I first learned about GMABooster from YugaTech. It’s a utility for speeding up the Intel GMA 950 graphics chip, which happens to be the graphics chip of my Asus EEE PCs (as well as most other netbooks). But unfortunately, the first time I downloaded it, it doesn’t seem to launch at all. I tried installing and reinstalling it as well as the .NET framework (yeech!) to no avail. Last night, I tried it again by downloading the latest version and it finally worked. I can now speed up the clock speed from the default 166Mhz to a whopping 400MHz. It’s no GeForce but higher detail levels is now possible with DOTA. Not bad for a free download.
Month: April 2009
I tried cooking sinigang again tonight. Michelle wasn’t around so I had to do it on my own. I followed the instructions from our sinigang recipe. But somehow it just didn’t come out right. Worse, I overcooked it and everything turned mushy.
Let’s begin with the blade. It is 3.5″ long and is a modified clip-point with a partially-serrated edge. It has a big nice round ambidextrous thumb-hole. The steel is 9Cr13CoMoV from China but it’s said to be equivalent to 440C steel which has the highest strength, hardness and wear resistance of all the stainless alloys. Pretty good so far.
The handle is made of glass-filled nylon with molded “triple-grip” pattern. It was the thing I least liked about the knife as it was too intricate but it does seem to work. Polymer handles are pretty tough by themselves as I’ve experienced with my Gerber EZ-Out but Benchmade chose to further reinforce it with a steel inner lining. Nice but could be a problem when exposed to saltwater.
The locking mechanism is lockback. A lot of people don’t like lockbacks and opt for a whole bunch of new technologies like axis locks. But lockbacks seem fine to me so far. The lockback mechanism on the Pika II seems very well made with no slack or wobble whatsoever.
The clip is the one of the best thing about the Pika II. It is small, light, and very strong. But best of all, it can be relocated to 4 positions. You can carry the Pika II any way you like! There’s also a provision for a lanyard. Well-designed, indeed.
The Pika II is part of Benchmade red box line: “Best in class value”. The knives in the red box line are low-cost, well-designed, fully-functional, and made in China, Taiwan to be precise.
There’s actually nothing wrong with that. Over a decade ago, I got myself a clip-point lockback that was made in Taiwan. It had a good, sharp, stainless steel blade. The only thing wrong were some chrome plated fasteners that eventually rusted. But it did it’s job, and well. I expect the Pika II to do the same.
CD-R King sure has come a long way. Starting with selling tacky and cheap CD-Rs they have become the purveyor of the tacky and cheap electronic gadgets. This is not to say the stuff they sell are useless. On the contrary, they’re quite usable once you get past the awful looks.
Case in point, I needed an enclosure for my 320GB 3.5″ HDD. It had been freed up of archiving duty upon the arrival of my Buffalo Linkstation. To reward it for months of hard work, I decided to get it an enclosure. The problem is that the prices ranges from P1,200 and up. Too much a reward considering 320GB HDDs cost about P3,000 these days.
So with heavy feet, I walked into one of the ubiquitous CD-R King branches. The stacks of goods were there, the line was there, the poor service was there. But I owe my HDD so I persevered and finally, it was my turn. I pointed at the enclosure (turo-turo high tech, yesh) and the sales lady showed it to me.
I checked the enclosure out and I decided it wasn’t bad at all. For P580 you get a nifty aluminum enclosure. It actually looked reasonably good except for a tacky translucent blue front plate. It the usual power cord, USB cable, driver installer (who needs those?) and a tacky and cheap plastic chrome stand. But best of all, it even includes a tacky and cheap screwdriver. With a package like that, who can resist, yeah? So I paid for it, went home, put in my HDD, and now it’s spinning merrily away on my sister’s desk doing backup work.
Now if they can only fix the long lines and poor service…