Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by G-17

Looking for cellular data plan.

G-17 — Sat, 07 Aug 2021 21:33:00 +0800

Thinking of getting an cellular iPad for a family member by the end of this year. Maybe the current Air, or perhaps the rumored new Mini in a couple of months time. I have zero experience with cellular iPads, since I have always purchased wifi only models before this.

Which telcos offer dedicated iPad/tablet plans now? From what I've heard, Maxis Zerolution is out of the question since people say you need a principle line to qualify. What about Celcom or Digi, or perhaps some of the smaller providers like uMobile? Do any of these telcos offer a 24 month data+device installment scheme?

If that's not feasible and I have to buy the device straight from Apple, also possible (I have family who runs a private school so can probably get Education/K-12 discount), but then there's still the question of which telco has a mobile data plan. Some people say I can get a prepaid sim from any telco and use the data only, but I don't want any phone number associated with the device. I heard that in some countries you can buy the iPad first and then sign up for a plan from a choice of local telcos straight from the Cellular/Mobile Data Settings in iPadOS. Is that possible here?

What are my options?

Thanks in advance.

Any way to block MKN/KKM/Gomen SPAM messages?

G-17 — Thu, 27 Aug 2020 17:53:16 +0800

I never found these messages useful. They were just repeating what I already read in the news. Now it's worse and they've started pedaling pseudo-patriotic Merdeka propaganda or telling me to remember to wash my hands at 4am. WTF?! Unable to block the number via usual phone settings (I'm on iOS). Is there any way to opt-out of this nonsense, like calling the telco (Celcom in my case) or something? For now all I can do is mute the messages.

Best Data Plan for Cellular iPad

G-17 — Wed, 18 Dec 2019 15:42:13 +0800

Looking for a data plan for LTE iPad Pro. Phone number not required. Data only.

Requirements;
1. Good coverage and speed
2. No blocking of UDP ports 500 and 4500 (required for my personal IPSec VPN)
3. As big a data quota as possible

In some countries, Telcos offer 100GB or 250GB data-only plans, usually with 6 months or 1 year validity. Do we have anything similar in M'sia? I'd prefer prepaid, but if no choice I'm willing to go postpaid. Cannot seem to find any iPad/Tablet specific plans on local telco websites. Maybe I'm searching wrong?

Any help/advice would be highly appreciated.
Thanks in advance.

iMessage & FaceTime issue

G-17 — Thu, 19 Jan 2017 18:49:12 +0800

Suddenly today I realized that people couldn't iMessage or FaceTime me if they used my Celcom number. I checked the settings and got the "Waiting for Activation" thing with the spinning circle next to my phone number being grayed out. Can still iMessage/FaceTime using my AppleID or another email, but the number isn't working. Did all the usual troubleshooting already - disabled iMessage/FaceTime, restarted phone, re-enabled - and even called Celcom (they told me to contact Apple) but alas, no solution. Anyone else having this problem since today afternoon with Celcom?

Exercise bike for senior citizen

G-17 — Fri, 27 Mar 2015 20:42:59 +0800

Greetings,

I need some help finding a suitable recumbent exercise bike for my mother who's approaching the age of 70. Her main goal is to strengthen her legs (she just had PRP injections to both her knees) and hopefully lose a bit of weight in the process.

Can anyone recommend me some suitable models/brands that have local dealers/showrooms, preferably online stores as well that deliver nationwide (we live in J.B).

Thanks in advance.

Wireless Powerlines & Homeplugs

G-17 — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 09:15:38 +0800

Greetings,

I'll get to the point. My mom will be "upgrading" her Streamyx ADSL connection to Unifi very soon. Technician is supposed to come over to her place this week or the next. She'll most probably opt to have the cable come into the living room, where the TV is (so that she can get all the free channels). Problem is, her work computer is upstairs in her room and it doesn't have a wireless card/chipset. LAN only.

I was thinking of getting those TP-Link Wireless Powerline or Aztech Homeplug setups. I plan to get a basic unit for downstairs (connected to the Unifi router), and maybe one with wireless upstairs, so that she can use it to connect her LAN cable and I can have the wireless signal boosted upstairs (rather than relying from signal from the main router downstairs) when I go visit her on holidays.

Does anyone here have experience with these setups? They seem to be plug and play, hassle free - perfect for someone like my mom. Plus they don't need any Windows-only software to set it up (my whole family uses Linux). But I am wondering about a few things;

Do we have to connect each unit direct to the wall plug? Will the "signal" deteriorate with more "abstraction layers" like if I use multi-socket adapters or surge protectors?

What about connection stability? Are we guaranteed a stable signal, or does it fluctuate a lot?

Does it make a difference if we have 3-phase electric power (rather than single phase)?

What's the hardware reliability like?

Also, what kind of prices am I looking at here?

Thanks for reading.

Need to convert Wifi signal to Wired

G-17 — Mon, 02 Jul 2012 00:36:16 +0800

Firstly, I apologize as this is probably going to end up a long TL;DR post. I've bolded the important question below, but I do hope you read the entire post.

Secondly, I know this probably belongs in the Networking sub-forum, but I'm asking here instead becasue;
a. The computers involved run Linux
b. I trust you guys~

Okay, here's the story. My mom called me earlier and said she signed up to have her Streamyx (4MB) account switched to Unifi. They were having some promotion and the rep told her that after 3 months she (actually it's me who pays her bills) would only have to pay an extra RM$9/month over the existing Streamyx fees. I think the main reason she signed up was because they offered some TV channels or something. I'm not that familiar with the plans as I live in Singapore.

Anyways, she said there'll be some "technician" coming over next week to setup the thing for her. As I understand it, They'll set up some Unifi box on the service pole outside, and bring a cable inside. My mom mentioned that they cover the cost of bringing the cable inside, but they don't do any internal concealed wiring.

Now comes the problem. My mom only has one TV downstairs, so I assume that's where she'll want all the hardware. (router, TV box, etc). Thing is, she has this really old "work" computer in her room upstairs. It's an old Celeron desktop from a decade ago with no wireless. Only the usual LAN cable socket. Previously, that room upstairs is where I set up the ADSL (Streamyx) modem/router for her, so she could use that old desktop. Her newer laptop has wifi so it, but she insists on using the old rig for her work stuff.

I don't have the time to D.I.Y LAN/CAT cabling from downstairs to upstairs, and calling a contractor is just too time consuming and messy (probably expensive too), so my options are either to install a PCI Wireless card into the desktop, or set up some kind of wireless access point or bridge. The first option is probably going to be troublesome, as it's an old desktop (not sure if it even supports PCI-Express), plus not all chipsets are supported on Linux (F*ck you, Broadcom!!). There's also a Wifi-to-USB device that I have, but setting that up would probably be even more troublesome. I want it to be all automatic for my mom; she should just be able to turn on the desktop and be connected, just like her old wired setup. I don't want to have to troubleshoot connection problems for her via the phone, since it's annoying.

Basically, I need some sort of device that can "grab" the wireless signal transmitted from the Unifi modem/router downstairs and "convert" it back to a regular wired LAN connection that I can just plug into mom's ancient desktop. Hopefully I can configure it just by accessing the IP via a browser address bar or console (like we all do) and don't have to install some stupid Windows-only installation CD. Possibly one IP to access the access point, and another for the main router downstairs.

I'm not sure if her current Belkin ADSL modem + router can do it. I recall seeing the option to setup a "Wireless Access Point" in the setup page, but don't know if that does what I want. Don't remember seeing any "Bridge" option. Not sure whether I need a Access Point or Bridge here? Do you think I could use the Belkin by disabling ADSL/DHCP and assigning a static IP (the IP of the Unifi modem downstairs) and have it "re-route" the wireless signal back through a LAN cable?

If that's not possible, then can you recommend some hardware I can buy in JB or SG that could do this for me, as painlessly as possible (meaning no installation CD nonsense)? I'm going to have to take a few hours off work to drive to mom's house on the day the TM people come, so I'll need to work fast and get back to SG as soon as they finish. Also, if possible, give me the model name/number that I might have to buy and the estimate cost as well, so that I can do stuff in advance if I need to.

Thanks for reading.

Terminal Colorschemes + Screenshots

G-17 — Sun, 14 Aug 2011 03:06:49 +0800

Since I'm bored and stuck at home babysitting on a Saturday night, I thought I'd start a useless thread.

I know there are a few CLI users here by now, so I'm starting this topic so that we can share our CLI colorschemes.
~/.Xdefaults, ~/.Xresources, Ncmpcpp config, MoC themes, Midnight Commander theme, Ranger, Xclock, Vim, Emacs...etc... anything you want as long as it runs in a terminal and requires a colorscheme. I figured it would be a great way to get people to take colorschemes seriously, since they often improve usability (syntax highlighting) as well.

You're free to post Gedit or Gvim colorschemes too, though I'll obviously laugh at you for doing that.

[addedon]August 14, 2011, 3:07 am[/addedon]I'll start off with a simple colorscheme for my preferred terminal emulator, URxvt. It's not my whole ~/.Xdefaults file, just the variables that set the colors.

Typface:
It's lime from the Artwiz-Latin pack, which is different from the traditional lime. Note: You must set FontPath in your xorg.conf (or equivalent) if you install from source in order for xfontsel to pick-up the ISO codes.

CODE

URxvt*font: -artwiz-lime-medium-r-normal-*-10-110-75-75-m-50-iso8859-1
URxvt*boldFont: -artwiz-lime-medium-r-normal-*-10-110-75-75-m-50-iso8859-1

Foreground, Background, Bold, Underline & Cursor values:

CODE

URxvt*background: #333333
URxvt*foreground: #cccccc
URxvt*cursorColor: #999999
URxvt*colorBD: #ffffff
URxvt*colorUL: #99cc66

Colors 0 - 15:

CODE

!-- Visibone 50/80 - 40/100 Mk2 --!
!BLACK
URxvt*color0: #666666
URxvt*color8: #999999
!RED
URxvt*color1: #CC6699
URxvt*color9: #FF99CC
!GREEN
URxvt*color2: #99CC66
URxvt*color10: #CCFF99
!YELLOW
URxvt*color3: #CC9966
URxvt*color11: #FFCC99
!BLUE
URxvt*color4: #6699CC
URxvt*color12: #99CCFF
!MAGENTA
URxvt*color5: #9966CC
URxvt*color13: #CC99FF
!CYAN
URxvt*color6: #66CC99
URxvt*color14: #99FFCC
!WHITE
URxvt*color7: #CCCCCC
URxvt*color15: #FFFFFF

OpenVPN vs PPTP vs Others

G-17 — Sun, 19 Jun 2011 23:31:17 +0800

All the network gurus out there;

With all the bullshit going on with Malaysian ISP's, I've been considering a VPN service. Thing is, I have absolutely zero experience with em, and I'm also pretty much a noob when it comes to the networking side of things.

I know some VPNs use openvpn (BolehVPN for example), while others generally require pptp-linux and/or pptpd. I tried this free-tral given by a LYN forumer just now that required pptp, and it was honestly a pain!! It probably wouldn't be if I installed the network-manager-pptp-gnome package, but I despise bloated GUI apps and try to avoid them as much as possible (sorry Flamer). I generally prefer a straightforward CLI setup that I can standardize across all my machines, old or new. BolehVPNs documentation leads me to believe that it'll be much easier with openvpn.

My main needs are anonymous surfing (when I'm in Singapore, especially) and getting past the throttling/blocking done by Malaysian ISPs. Torrenting and P2P are generally not a big deal for me, since I don't use em much in Malaysia (in my Singapore home, I only torrent and seed Linix ISOs, which are completely legal and not throttled, so I'm not afraid there). I tend to prefer file-sharing and XDCC transfers for my entertaintment/porn. As long as I can download from http at full speed without throttling , post in anti-govt blogs without being blocked and stream as much porn as I want, I'm happy.

Any thoughts on this?
Feel free to post your experiences if you have any to share.

I realize this is more suited to the Network/P2P forum, but I want to get experiences from Linux users specifically.
Also, please recommend me good alternatives to BolehVPN if you have any.

Edit:
Please don't link me to any OpenVpn vs PPTP Pros & Cons pages on the web. I've probably read them all. I sort of know the gist of the argument, I just want to know your personal experiences.

#lowyat-foss IRC channel

G-17 — Wed, 15 Jun 2011 11:03:16 +0800

Hey all.

Our good friend @cocooh opened an irc channel some time ago.

~~#lyn-foss@irc.freenode.net~~

UPDATE : CHANNEL NAME HAS CHANGED TO #lowyat-foss

Feel free to stop by for distro support, config-sharing and idle chit-chat.

Linux/BSD/FOSS General Chat & FAQ

G-17 — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 16:24:02 +0800

Since some members wanted this thread, I'm starting it.
If it takes off, I hope a mod/admin stickies it.

SSD Prices Question

G-17 — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 18:38:24 +0800

Greetings,

I've just returned to the region after living/working overseas for many years, so please excuse my utter lack of local tech vendor knowledge.

I'm currently interested in purchasing SSD's. One small one for my netbook and a slightly larger one for my main desktop's root partition. I currently run the 2.6.33 kernel (Linux) and Btrfs, both of which come with major benefits/optimizations for SSDs.

I live in Singapore at the moment (only PR, still Malaysian, don't worry) , so I would like to know what the prices are in Malaysia, for comparative purposes. If someone could point/link me to a website or vendor that stocks OCZ and Intel SSD's, I would be very grateful.

Also, local reviews of SSDs would be nice as well.

Thanks in advance.

Cheers~

P.S
I hope I posted this in the right section. If not, I apologise.