Lowyat.NET: Latest topics by chrisqck

MELAKA RUNNER - WTA & NEED ADVICE

chrisqck — Tue, 03 Sep 2019 21:14:00 +0800

Hi Everyone,

Lately I've been thinking of improving my health. My exercise of choice was walking & running. My problem is I work shifts are most day I finish at 10 PM so most gyms already closed. I just want to ask any malaccas runners here if you guys know anywhere I can run safely after 10 PM ? Your advice is much appreciated.

Just to add: According to the BMI measurement, I'm considered Obese. I also have High Blood Pressure & recently diagnosed with Diabetes. So it's really critical that I start doing something about my health now.

Digitizing Old Photos

chrisqck — Sat, 10 Feb 2018 19:24:56 +0800

Hi All,

I want to share little story before I ask the question.

My family's ancestral home is in Kelantan. Ancestral Home means that's where the altars for remembering & paying respects to elders in the family that has passed on is kept. A few times a year all relative will gather at my house to pay respect, etc, including Chinese New Year. This also means, in the past, back when my grandparents were living there, every relatives & friends of the family will make sure to send some copies of the photos of important events in their life. Birthday celebrations, weddings, funerals, even holidays & graduations photos. My ancestral home is the central repository of all all these photos.

Few years back, you all know of the big flood of Kelantan, right ? My house which I usually would LOL-ed if some unknowing, concerned friend ask if my house flooded, actually was submerged in the flood up to my waist height while standing in the house. 80% of furniture has to be thrown. Most of the photos also was under the flood water then. The ones that survives are those that I secretly took back with me the last time I went back before the flood. I was planning to surprise my mom with the scanned photos of her siblings (most gone by now thanks to old age) & friends & other relatives, not to mention my own siblings & our small family's old photos. My secret plan was the reason the box of photos survived.

I am looking for a good scanner for scanning those old photos that I managed to save. I have a HP MFP at home & in the office. I will use those for scanning Facebook & small photo print version of the photos. But after I'm done with that, I would like to do it again using a high quality scanner at the "archiving" level quality.

I will be honest with you - I know nothing about photography and all these digitizing photograph stuffs aside from what I picked up here & there reading online articles & talking to my colleagues back when I work as IT guy at publishing company. So any advice you can share is much appreciated.

Mobile Data in China (Chengdu)

chrisqck — Thu, 12 Oct 2017 16:30:15 +0800

Hi All,

I will be accompanying wife on her 1st ever travel oversea further than Singapore end of this month. I would like to know if anyone here have any recommendations with regards to mobile data while there. I will mostly be using it for social media, light browsing for info & maps. Thanks in advance for any info shared.

Simple Scripting For cURL

chrisqck — Sat, 29 Oct 2016 14:32:53 +0800

Hi Everyone,

Anyone here can help me with this scripting ? I came across a simple 1 liner script which uses cURL to download IPSW files and is very useful over unstable internet connection as it allows resuming after error. However, it only handle single error code. I usually encounter 2 or more error codes. I wonder if anyone here knows how to modify this to handle at least 3 error codes.

CODE

export ec=56; while [ $ec -eq 56 ]; do /usr/bin/curl -O -C - "http://appldnld.apple.com/ios10.1/031-65467-20161024-3A15EC8C-92E9-11E6-B408-1C827FA31755/iPhone_5.5_10.1_14B72_Restore.ipsw"; export ec=$?; done

Bus Melaka Sentral to Tanah Merah (Kelantan)

chrisqck — Thu, 01 Sep 2016 17:46:54 +0800

Hi Everyone,

Would like to know if anyone know if there's any bus (aside from Cepat) that goes to Tanah Merah, Kelantan ? I need to go back in about 2 weeks time.

Thanks.

[WTA] Driving Directions KL > Alor Setar > MLK

chrisqck — Sun, 12 Oct 2014 12:46:39 +0800

Hi All,

Would like ask if anyone can advise how to drive from University Malaya area to Alor Setar, Kedah and also from AS to Melaka.

If possible with landmarks like buildings or highway exit, etc.

First time driving to Alor Setar. Many thanks in advance for the instructions.

How Many 4.4 phones are affected by this issue ?

chrisqck — Thu, 25 Sep 2014 11:20:32 +0800

I'm just curious how many of those using non-customer ROMs are affected by this issue ? I'm using Note 2 and was perfectly happy while on 4.3. Luckily by the time I upgraded to 4.4.2 my warranty is over. So went ahead and root my phone (burnt the KNOX e-Fuse too) and fixed the issue. However my phone seems to be not as stable as before. Apps keeps hanging and sometimes the phone will auto-reboot by itself. Damn fed up with Samsung liaoz. My cousin who's using S5 is also complaining of the the same issue.

So anyone else using 4.4.2 Offical ROM having this issue ?

Find Out More About This Issue

Good Shoes

chrisqck — Sun, 09 Feb 2014 08:49:59 +0800

Hi everyone,

I recently changed job and as part of my training, I'm asked to familiarise with the role of Customer Service Officer. Unlike my previous company, this CSO position involves a long hours of standing at the service counter. By the end of every work day my feet will be very painful. At the moment I'm using normal leather shoes for work but I've noticed everyone is wearing sneakers and sports shoes to work.

I'm thinking of getting myself something comfortable to wear that would reduce the strain of long hour standing. Presently I'm thinking of sports shoes with very good cushioning like Nike Air. Just wondering if anyone have any other recommendations.

Our Tax Money

chrisqck — Tue, 26 Nov 2013 11:09:34 +0800

Hi All,

With reference to this article : Tax dodgers angered by corruption, says ex-NST boss

I would like to know if anyone here can advise what are the expenditure that uses money from our tax collection ? I was one of those who refuses to pay tax every year because I was pissed with the waste that was reported by the Auditor-General every year. Then a family member had heart attack and went for stent procedure at a government hospital and the cost of the procedure, few thousands ringgit, was waived by the hospital due to they were poor. Then I insaf liaoz and pay my taxes on time every year.

However I can't help to still butthurt everytime I see A-G report. I'd like to understand more about how the tax collection money are spent by our government. Anyone can help I'm much appreciated.

P/S: I tried to google but maybe I'm using the wrong keywords coz didn't get any useful data...

Helping customer To Reset Pasword

chrisqck — Tue, 05 Nov 2013 21:47:43 +0800

Hi Everyone,

I would like to seek your advise and if you're willing to share your personal experience, it would be much appreciated.

A customer walks into a computer shop and asks to have the password reset. The technician, giving the customer benefit of the doubt, helps him and charged a fee. Later it turns out the laptop was stolen. From the point of view of LAW, is this technician, and the shop, liable for any crime charges ?

If anyone works in computer shop, mind sharing your own experience ? While I would never want to be involved in any crime and the same time I don't want to turn away genuine cases.

Thanks in advance.

Data Migration Ext HDD to Int HDD

chrisqck — Tue, 30 Jul 2013 15:26:52 +0800

Hi All,

Would like to seek your advise with regards to this issue. I have a customer who just throw everything inside her ext hdd without much consideration on the folder structure and name. now she's having issue accessing the file ont eh Ext HDD as it's extremely slow. In Windows the HDD is super slow sometimes Windows just gives up. On Ubuntu, I can still access it though the deeper you go into the folder structure, the slower it gets to list down the contents.

I've had similar experience with very long file name in Windows and I usually use Robocopy. In Ubuntu I discovered Rsync (and the GUI GRsync). It's quite useful except that for very very long path name (media\chris\exthdd\<longfoldername>\<longfoldername\.....\<longfoldername>\.....) it usually will take very long time and then sometimes hangs.

One workaround I'm thinking of using is by going 3 folder level deep and zip the content up. Then I will use rsync to copy the zipped files and folder structure over to the Int HDD and unzip it there. I'm sure Ubuntu should not have problem with long path name, right ?

Question now is which ZIP tool do I use ? I need to preserve the folder structure and the filename when I unzip it in the Int HDD.

Regards,

Chris

Statute of Limitations under Malaysian Employment

chrisqck — Tue, 11 Jun 2013 15:12:14 +0800

Hi All,

Hoping someone with knowledge and experience can advise me on this matter.

Let's say I'm a technician working for a computer repair shop. I repair many computers every day. Now let's say I resign today. Then 2 months later, my boss call me and ask me to go back to the shop to solve some issues arising from my repairing the customer's computer. Can the ex-boss do that legally ?

Put that in a corporate scenario. Maybe I'm a Project Manager handling a big project. Then I decided to resign and work for another company. I did proper handover to the person taking over from me. 1 month after I resign, some issues arise related to the project. Can the company order me to go back and resolve it for them LEGALLY ? Meaning if I refuse to cooperate, can they take any legal action on me ? (Assuming I did all my Due Diligence when doing my work and I did proper handover and documented it with signature).

I'm asking because I'm thinking of leaving my current company. Problem is I noted the big boss has the habit of calling ex-employee to come back and solve any issues arising from anything that they handled in the past. Sometime the person already left the company more than 2 months. I'm concerned that this could happen to me too.

Thanks in advance for all advice shared.

Configure QoS & logging Internet Traffic

Thu, 01 Jan 1970 07:30:00 +0800

Configure QoS & logging Internet Traffic

chrisqck — Fri, 18 Jan 2013 13:24:42 +0800

Hi,

Lately there have been ppl in the office who is abusing the not-so-fast internet connect for torrenting. As a result those of us who needs the bandwidth for business purpose has to put up with super slow connection. I would like to know if having QoS enabled will help in this case. The limited understanding I had on QoS is it allows you to set priorities for specific network packet type. This mean by right if QoS is enabled, I could set lowest priority for non-business traffic like torrenting. BTW, are there any caveats to QoS ?

Another thing I would like to know is if it's possible to enable detailed network traffic logging. What I need is the outbound network destination ip address (resolved to domain name if possible) and the internal ip address that is connecting to it.

I've been checking for answers online for a few hours now but can't seem to find the answer needed. Hopefully someone here can help. Thanks in advance for any advice/guides shared.

cheers,

Chris

Black Screen of Death

chrisqck — Wed, 05 Dec 2012 08:59:17 +0800

Hi All,

Hope someone here can figure out what could be the cause of this problem. This laptop is not mine but belongs to my friend. I've done a whole lot of troubleshooting but problem still persist. Basically after about 10 minutes of playing video, regardless of what player app you use, the screen will just go blank, no mouse, and no respond to keyboard input (no response to Ctrl+Alt+Del) and the only way forward is to force power off by pressing and holding the power button.

# Laptop Information :

Model: ACER ASPIRE 4551-P321G32Mnsk
CPU: AMD Athlon II X2 P320 (2.1GHz)
RAM: 1GB
GPU: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4250
HDD: 320GB

(if you need more info on the spec please let me knowand I'll update above)

# Troubleshooting Steps:

1. Initially I thought it was caused by the sleep or turn off display function. I've set it to "never" but problem persists.

2. Next I suspect could be the video driver. When i right-click and tried to launch the driver config utility, it didn't launch at all. So I download the latest video driver, uninstall the current driver, reboot and install the latest driver. Problem persists. (That took over night downloading as the driver file size was quite big).

3. Then I thought I'll start from FRESH. So I format the HDD, reinstalled Windows & all the drivers. (Yes, I checked and made sure all the drivers are available before I decided to reinstall Windows). Test and problem persists.

4. I then googled summore.... some article said upgrading from BIOS version 1.03 to version 1.11 solves the problem. So I downloaded the BIOS update, unzip and tried to run it in Win 7. Error messages. Then, using my 8GB USB Stick, I created a DOS boot USB and successfully update the BIOS from there. Rebooted, test and PROBLEM PERSISTS~!!! arggghhhh!!!!

So what have I missed ? Anyone else having this same issue ? BTW, I had also came about the BlackSoD issue that was related to some Windows Update while googling. For safety measure, I also install the fix from PrevX, just in case. No help. So now I'm stuck. Thinking of contacting ACER Support but want to check here first before I do. I don't think the laptop is still under warranty. Anyone have any idea ?

Chris

ReadyBoost via USB 2.0 or 3.0 Thumbdrive

chrisqck — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 00:28:46 +0800

Hi Sifus,

My cousin gave me his old laptop Acer Aspire 6935G which to me is not bad. It was OK for my daily usage need (mainly watching movies & browse internet). The RAM is already MAXED to 4GB. This is good enough but lately I've been thinking of using it to do some virtualisation via VMWare. From past experience, 4GB is not enough for this purpose. So I was thinking of how to add RAM when suddenly it striked me that I could do it via ReadyBoost~!!!

Read up a bit on this and what I've come away with is that it makes no performance gain for machines with 2GB or more of RAM. HOWEVER, my purpose is NOT to increase performance per se but rather to provide *additional RAM* for my virtualisation needs. So I would like to ask if anyone have ever thought of this before & actually tried it out ?

FYI, the idea came to me when I came across SANDISK CRUZER FIT while browsing around. Since my laptop has 3 USB port, I could & does not mind, for this purpose, sacrifice 1 USB port by plugging this super small thing to add RAM. The form factor is really "plug-in and forget", I feel.

Thanks in advance for any advice/experience/knowledge sharing

Cycling to Work

chrisqck — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 00:29:43 +0800

Hi Everyone,

Just want to ask some quick questions regarding cycling to work. Are anyone here doing it now ? Can share your experience ? My main concern is where do you park keep your bike and avoid it from being stolen ?

I'm really interested but I'm very much worried by this problem. Can somebody enlighten me please ? Thanks in advance~!!!

Cheers,

Chris

Low End Laptop with Win XP Support

chrisqck — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 17:44:42 +0800

Hi Everyone,

Hope you could advise me on this as I've reached the end of the road as I see it.

Basically my brother is opening his own auto-wiring shop and needs a laptop for business. The apps that he'll be using can only run on Win XP. I've spent a few days going through the price list & checking the brands' website, checking out specs & driver supports vs pricing. Finally I settled on Lenovo G475. My reasoning was simply (i realised now *too* simple) out of the models that are available in the shops, this model (plus other Lenovo models) does have Windows XP drivers. [ OBVIOUSLY, I missed ONE IMPORTANT STEP in my R&D phase : Google "<laptop model> + <Windows XP> + <problems>" ~!!! Grrrr!!!! ]

So, we bought the model. I tred to install Windows XP and it kept BSOD on me. Finally from reading some articles online, found out have to disable Virtualisation support. Ended up disabling almost EVERYTHING not required and STILL it's BSOD-ing during installations. SIGH. Finally, due to time contraint, we decided on Windows 7 + XP Mode. I even shown him how to install apps via XP Mode & even create links on the desktop to the MS' XP Mode page.

I just received calls from my bro that his IT Guy told him the app needs to run on XP directly and XP Mode is unstable. (Frankly, I just feel like going to the IT Guy's shop and ask for the apps and figure this up myself). So, now I'm stuck with making XP work on this crappy laptop.

The last alternative would be to sell off this laptop 2nd hand & buy another new laptop. But anyone know which model of the new laptops currently being sold in shops is compatible with Win XP ? I've been to most shops and all laptops seems to come with either FreeDOS or Win 7 only. Any recommendations would be much appreciated~!!!!

Chris

Rooting WonderMedia WM8650

chrisqck — Wed, 21 Sep 2011 22:19:38 +0800

Hi Everyone,

I apologise for the long post in advance. It's part rant and part call-for help. I would appreciate if anyone could point me in the right direction as I've been googling the past few days but didn't find anything that is really assuring enough for me to proceed. Figuring there must be quite a number of experienced sifus around here, i would really appreciate if you could help me.

What happened is my aunt, who is not very tech savvy, was convinced by a close relative to purchase an Android tablet of unknown brand obviously made for the china market. Checking the system info, i found the device model listed as WonderMedia WM8650. Being the only person in the IT line in the family, naturally she passed the tablet to me for test drive and also setting up the device to suit her level of tech savviness. (I was also the one who built her custom pc and config everything to suit her need & also giving her step by step guide on how to use the computer). Asking to return this device & for a refund would cause too much family drama so now I'm stuck with this problematic device that I need to make work.

This tablet comes with some default apps. The weather app has the locality set to Shenzen. It also has an "App Market" that is not the original ANDROID App MArket. All the apps there are in Mandarin. I am able to add the original ANDROID App Market however by adding the widget on one of the pages. I have created a gmail acc for my aunt and is able to login to it on this tablet. However it kept giving me the error "GoogleTalk Authentication failed". Naturally, I'm not able to install any apps from the Market. I have spend weeks on the net googling the error message and trying many things but nothing helps. I have now given up on this device and am thinking of pursuing a different approach: Flashing it with a good ROM.

Here are the specs according to the "About Device" section :

Model Number: WonderMedia WM8650
Android Version: 2.2
Kernel Version: 2.6.32.9-default
Build Number: generic-eng2.2 Froyo Ver1.5.0-20110613.053944

Aside from the standard custome apps for email, browsing, youtube & camera, there's also a default app named Superuser ver2.3.6.1 installed. Also, I have done factory reset twice.

From my googling, I came across info on Honeycomb ROMs but not sure if can be used for this device. Does anyone here own the same model or similar spec ? And have you managed to flash any stable ROMs ? Any guide/advice would be much much appreciate. Thank you in advance.

[WTA/B] ZTE S202

chrisqck — Mon, 23 May 2011 09:56:45 +0800

hi,

just want to ask if anyone have heard of this phone and where can i get it (either klang valley OR melaka) ? this is a very basic phone and targeted for the elderly as it has big buttons and an SOS button. i'm thinking of getting one for my father in law. anyone know where to get this phone ?

i did a site specific search via google and found this link on lowyat.net: ZTE s202 on Hakka Loon Tan v165

anyone here have any idea where i can get this phone or similar-functionality model from same company ? thanks in advance for any advise given ; )

**chris