Asia (ITU Region 2 and ITU Region 3)

Band VIII (W-CDMA 900) in Europe, Asia, Oceania (ITU Region 1 and ITU Region 3)

As far as I know, band usage is totally up to service provider. Guideline above doesn’t help a bit about what band we are using. We just have choose phone suit our choices of service provider. Sometimes it’s pretty hard to know all about these info since it’s not well informed publicly. I would add data in to this matrix as far as my knowledge goes.

Country	Carrier	UMTS band
US	AT&T	Band V
	T-Mobile	Band IV
Thailand	AIS	Band VIII
	True	Band V
	TOT	Band I

*This covers only GSM. Verizon & Sprint in the US and Hutch in Thailand use CDMA.

Most phones support Band I and either Band V or Band VIII, not both. You really have to be careful choosing one or you will end up using only EDGE network. So far, only iPhone 4 supports Band V, Band VIII, Band II and Band I (850/900/1900/2100) pretty versatile phone I would say. We surely can expect more of these very wide range of support in the future. [Apple iPhone 4 spec]

T-mobile G2 supports Band I & Band IV (AWS/2100) [reference]

Popularity: 5% [?]

force to use Google.com, not any local search

Posted on August 16, 2010 by sipp11

Google is a smart ass when it comes to serve what people want. However, most of the time you find yourself aboard, they just assume you are one of local folks. That’s painful when you are searching something. You are likely to get most of local search results than what you are familiar with. So? what can we do with it? It’s varied by how you do things.

1. If you used to open browser, type “google.com” then find things from there. You will have to type a bit more than usual. Try “google.com/ncr” This time you will see same old buddy you saw/expected.

NCR – is likely to be an abbreviation of No Country Redirection.

2. If you are using Firefox, you will have to find new search engine. Lucky us, portugesemike did this for us all. You can just use this instead of regular Google one.

3. If you are using Chrome, you have to go through setting a bit as following.

UPDATE 2011/08/10:
Preference –> Manage Search Engines

Add new search engine by using
Search Engine: Google.com
keyword: google.com/
URL: http://www.google.com/search?q=%s

Customize and Control >> Options >> Basic tab >> click at manage in default search section

You have to add *ncr* to keyword, then magic will happen.

Have fun with real Google.com search!

Popularity: 2% [?]

Wireless XBOX controller keeps turning off

Posted on July 30, 2010 by sipp11

Symptom: your XBOX controller keeps turning off while you are playing; although it can be turned on instantly, but the mood is gone.

Cause: Firstly, check if batteries are empty or not. If not, it can be assumed that a contact in the battery compartment is moving. Thus your controller will shut off when the contact surface doesn’t touch the battery. It’s all about hardware, nothing is related to software or driver at all.

Solution: don’t try to bend the metal contact since it will be weaken the metal. What you need is something to put in underneath the metal contact and make sure of the contact will stay close to the battery at all time. Below figures are a dirty way to do so; it doesn’t look nice, but works nicely =)

Popularity: 6% [?]

Sync Contacts problem in Froyo?

Posted on July 28, 2010 by sipp11

Symptom: No matter how you tried, you will not see Twitter and/or Facebook data in your contacts.

Cause: When you upgraded your Android to Froyo, you are likely to face this issue–missing Facebook and/or Twitter contact in your existed contacts. It’s somehow broken the bond between Contact & Facebook & Twitter.

Solution: Go to Settings | Applications | Manage Applications – find Twitter and/or Facebook, then tap Clear data. Restart once, check if you have Sync Contacts turn on for those apps. You should be good to go now. If you still find a problem, try Clear data in Contacts too. It will be a bit slow to recover this time since it will have to start from scratch again, but you will have everything in order again.

Popularity: 2% [?]

MOTOLORA: Buy from another company if you like to have custom ROMs.

Posted on July 15, 2010 by sipp11

This has been addressed by Motolora couple days ago before upcoming Droid X, which is named to be the best phone yet, is available.

I really don’t understand yet how Motolora decided to piss customers (or soon to be customers) like this. As Nexus One owner, I can do pretty much all I want with phone. However, I still use stock ROM, why? I don’t like any custom ROM over vanilla one. Nonetheless, I do push some edited libraries I like to my phone such as light_mahimahi and indeed superboot image which is for root access. Nothing is better than what you’ve done by yourself.

The way I see this is Motolora can just do the way Google did with Nexus One. You can unlock easily, but the consequence is no turning back and surely voiding warranty. That is software part of course—if your phone turned to a brick, that’s yours since you gave your consent before unlocking. However, if hardware failure happens, that should be covered. There is a rumor about eFuse being used in Droid X as well, but that ain’t confirmed. If it’s true, it would be the worst move ever. By the way, we all know that rooted phones are just a minority; custom ROM phones are even less, but these are groups of people who are willing to buy every single new phone or considering as pretty loyal customers. I guess that Motolora never learned when Palm, Inc pissed off all loyal customers then.

For me, the worst thing of this issue is Motolora is like the only company so far that has a physical keyboard which I really want. Milestone was my target. This issue gave me a big pause—since I was waiting for superboot image for it for a while now. However, with new Droid X, I guess Motolora will have no real advantage to other companies then.

Good bye, MOTO until you change your mind.

updated: (July 28, 2010) It seems like DroidX can be rooted pretty easy w/o breaking anything; what a good sign that is.

Popularity: 1% [?]

AT&T Nexus One to Froyo

Posted on June 29, 2010 by sipp11

It’s been a while after T-mobile one got Frozen Yogurt. However, it’s time to end since Google started pushing Froyo OTA update since last week. I got 2 OTA updates, but they both failed to complete the update. Why? because I rooted my EPE54B. Thus, OTA will not do the job nicely.

How? you can do all manual update =) As of now, Google released FRF85B. For whom you might not understand, all T-mobile and AT&T, which have their own build number, will have to same build, FRFxx. When Google first released Froyo to T-mobile Nexus One, it’s like FRF50. However, not it’s FRF85B which is official.

Update procedure: it will be 2 path for rooted N1 and unrooted N1.

1. For unrooted N1, EPE54B, you just grab images of your build below.

FRF83 to FRF85B download this file.
EPE54B to FRF85B download this file.

2. Rename the file to update.zip and copy to root directory of SD.

3. Reboot your N1 to recovery mode by holding volume down + power. You will get into HBoot/Fastboot mode.

4. Use volume up/down to select menu and power to select “recovery.” N1 will reboot again to /!\ page. That’s fine. Then, you have to get into recovery mode by holding power and press volume up.

5. You will see Android system recovery;you now can use your trackball to select any option. Choose apply sdcard:update.zip

6. Wait until reboot and have fun with Frozen Yogurt.

For rooted N1, you will have to take rougher route. You actually have many ways to do so. Custom ROM like Modaco or else, for example. However, I just prefer to have original ROM with root access. You can follow these steps to do so:

1. go back to original image.

2. update as unrooted N1 steps above

3. root FRF85B

For the first step, you need to download original image, here. Please check md5 too. Then you have to extract boot.img, recovery.img out to your android-sdk tools directory (c:\android-sdk\tools for me) Now you are ready to copy old image to replace superboot one by fastbooting. You have to get to Fastboot mode and check if it’s Fastbook USB which is indicated connection between N1 and computer.

c:\android-sdk\tools> fastboot devices  // to check if computer sees N1
c:\android-sdk\tools> fastboot erase userdata
c:\android-sdk\tools> fastboot erase cache

This 2 steps above are optional and if you use Amon_RA’s recovery, you will have to get into recovery mode to wipe those.

c:\android-sdk\tools> fastboot flash boot boot.img
c:\android-sdk\tools> fastboot flash recovery recovery.img
c:\android-sdk\tools> fastboot reboot

That would be all set for returning back to original image =) (well, not exactly true since we didn’t care about system.img and userdata.img which the update doesn’t bother.)

For the last step, download superboot image here. Then rename to update.zip and apply sdcard:update.zip in recovery mode like when you did with updating Froyo image.

Now you will be very happy AT&T Froyo Nexus One like I am.

Note: FRF85B root update.zip didn’t do the trick for me since it’s error while updating. If you face the same situation, just ask. You can do a manual way also =)