Almost all ISPs give regular POP email to their subsribers and customers as this is the cheapest system. However, there may be some of them which actually have IMAP, although quite rare. If they do, they are likely to say that they acrually have it as it is a plus point for them. I know of an ISP which does offer IMAP but simply does not admitt or state that they do and provide no instructions or server names. This ISP is Fiji International Telecoms LTD subsidary, Kidanet. It’s a shame that they don’t openly state this, I would think of it as a great advantage as it at least makes the service usable. I suppose it’s the prerogative of the ISP to advertise this.

Just for your information the server will be just mail.kidanet.com.fj just like the POP and SMTP ones. However, you must select that you wish to use an IMAP email service in the email client to use it. IMAP is better than POP because it allows syncronisation of folders with the server so when acessing web mail, the mail repositiory is current.

The Spray Can

I had thought about this at one point in time at least. Do I really want to use Skype just because its cheap? Well although the answer seems to be yes. Who really wants to turn the computer on each time they want to make a call, or just leave it on the entire day wasting precious electricity. Well, I surely don’t.

The biggest question is whether I made the mistake of buying such a phone, if it can be called a phone. I remember insisting my parents to buy a phone which does not require the computer and can just plug up to my router, but what do they know about such a difference, they just know that its a phone and it is compatible with Skype. So, there goes 200-300 bucks down the drain for a particularly useless device. Oh, how the world is so cruel.

The Spray Can

The Spray Can

Here in Fiji Hi-Def home theater is mostly for the crazy audio and videophile. Only one shop is renting out hd-dvd movies and that is IMDVD. Heaps of amplifiers and speakers and cables and t.vs and projectors are available too. But how many can afford it all? Well not many actually; however, I have had the good pleasure setting one up and using it too.

The worst part of setting it up is that most folks don’t realize that hd stuff is not like standard def. you can’t use coaxial or optic to get the true sound. you cant expect everything to be fast because it all works like computers more than consumer electronics.

But look on the brighter side of it, at least it sound s better and looks good on bigger screens. Remember that not all players support bitstream output and even though you have some of the latest amps out there the amp won’t be able to decode the sound if the player can’t output bitstream audio. This includes the PS3 for now until they an come up with a firmware upgrade to fix it.  So most folks should try to get an amp with hdmi input but note that some are just video switches and will not accept audio through that port. Yamaha amps are good. They aren’t cheap but they are reliable and do decent sound processing. Or the next best thing would be to use the external 6 channel input. Running 3 pairs of analog signal to the amp from the player is the next best thing. This again excludes the PS3 as it only has HDMI output. The only HD-DVD players out there that provide bitstream audio or possibly 6 channel output would be the upper end 2nd and 3rd gen players. So only the A35 toshiba can do it really or else other players can only output 6 channel pcm through hdmi which needs a relatively new amp. The newer ones are ok too but if you want the amp to process and decode the sound you need a combination of a high end player like A35 and also a new amp like the onkyo 605 which can decode hd audio.  Optical in the end only gives SD sound not Hi-def.

On the picture side of things, 720p is minimum to enjoy this thing but a normal SD T.V could do as well, the picture just might not be as good, but it will be better than normal DVDs. The picture vastly improves as the screen gets bigger, so projectors benefit the most. HDMI and DVI are both good as long as the screen supports HDCP. Component will be O.K too. It will give HD picture according to the native resolution of the HD movie rather than the screen but it will not work on those movies which are protected with HDCP. So HDMI it is then.

Overall the experience is way better than DVD and far far better than going to a movie theater if you have a projector. And the only downsides are cost and the fact that there is a format war ensuing. Apart from the fact that also the whole audio side of things is in a bit of a mess and that all the HD-DVD players are really slowwwwwwww; press the eject button and the tray comes out like half a minute later.

All good I say

The Spray Can

It’s been a while since I posted anything.

You know something; there are times when you go to some random site and they tell you to sign up for something. You give your email address to them oh so relunctantly and regret it later for they send you nothing but spam.

Your mail box fills with this stuff and you know what you got to get rid of the account. Get a new one and start life as you knew it all over again. Not good!

So what is the answer to the problem you ask. The answer is to use a temporary email address from one of the many providers out there. They all have their own system of dealing with mail.

Example is pookmail.com which lets you have an address for a day. Well not really. Anyone can see the mail, not just you but just pick a real random name and you should be fine, I suppose anyway.

some of the providers give you around five minutes to receive mail and then poof, its all gone, no worries, no spam, no restarting life. Great isn’t it.

The Spray Can

There are many computer cases out there, but my favourites are:

Antec P180, P182

Lian li anniversary edition snail like case

Asus Vento 3600

Asus Vento 7700

The most underrated of all but most liked by me:

The Spire pininfarina case, (a designer case)

Enjoy!

The Spray Can

I installed and am using ubuntu on a partition that is around 3GB with around 300mb free so it’s around 2.7 gigs. My system has all the basics you really would need and more including beryl and wine, all the extra stuff from easyubuntu, pidgin, skype, thunderbird, etc.

If this were Windows, I would struggle to keep the limit at this kind of space. Actually I have experience. My wimdows partition with not much on it just grew and grew from what it should have been, around 4-5Gb upto 12GB and over. Wow it doubled without much effort. Ubuntu remained a small partition even though I added stuff like the above. Just goes to show you how linux can still work on older machines with less resources.

Linux 1, Windows 0

The Spray Can

Came across a nice little trick I thought I should pass on. Very neat little trick.

You get the participant to choose a random 5 digit number, multiply by 10, subtract the original number and add 234. They will get a 6 digit number. Ask them to hide one digit and tell you the rest of the five digits. I suppose the digits given can be in any order.

If the six digits of the answer are added together, they will give a multiple of nine, so adding the rest of the five and subtracted from the next multiple of nine will give you the digit that they are hiding.

There is just one flaw, if the addition of the five digits given come to a multiple of nine then the answer can be either 0 or 9 as both added to the total of the five digits will give a multiple of nine.

eg.

52378

52378*10= 523780

523780-52378=471402

471402+234= 471636

If say 6 is hidden so add 4+7+1+3+6=21, next multiple up of nine is 27, so 27-21=6, the number hidden is thus six

Hope you like it, have fun!

The Spray Can

I love Ubuntu for many reasons. It is open source, free to obtain, it is very stable, etc. The one I did not mention would be its looks, functionality and the blingbling. Beryl and emerald themes for the Linux desktop means that at least some folks might adopt it as their O/S even if it is just cause of the looks.

Here is a look at my desktop

I am using the solidline theme for emerald. The icon set is nuove-XT 1.6. The candido engine and my wallpaper is ‘Hole by cesconetto’.

Links coming soon for the above!

Enjoy!
The Spray Can