Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by Steel Up

Bounce card

Steel Up — Fri, 09 Nov 2012 01:01:21 +0800

I recently bought A Better Bounce Card (Large) for my Metz 44. I THINK I installed it correctly on my flash according to the instructions, but it seems like the lighting is not as soft with the card placed on my flash.

Ceiling bounce with no card

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Ceiling bounce with card

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Both photos have the same settings. 1/125, F4.5, ISO 100, Daylight white balance.

Will the card give me a much softer light in outdoor environment or indoors with really high ceiling/no bounce-able surface nearby? Any help would be most appreciated.

How many batteries needed for my external flash?

Steel Up — Sat, 27 Oct 2012 22:06:03 +0800

Hello everyone. I hope it was right for me to create a new thread for this ; I'm really sorry if that's not the case.

I'm a relative newcomer to photography and I just recently bought a Metz 44 AF-1 flashgun for my Canon 1100D. Now I'm thinking of buying 2 sets of Eneloop XX batteries, each with their own charger. Would 8 Eneloop XX batteries last me the whole day? Anime Festival Asia shall be the first time for me to test the Metz and I'm worried about running out of batteries for my flashgun. The number of pictures I take can vary greatly between events, but would 8 XXs be enough for, say, 500+ shots with the Metz?

Should I buy 8 more Eneloop XXs (just the batteries, no more chargers)? I might get some Duracell alkalines as backups, but I'd rather not start using them until towards the end of the day (4PM onwards. I start taking photos around 10AM). On the other hand, getting 8 more would put the total cost at Rm300+ and I don't know if that might just be an overkill.

Please share with me your experiences. I would most appreciate it.

Planning some upgrades to my PC

Steel Up — Mon, 14 Nov 2011 16:44:27 +0800

Hello everyone! I'm planning to change a few parts for the purpose of gaming. Budget is RM 2000 or below. My current specs are:

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Plans:

-As of right now I don't really want to change my mobo and CPU. Planning to just overclock my q6600 and buy a cooler. Which cooler might be good?

-I want to get a 3TB HDD and the budget will include OEM Windows 7 Home Premium. Will it be worth it to purchase the HDD now considering the prices are sky high?

- I also plan to get at least 4 GB of RAM. Or would 8GB be a better investment? My PC can support DDR3 right? Would you recommend HyperX or regular DDR3?

-After the above has been considered, which GPU would be good for my setup with minimal bottleneck?

Thanks, everyone! Any help would be much appreciated!

Dealing with subjects you're weak at

Steel Up — Mon, 25 Jul 2011 14:53:02 +0800

We all know university education is mostly about self-learning, but how do you go about dealing with subjects that you are particularly weak at? For example, if you were qualitatively strong but VERY quantitatively weak and could excel at, say, 23 out of 25 subjects/units/modules of the whole course, what could you do about the 2 subjects with strong quantitative focus? Or you could just reverse the situation. Of course, this does not exactly apply to the excellent all-rounders.

'Tuition' on the undergraduate level is very unlikely, and the consultation hours provided by your lecturers might not be adequate. Add to that the fact that you could not even begin to self-study on something you're completely clueless at. So I'd like to know how all of you dealt with your Achilles' heel during your undergraduate years. I'm not talking about just passing, but rather getting a distinction, or a credit at the very worst.

Currently I'm betting on getting to know the top scorers of the subjects. But other than peer assistance(which might or might not work), what else could be done?

Laptop fell down from the roof of my car

Steel Up — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 19:27:53 +0800

So yeah, it fell down while it was in my laptop bag. I guess a minimal amount of the impact was cushioned, but still...

Runs fine at the moment, save for a broken 'joint' or however you call it (the part that turns when you fold your laptop). But I'm still quite worried, and since prevention is better than cure I have several questions:

1) What could possibly be the long term consequences?

2) Should I take preventative measures now? Eg. Replacing the HDD perhaps, to avoid data loss?

3) I just upgraded the RAM and I might want to upgrade to Home Basic OEM to raise the memory cap. In relation to question 1 and 2, would this be a wise short term investment?

4) Is it possible to estimate the overall lifespan? I'm sorry if this is a rather unrealistic question.

Just a short dxdiag log of my PC below.

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Thank you for your time! Do tell if more information is required.

Friendzoning

Steel Up — Sat, 29 May 2010 09:43:19 +0800

How exactly does one friendzone him/herself? I'm vying, against another guy, for the attention of a girl and between the both of us I guess I do most of the listening to her problems. The more 'understanding' fella, I suppose.

And I can't seem to stop myself from doing this, since I love her and I want to be there for her. But don't guys who become shoulders to cry on get friendzoned in the end? Should I just ignore her problems and just do my thing?

She doesn't know about my feelings, by the way. It's really killing me since if I were to confess, our friendship might get affected and I don't want that. On the other hand, I'd be kicking myself if I were to lose her to other guy if there's no friendzoning going on, yet I delay in telling her my feelings.

Quantitative Method/Business Stats

Steel Up — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:56:13 +0800

I'll be taking quantitative method/business stats next sem. Well, some people say it isn't too hard since it's only a second sem subject. But I'm very, VERY weak in Maths. I've been wondering about how to really prepare myself for this course. Should I go for STPM-level math tuition or are there QM/BS tutors around KL/PJ? Or are there good books I can self-revise with effectively? I have roughly 3 months of holiday before the next sem.

Please help.

[addedon]November 19, 2009, 5:55 pm[/addedon]BUMP

Please help, I really gotta know. :S

3.1 or higher CGPA during first year of a degree

Steel Up — Tue, 07 Jul 2009 17:46:31 +0800

So I'm thinking of enrolling in Taylors' University of South Australia's Bachelor of Management. I plan to credit transfer to Monash later based on my first year results. Thing is, I'm unsure if I'm able to meet the 3.1 CGPA requirement. So how hard is it? When you factor in your aptitude as well as willingness to work hard, of course.

Just to add, I've just completed my A Levels. But Monash wouldn't let me in into their Business programme because I didn't take Core Maths. Laugh away.

So I'm applying for entry into Monash Sunway

Steel Up — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 18:28:18 +0800

Yeah, Business and Commerce. Problem is, the staff I met immediately dismissed my prospects of studying business there because I'm not taking Math for my A Level. Fair enough, but glancing at their first year structure, where the units are compulsory for ALL students...

* AFW1000 Principles of accounting and finance
* BTW1200 Business law, or BTW1201 South African business law (SA*)
* ECW1101 Introductory microeconomics
* ETW1102 Business statistics, or ETW1000 Business and economics statistics (S*)
* MGW1010 Introduction to management
* MKW1120 Marketing theory and practice

Alright, statistics, accounting and, perhaps, finance, are all doable for me. Besides, don't they teach these from scratch during the first year? And as for the others, I'm doing well in my Law and Economics for my A Level. Could a Business graduate from Monash please tell me whether by not taking Mathematics for my A Level, I will truly be at a disadvantage reading business at Monash?

Also, I'm thinking of majoring two out of these fields at Monash, if by chance I can get in : International Business, Economics, Marketing and Management.

[addedon]April 29, 2009, 12:53 pm[/addedon]So, nobody has any idea?

Wearing snorkel while swimming laps

Steel Up — Tue, 18 Nov 2008 00:31:44 +0800

At the moment I know how to swim free-style but unfortunately my breathing technique sucks. I always gotta stand up in the pool to take a breather and then start swimming again. So I'm planning to get snorkel goggles. Thing is, will it lower down the amount of calorie burned significantly? I got into swimming with slimming down as my main objective.

ASUS 8800 GT fan speed

Steel Up — Thu, 08 May 2008 19:45:23 +0800

So I've been experiencing heat problems whenever I play games, even old ones. Turned out that the GPU's card is only running at 29% speed. Thing is I've tried both nTune and RivaTuner and they just won't let me increase the fan speed (the option is greyed out in nTune). I heard that this is some sort of BIOS problem? What can I do about this?

Thanks in advance.

Tuition for A Levels

Steel Up — Fri, 22 Feb 2008 19:15:31 +0800

Just wondering if some extra coaching is needed to score that elusive A. Granted it's been only a month since my course started, but I feel like I'm struggling in a couple of subjects. Has anyone here went for A Levels tuition? How is it and much does it cost on average? Did you find it really helpful?

A Levels

Steel Up — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 17:04:03 +0800

So I was wondering if anyone here has taken only 3 A Levels subjects before. What are the chances of landing a scholarship with only 3As? Currently I only get to choose Accounting as my fourth subject and since I've never even gotten a "pass" in Accounting during high school, I'm naturally hesitant to pick it up again. Won't it suck to only have 3 As and then 1C(or worse!)?

Please share with me your experience as a 3-subject student.

HELP University College

Steel Up — Sun, 02 Dec 2007 15:59:05 +0800

Hi, I'm thinking of taking a degree in IT at HELP. Anyone here taking the course? How is the quality? And overall, how is HELP's environment and management? Thanks in advance.

Thinking of going for a Business/IT course.

Steel Up — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 20:07:27 +0800

Hello all, I've been thinking of going for a BIT course but I'm unsure about a few things.

1) I'm very, VERY bad at maths and accountancy, at least based on my SPM results. I do have a natural affinity for computers and their systems. Is this enough for me to excel in a BIT programme? Or should I just forget about it.

2) I'm currently considering HELP University College's BIT course, though I couldn't verify whether it's LAN accredited. Is this place a good college for BIT? My second choice is MMU, though under the current circumstances it's a bit iffy to stay in Malacca.

I guess these are my main concerns. I'm sorry if I'm not being clear on a few things so please ask me to clarify anything you might find confusing. Thank you for your help in advance.