Here’s wishing all Singaporeans a Happy National Day!
Singapore celebrates her 47 years today as a nation!
The island nation of Singapore was born on 9 August, 1965. Today, the country celebrates its 47th birthday.
Happy Birthday, Singapore!
Singapore’s 47th National Day
August 9th, 2012New compact camera: Samsung EX2F
August 6th, 2012Samsung has unveiled the Wi-Fi-enabled EX2F compact camera. It has a fast F1.4 lens and will be available in Singapore in August for S$699.
The Samsung EX2F is now available in Singapore. From now until 16 September, get a free 25L Dry box and Power bank charger worth $238 and an SD card, a camera case and an extra battery worth $115.
The Samsung EX2F compact camera has a maximum aperture of F1.4 and is Wi-Fi capable.
Following the success of the EX1 which had an F1.8 lens, Samsung has upped the ante with a super-bright F1.4 lens in the new EX2F.
| Samsung EX2F | |
| Megapixels | 12 MP |
| Sensor | 1/1.7″ BSI CMOS |
| Optical Zoom | 3.3 x |
| Wide angle | 24mm |
| Max zoom | 80mm |
| LCD | 3″, 614k dots, VGA, AMOLED |
| Movie | Full HD 1080/30p |
| Flash | Built-in + Hotshoe |
| RAW | Yes |
| Image stabilisation | Dual IS |
| Size /mm | 111.9 x 62 x 28.9 |
| Weight | 294.3 g * |
| Aperture | F1.4 to F2.7 |
| Others | Built-in ND filter |
| Price | S$699 |
| * Weight excludes battery and memory card. | |
A maximum aperture of F1.4 is available at the camera’s widest angle at 24mm.
The F1.4 lens lets in four times more light than an F2.8 lens, and comprises 11 elements in 9 groups, with 4 aspherical lenses and 2 high refractive lenses.
The larger aperture allows for shooting with very shallow depths of field, and the ability to shoot at low-light.
Low-light shooting is further assisted with Dual Image Stabilisation (Optical IS & Digital IS).
On the other hand, a built-in Neutral Density (ND) filter provides greater control over exposure settings either for creative purposes or in situations of over-exposure.
The camera is housed in a durable magnesium body usually found on DSLR cameras.
As in DSLR cameras, the EX2F allows Full Manual Control of exposure settings and records photos in RAW format.
Available in Singapore for S$699.
The Wi-Fi connectivity of the EX2F means that photos taken can be easily and speedily shared to social networking sites such as Facebook, or sent to friends or family via email.
The camera can be connected to smartphones and tablets via a Mobile Link, or saved through Auto Backup to a PC or to the Cloud.
Detailed technical specifications of the Samsung EX2F can be found below.
Top eight of SingTel Grid Girls 2012 unveiled
August 5th, 2012You can vote for the top three Singaporean faces to flag off this year’s Singapore Grand Prix race.
Top 8 of 55 SingTel Grid Girls 2012. Click for larger poster.
Fifth-time title sponsor of the FORMULA 1 SINGTEL SINGAPORE GRAND PRIX, Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel) has unveiled this year’s top eight SingTel Grid Girls and their new uniforms.
To vote via SMS, type in this format, [Grid Girl’s code number <space> Name <space> NRIC], and send it to +65 9113 6891. The code numbers are:
- GG1 – Priscilla Lee
- GG2 – Esther Leong
- GG3 – Arrian North
- GG4 – Emily Chia
- GG5 – Mabel Lim
- GG6 – Victoria Yeo
- GG7 – Rebecca Ly Dia Dore
- GG8 – Ashvin Sandhu
Members of the public will be able to vote for the top three from among the eight finalists who are from 18 to 23 years old.
This year’s SingTel Grid Girls will be sporting striking outfits designed by 26-year-old local design talent, Ms Roslinda Abdul Rahman.
She is the winner of The Project Racetrack.
The uniforms for all 55 SingTel Grid Girls will be sponsored by local fashion design house ESTA Pte Ltd.
GG1 Priscilla Lee in the new Grid Girl uniform.
The Project Racetrack
The Project Racetrack is an F1 fashion design competition integrated with a 74-hour long fashion design training course.
It was conducted by the Textile and Fashion Industry Training Centre (also known as TaF.tc) and Singapore WSQ Develop Design Collection in partnership with SingTel.
The competition serves as a platform for young aspiring designers to develop and showcase their creativity with F1 as an inspiration.
How to vote for the top three SingTel Grid Girls
The three finalists will be given the important role of holding the Singapore, Formula One and Singapore GP flags at the race in September.
GG8 Ashvin Sandhu
The top three 2012 SingTel Grid Girls will be crowned at the SingTel “F1 for Everyone” Roadshow at East Coast Park on 2 September.
This year, for the first time, the results will be based purely on online and SMS voting.
From 3 August to 27 August 2012, the public can find out more about and vote for their favourite SingTel Grid Girls at www.singtelrace.com or via SMS.
Voters stand to win a pair of Singapore Grand Prix Pit Grandstand Tickets worth $1,488.
There will also be 10 consolation prizes of Singapore Grand Prix Goodie Bags merchandise worth $150 to giveaway.
This year’s top eight finalists of the SingTel Grid Girls for Singapore Formula 1.
“We raised the level of competition this year by allowing only eight instead of the usual 12 to make the cut,” said Mr Johan Buse, Vice President of Consumer Marketing, SingTel.
“新电信已揭晓了今年星加坡F1车赛的头八名 SingTel Grid Girls。这八名决赛者将竞争头三名的名衔。公众可以上网或通过SMS投选你们支持的参赛者。” – 科技点心（微薄）
More photos of the top eight finalists of the 2012 SingTel Grid Girls below.
National Day offers: Minox Binoculars discounts
August 4th, 2012This National Day, the BF10x25BR (S$199) and BF10x42BR (S$299) Minox binoculars are being sold at up to 50% discounts off the regular retail price.
Minox BF10x25BR has a 10x magnification, and is dustproof and waterproof up to 3m. Nitrogen filling ensures permanent protection against corrosion and prevents fogging of the glass surfaces on the inside, even with severe and sudden temperature fluctuations.
If you don’t happen to have a front-row seat at this year’s National Day Parade, you can still get up close and personal with the action!
“为迎合八月九日新加坡国庆日，Schmidt Marketing 将以五折的价格售卖德国 Minox BF10x25BR (S$199新元) 以及BF10x42BR (S$299新元) 望远镜。国庆庆典当日，就算你不是坐在最前席，也可利用望远镜，好似近在咫尺间观看表演。” – 科技点心（微薄）
To celebrate the nation’s 47th birthday, Schmidt Marketing, the sole distributor of German luxury brand Minox Binoculars in Singapore is offering the BF10x25BR for S$199 (down from the usual S$359), and the BF10x42BR for S$299 (down from S$599).
The offer is valid till end of August 2012.
Available at the Schmidt Marketing Flagship Store (Ngee Ann City Tower A, #05-33) and selected retailers.
National Day offers from SingTel
August 4th, 2012SingTel celebrates Singapore’s 47th birthday with mobile, broadband, mio TV and multimedia content offers.
Check out SingTel’s National Day offers and promotions from 4 to 12 August.
Singapore Telecommunications Limited (SingTel) will offer 47 mio TV on-demand movies for just $1 each from 8 to 12 August. Titles include recently released Hollywood blockbusters, as well as Asian, Bollywood and Malay favourites.
Discounts to celebrate Singapore’s 47th birthday.
Customers who sign up for SingTel’s Flexi mobile plans from 4 to 12 August will enjoy $47 off all handset purchases.
They will also receive a discount of $4.70 off their monthly Flexi plan subscriptions.
The promotion is also available to existing customers who renew their subscriptions.
In addition, customers who subscribe to SingTel’s mio Home or exPlore Home broadband plans from 4 to 12 August can enjoy mio TV’s Combo pack at a special price of $19.90 per month, discounted from $29.90 per month.
The Combo pack includes mio Stadium football channels and ESPN STAR sports, as well as English entertainment and Jingxuan Chinese channels.
SingTel has supported the National Day Parade since 1995 as its Principal Telecoms Provider.
This year, SingTel is also providing the technology for the NDP online ticket balloting system and One Place multimedia portal.
With the new Barclays Premier League season starting on 18 August, the Combo pack is ideal for fans of the beautiful game.
In the spirit of the occasion, SingTel will offer a selection of Singapore’s most loved National Day songs for download and streaming through its award-winning AMPed 2.0 music service.
SingTel will also offer the Reuters SMS news alerts service for $4.70 per month, discounted from $7.50 per month.
See Olympic London in 3D with Nokia Maps
August 4th, 2012The 2012 Olympic Games is ongoing in London right now. Nokia’s spectacular 3D Maps lets you fly through the English capital from the comfort of your home.
An aerial view of the London 2012 Olympic marathon route.
Get a bird’s eye view of the beautiful Olympic city of London in 3D with Nokia Maps 3D.
So while you’re waiting for the next Olympic sports event to begin, take a break and fly over the Olympic Village in London with Nokia Maps 3D.
The buildings are shown in photorealistic 3D models using imagery captured by C3, a leading provider of 3D mapping solutions.
CNN, in partnership with Nokia, has created some amazing flyovers of London using Nokia Maps 3D, showcasing the Olympic marathon route, an aerial view of the Wimbledon Tennis Club, a peek at the Olympic Village and even a spectacular glimpse of Hyde Park.
Explore cities that have hosted the Olympic Games.
Nokia Maps even has a dedicated Olympic Games section that allows you to take a 3D tour of London, visiting all the must-see tourist spots, or gathering tips for accommodation, restaurants, shopping and famous sights.
TODAY! Xperia ion, Xperia go and Xperia acro S arrive in Singapore
August 3rd, 2012Sony Mobile Communications today announced the official launch of the three Android smartphones in Singapore. The Xperia ion (S$798), Xperia acro S (S$698) and Xperia go (S$488) are available from today.
The Sony Xperia ion, Xperia go, and Xperia acro S are available in Singapore from today at all Sony stores, Sony centres, Xperia concept stores and operator stores.
The Xperia ion is Sony Mobile’s new flagship smartphone and offers a brilliant HD experience on a large 4.6-inch screen.
The Xperia go and Xperia acro S are water and dust resistant.
| Sony Mobile | RRP | Colours |
|---|---|---|
| Xperia ion | S$798 | Black |
| Xperia acro S | S$698 | Black and White |
| Xperia go | S$488 | Black, White and Yellow |
* Prices do not include line contract.
These three smartphones were among six that Sony Mobile showcased in Singapore back in June.
BlackBerry reveals 4G LTE PlayBook
August 2nd, 2012RIM has unveiled the new 4G LTE PlayBook. Available in Canada on 9 August with 32GB and a more powerful 1.5GHz dual-core CPU. Prices TBA.
The new PlayBook comes with much needed cellular connectivity.
The 4G LTE version of the BlackBerry PlayBook will make its debut in Canada next Thursday, with availability in other countries in the following months.
| Cellular connectivity | |
| LTE | 700, 1700 MHz |
| HSPA+ | 100, 1900, 1700, 800, 900 MHz |
Given the incompatibility of 4G networks in different countries, it could be some time before a version compatible with your country becomes available.
In the meantime, the new PlayBook will at least bring much needed cellular connectivity (on 3G) for users from countries which do not have a 4G network yet (or who have incompatible networks).
Available in Canada on 9 Aug.
Research In Motion (RIM) had announced earlier that the PlayBook will eventually run on BlackBerry 10 OS.
So the 4G LTE should be upgradeable from the current BlackBerry Tablet OS when BB10 becomes available next year.
Apart from the 4G LTE connectivity and CPU speed-up, the hardware for the new PlayBook remains the same – which is a testimony of how advanced it was to begin with when the original PlayBook was launched last year.
Brother launches a slew of MFCs, printers, scanners, and faxes
August 2nd, 2012Brother launched in Singapore 11 new products today – 3 MFCs, 4 printers, 1 laser fax, and 3 scanners. Prices within.
Brother launched its slew of products at Stellar, 1-Altitude in Singapore.
Founded in 1908 in Japan, the 104-year-old Japanese manufacturer introduced its slew of new office appliances in Singapore today.
The MFCs, printers and laser fax come with 3-years on-site warranty while the scanners come with 1-year carry-in warranty.
4 new mono-laser printers
The Brother HL-5440D & the HL-5450DN looks identical (left) while the HL-5470DW & HL-6180DW looks identical (right).
The four mono-laser printers are targeted towards SMBs and large corporations, offering double-sided printing as well as print speeds of up to 40ppm.
| Mono-laser printers | Prices |
|---|---|
| HL-5440D | S$288 |
| HL-5450DN | S$588 |
| HL-5470DW | S$688 |
| HL-6180DW | S$788 |
With Mobile Print (available in all the new models except HL-5440D), users can print anytime, anywhere from their desktops or mobile internet devices such as their Apple or Android smartphones.
The driverless printing supports various platforms, such as the Google Cloud Print, Apple Air-Print and Wi-Fi Direct (applicable for wireless models only).
3 new MFCs and 1 laser fax
Brother MFC-8910DW and MFC-8510DN
The MFCs (Multi-Function Centres) can print, copy, scan and fax.
| Multi-Function Centres | Prices |
|---|---|
| MFC-8510DN | S$888 |
| MFC-8910DW | S$1,088 |
| MFC-7290 | S$378 |
| FAX-2840 | S$268 |
Two new models with double-side printing and networking cater to SMBs and large corporations while one is a budget machine for the home or small office.
The FAX-2840 has a fast transmission speed of 33.6kbps and 500-page fax in memory. It can print up to 20ppm at resolutions of up to 2,400 x 600 dpi.
3 scanners
Brother scanners DS-700D, ADS-2100 and DS-600.
The ADS-2100 Desktop Document Scanner helps SMBs digitise hardcopy documents through single-pass high-speed duplex scanning.
| Scanners | Prices |
|---|---|
| ADS-2100 Desktop | S$588 |
| DS-600 Mobile | S$218 |
| DS-700D Mobile | S$328 |
The DS-600 (single-sided) and DS-700D (double-sided) Mobile Document Scanners allow mobile workers to scan documents on the move, powered by a USB cable.
All three scanners are able to scan name cards as well as A4 size pages.
You can fold an A3 size poster into two so that the scanner can scan both sides and then stitch both halves together with the included software.
Brother FAX=2840. The MFC-7290 looks almost identical in size and form factor.
The scanning software can do OCR (Optical Character Recognition) to scan to editable text files (with no formatting); or scan to PDFs as images (layout preserved).
Alternatively you can also scan your documents into searchable PDFs (OCRed text layer superimposed on scanned image).
As these scanners are sheet-fed, they can only scan loose-leaf pages. For bound books, you’ll need to use a flat-bed scanner instead.
Notes:
“日本悠久制造商Brother在新加坡推出了一系列新产品。包括四部镭射打印机，三部多用途打印机，一部镭射传真机，以及三部文件扫描机。”科技点心（微薄）
- All prices in this post include GST.
- All photos are from Brother but have not been shown to scale.
- Legend for Brother’s nomenclature:
- D – double-side printing
- N – network
- W – WiFi
Microsoft announces Windows 8 Release to Manufacturing
August 2nd, 2012Milestone signals Windows 8 has completed product development and testing, and is being handed-off to hardware partners to get ready for October 26 general availability. Release schedule below.
Windows 8 has reached RTM (Release to Manufacturing).
Microsoft has just announced that Windows 8 has reached Release to Manufacturing (RTM), the latest milestone in the launch of the new Windows 8 operating system.
Users buying a new Windows 7 PC between 2 June 2012 to 31 January 2013 can purchase an upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for S$17.99 (including GST) on the day of Windows 8 launch.
Those currently on Windows XP, Windows Vista or Windows 7 (prior to 2 June) can upgrade to Windows 8 Pro for US$39.99.
For those wanting to try a pre-release version of Windows 8 before general availability, the Windows 8 Release Preview is available for download here.
Developers can visit the Windows Dev Center to get access to all the tools and resources they need to design, build, and sell apps in the Windows Store.
Whereas all apps during the preview phases were free, developers can now begin charging for apps with the RTM.
Those with access to RTM bits will begin to see paid apps appear in the Windows Store.
The schedule for releasing the final RTM code to select audiences – including developers, IT professionals and partners – will begin in mid-August.
August 15th
- Developers building new apps for Windows 8 will be able to download the final version of Windows 8 via an MSDN subscription. You can visit the Windows Dev Center to get access to the final build of Visual Studio 2012.
- IT professionals testing Windows 8 in organizations will be able to access the final version of Windows 8 through a TechNet subscription.
August 16th
- Customers with existing Microsoft Software Assurance for Windows will be able to download Windows 8 Enterprise edition through the Volume License Service Center (VLSC), allowing you to test, pilot and begin adopting Windows 8 Enterprise within your organization.
- Microsoft Partner Network members will have access to Windows 8.
August 20th
- Microsoft Action Pack Providers (MAPS) receive access to Windows 8.
August 26th
- General availability of Windows 8 to customers.
September 1st
- Volume License customers without Software Assurance will be able to purchase Windows 8 through Microsoft Volume License Resellers.
