Archive for December, 2014
Sunday, December 28th, 2014
In addition of making overseas calls from your home country, you can also use Skype to call family, friends and colleagues who back in your home country on their landline or mobile – when you are travelling overseas. All you need is Wi-Fi access or mobile broadband on your smartphone, and some Skype credits.
Check out Skype as an additional affordable means of voice/SMS communication when you travel overseas.
When I first arrived at Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok, while waiting at the customs, I logged on to the free Wi-Fi network in the airport and used Skype to call a local sight to make enquiries and make reservations for a day trip to a wildlife rescue centre in Petchaburi.
Free airport Wi-Fi in Thailand
I found out when writing this article that the AOT Wi-Fi network at Suvarnabhumi Airport is provided by True Move and is available at the main internaltional airports in Thailand.
These include the airports at Suvarnabhumi, Don Mueang, Chiang Mai, Chiang Rai, Phuket and Hat Yai.
The Suvarnabhumi Airport serving Bangkok provides a pretty decent free Wi-Fi to travellers in its terminals – good enough to make VoIP calls using Skype.
First you need to register in the login page for the AOT network in the airport and you get to use the network for free for up to 2 hours a day.
Don’t bother to memorise the complicated userid and password they issue you, the next time you use the network – which is probably when you leave Thailand – you can register as a new user again and use a new set of userid and password.
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Tags:airport, AOT, broadband, Microsoft, mobile, Moto G, Motorola, prepaid, SIM, Skype, Suvarnabhumi, Thailand, Thailand 2014, tips, travel, True Move, Wi-Fi
Posted in App, Holiday, Howtos, Internet, Microsoft, Network, Office, Skype, Software, Thailand 2014, Tips, travel, Wi-Fi | 1 Comment »
Thursday, December 25th, 2014
Here’s wishing everyone who celebrates Christmas a very Happy Christmas!
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
This photo was taken with a Sony α7 II full-frame ILCE camera, and FE 70-200mm F4 G OSS Full-frame E-mount Zoom Lens (SEL70200G).
Tags:Christmas, greetings, Xmas
Posted in A7, Events, events, Holiday, MIL, Photography, Photos, POTD, POTD, Singapore, Sony | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 23rd, 2014
LG plans to showcase its new Music Flow Wi-Fi Series lineup at the 2015 International CES in Las Vegas.
In addition to home libraries, users can stream music from service providers such as Spotify, Deezer, Napster, and TuneIn.
The lineup includes the company’s first battery-powered Wi-Fi Speaker (Model H4 Portable/NP8350), advanced Wi-Fi Sound Bars (Models HS7/LAS750M and HS9/LAS950M) and the Streaming 3D Blu-ray Player (Model BP550).
These speakers are designed to be compatible with Android and iOS devices.
More details from the press release below.
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Tags:audio, AV, Bluetooth, CES, CES 2015, LG, music, Music Flow, speakers, Wi-Fi
Posted in Announce, Audio, audioVisual, Entertainment, Gadgets, LG, Lifestyle, Music, speakers | No Comments »
Sunday, December 14th, 2014
A dual-SIM phone allows you to stay contactable to your regular contacts yet enables you to take advantage of more affordable local data/voice rates to avoid expensive overseas roaming charges – without having to carry two separate mobile phones.
The Motorola Moto G (2nd Generation) is one of the increasing number of smartphones that support a dual-SIM capability.
Nowadays, it is increasingly easy to get a local SIM card when one travels overseas for work or leisure.
The local SIM allows you to make/receive calls at affordable local rates and more significantly, to stay connected via mobile broadband – without chalking out a huge bill.
You can read
over here all about the benefits of getting a pre-paid local SIM card whenever you travel overseas.
But most mobile phones allow only one SIM card to be installed – so if you put in the local SIM card, you’ll have to remove your regular SIM card and become uncontactable to those who call you on your regular number, unless you forward those calls to your local number.
Otherwise, you’d carry a second single-SIM card phone, which is a hassle.
Not too long ago …
I remember in the early days of smartphones, people were selling dual-SIM card adaptors the size of regular sized SIM cards that you could place two micro SIM cards in.
You’d have to cut your regular sized SIM card yourself into micro SIM card size and it was a daunting proposition for most people to risk damaging your SIM card in the process.
These adaptors only worked for certain models of mobile phones, and you need to switch off and on the phone to switch between the SIM cards.
Fortunately, smartphones have evolved and nowadays, you have dual-SIM card phones that enable you use both SIM cards at the same time.
I brought along a Motorola Moto G (2nd Generation) dual-SIM card phone during my short break to Thailand and it was such a blessing.
There are two micro-SIM card slots so I could keep my regular SIM card in one slot and plug in the prepaid local SIM card that I bought at Suvarnabhumi Airport in the other.
The guy at the True Move counter did all the set up for me.
So after five minutes of queueing and five minutes of installation and payment, I was as connected in Thailand as I was at home back in Singapore.
I could receive roaming calls on my regular number from my friends back in Singapore and other parts of the world, while at the same stay connected on email and social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram via the mobile broadband on the local SIM card.
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Tags:airport, broadband, Lumia, Mi-Fi, Microsoft Devices, mobile, Moto G, Motorola, prepaid, SIM, Suvarnabhumi, Thailand, Thailand 2014, tips, travel, True Move
Posted in Android, Events, Gadgets, gadgets, Holiday, Lumia, Microsoft, Microsoft Devices, Moto, Motorola, Nokia, Phones, smartphones, Thailand 2014, Tips, travel, Windows Phone 8 | No Comments »
Saturday, December 13th, 2014
First thing I did when I exited the gates in the Arrival Hall in Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok was to get myself a pre-paid SIM card that gave me a local number for voice calls and seven days of mobile data broadband at 299 THB.
The truemove shop is one of the first things you come across when you exit the gates at the Arrival Hall at Suvarnabhumi Airport in Bangkok, Thailand.
Immediately after exiting the gates in the Arrival Hall, you’ll come upon this telco shop that sells pre-paid SIM cards, as well as other mobile plans.
The 7-day prepaid SIM card offered by True Move is one of a few pre-paid mobile plans available in Thailand. This package bundles 7 days of unlimited data, free call credits of 100 THB and incoming call, your own local number, attractive international call rates – all for 299 THB or approximately S$12.
Here’s where you can grab an affordable and convenient pre-paid SIM card that gives you mobile broad band as well as voice calls, and a local number.
I’m here for seven days, so I was delighted to grab the 7-day SIM card that costs 299 THB, or S$12.
You get seven days of free broadband mobile data as well as 100 THB of free call credits, which gives you 100min of local talk time at 1 THB/minute.
The seven days are calendar days and includes the day you bought the card, ending at 2359hrs on the seventh day.
What I found useful was not only the free call credits but having a local number that you can give out for others to contact you via local calls.
My wife can now call me at local rates, through her autoroam.
Otherwise, she would have to make an overseas call just to get me on my Singapore mobile number – you know sometimes we get separated in crowded places, or we deliberately split up to visit different shops etc.
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Tags:airport, Bangkok, broadband, Changi, Hua Hin, Mi-Fi, mobile, Moto G, Motorola, prepaid, SIM, Suvarnabhumi, Thailand, Thailand 2014, tips, travel, True Move
Posted in Events, Gadgets, Holiday, Howtos, Internet, Network, Phones, Promotions, smartphones, Thailand 2014, Tips, Travel | 1 Comment »
Friday, December 12th, 2014
It’s the year-end school holidays and the family decided to take an impromptu short break to Thailand for a week.
Welcome to the Land of Smiles. Here the welcoming facade of our hotel in Hua Hin, Thailand.
We’d initially thought about going to Krabi but it looked so crowded in photos on the Web that we decided to choose somewhere that’s more “off the beaten track”.
So we settled on Hua Hin, a popular weekend getaway for the local Thais in Bangkok.
Time for relaxation. Laidback sculpture in the gardens of our hotel in Hua Hin.
It’s a two-and-a-half hour drive from Bangkok and four-plus-hour journey by train or bus.
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Tags:Bangkok, Hua Hin, Microsoft, Moto G, Motorola, Olympus, Skype, Suvarnabhumi, Thailand, Thailand 2014, travel
Posted in Cameras, Events, Gadgets, gadgets, Holiday, Lens, Microsoft, MIL, Moto, Motorola, Olympus, OM-D, Photography, Photos, POTD, Skype, Thailand 2014, Tips, Travel, travel, Zuiko | 2 Comments »
Wednesday, December 10th, 2014
When we visited wasd in their final week of production, we discovered that they were very much ahead of schedule – and it looked like they’re going to finish with much time to spare! Erin reports.
Team wasd (Niger is just outside this snapshot) busy finishing up their animation clip.
On the second last day of the 3-week production, we visited Commonwealth Secondary School’s wasd at Nanyang Polytechnic.
There was a rather relaxed ambience in their cubicle, as they were close to completion and were simply doing rendering and touching up on the finer details.
All set for rendering.
They chose to do rendering in layers, instead of everything at one go.
Rendering in layers is to render different objects in the scene separately, in different layers, so that for each layer of objects, a different image is rendered.
The ticking clock that commences the day for the non-sleeping SAF.
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Tags:animation, Commonwealth, competition, education, N.E.mation!, N.E.mation! 9, production, wasd
Posted in After Effects, audioVisual, Contest, Education, Events, events | No Comments »
Tuesday, December 9th, 2014
We visited Team Elemonators in the third and final week of their 3-week production. The girls were going at completing their 1-minute animation by the end of the week. Erin reports.
The team Elemonators, with their two fluffy mascot bears, courtesy of Leanne.
It’s the third week and team Elemonators are speeding ahead hurriedly, close to the completion of their task!
The tools of the trade which occupy Esther’s workspace. To the right, near the NEWater bottle, is a Wacom Intuos Graphics Tablet, and a Lenovo computer.
The clock is ticking away for CHIJ St. Nicholas Girls’ School’s Elemonators as they finish up their animation, already three-quarters through.
All they had to do was to finish animating the last few scenes of their animated piece, and then render it.
When we dropped by, the team was focused on the rotoscoping segment of their animation journey.
What is rotoscoping?
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Tags:animation, competition, education, Elemonators, N.E.mation!, N.E.mation! 9, production, St Nicholas
Posted in After Effects, audioVisual, Contest, Education, Events, events, Video, Visits, Wacom | No Comments »
Saturday, December 6th, 2014
The vision of Intel Education’s initiatives is: Empowering Tomorrow’s Innovators. Here’s a peek into how Intel is plugging into the education scene.
From left: Eileen Lento, Ph.D; John Galvin; Sam Al-Schamma – key education advocates and leaders in Intel.
To most people, including myself, Intel is the leading chip maker that manufactures the processors in the computers that we use.
The company is also heavily involved in helping educational organisations and government bodies harness technology to reinvent teaching and learning for the younger generation.
Intel’s contribution to Education
To improve education in more than 70 countries, Intel and the Intel Foundation has, in the past decade, invested more than US$1billion, contributed more than 4 million employee volunteer hours, trained 14 million teachers, and helped 5 million people gain digital literacy.
I had the pleasure of listening to key executives in Intel Education over lunch earlier this week during the Bett Asia Leadership Summit in Singapore at the Marina Bay Sands.
John Galvin – a vice president of the Sales and Marketing Group and general manager of Intel Education at Intel Corporation – hosted the lunch and shared his experience in setting global strategy and implementation of innovative technology solutions to advance education worldwide.
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Tags:Bett, education, Intel, Intel Foundation, Tech Focus, technology
Posted in Brief, Education, Enterprise IT, Events, events, Intel, Tech Focus | No Comments »
Friday, December 5th, 2014
The new 8-inch, Android 4.4 (KitKat) ruggedised tablet is now available in Singapore at S$698 (LTE) and S$598 (Wi-Fi).
The Samsung GALAXY Tab Active is available in Titanium Green and it comes with the Ruggedized Cover and the “C Pen”.
Samsung has launched its first ruggedised tablet, with anti-shock protection to withstand a 1.2-metre drop (with ruggedised cover on); and water/dust resistant to IP67 certification.
The Samsung GALAXY Tab Active is now available in Singapore at $698 for the LTE version and $598 for the Wi-Fi version at IT retailers, Samsung Experience Stores, and from authorised Enterprise channel partners.
The GALAXY Tab Active is developed specifically for the business environment with professional functionalities and reinforced security.
Weighing 393g and measuring 213.1 x 126.2 x 9.75mm, the tablet has 1.5GB RAM and 16GB memory, with MicroSD slot for a further 128GB.
The GALAXY Tab Active is driven by a 1.2GHz Quad Core processor and powered by a 4,450mAh user replaceable battery.
The following accessories are also available for purchase with the GALAXY Tab Active:
- Gear Circle (SM-R130) available in Black, Blue and White at S$168.
- 9500mAh Battery Pack (EB-PN910) available in Black and White at S$128.
- USB/LAN Hub (ET-UP900) at S$98.
The 8-inch WXGA (1280 x 800) TFT LCD touch screen has 16 million colours.
(more…)
Tags:Galaxy, prices, ruggedised, Samsung, Singapore, Tab, tablets
Posted in Android, Announce, Availability, Business IT, Gadgets, gadgets, Galaxy, newArrivals, Prices, Samsung, Security, Specifications, Tablets, tablets | No Comments »
