General – Page 209

Pathfinder

By Jay Lagare on Saturday, April 14, 2007

Just found out that Pathfinder is still about to show in the US. I fear this is too late but I must warn you: Don’t watch it! You’re just going to regret it. In a moment of poor judgement, I watched it and did. My impression was it’s trying to be so many things all at once. It tried to be like Apocalypto by setting up in pre-Columbian America and by using Nordic for Vikings. But it fell short because it didn’t do the same for the Native Americans speakers. Like, 300, it traces its roots to graphic novels. It tried offering the same adrenaline-pumping action. Unlike 300, it failed miserably. The action scenes were absolutely lame. Another indication it tried to be like 300 is what seems to be an attempt at approximating the look and feel of a graphic novel. It failed in that, too. So what’s good about this movie? NOTHING.

Rating: 1/5

General

2007 April 7 – Avilon Zoo, Montalban, Rizal

By Jay Lagare on Sunday, April 8, 2007

My brother and I took my sister and her family to the Avilon Zoo yesterday.

Getting there is a small adventure in itself. From Commonwealth Ave., turn right towards Batasan Complex. At the Batasan Complex, turn right to the Batasan-San Mateo Road. At the end of the road, turn left to the Marikina-San Mateo Road. Keep going until you see a Total gasoline station to your right. Take the first left towards the Eastwood Greenview Subdivision. You will enter a rotonda. Exit the rotonda after the subdivision gate and follow the dirt road till you see the Avilon Zoo sign.

Parking is spacious and free. Entrance is P200 per person. You have the option to hire a guide for your group for an extra P350. This is recommended since the zoo is laid out in a rather convoluted manner. The guided tour takes about 2 hrs and takes you through areas designated for reptiles, mammals, birds, snakes, spiders, and arapaimas. Arapaimas are one of the zoo’s highlights. They are supposedly the world’s largest freshwater fishes. The small ones gobble chicken heads whole while the big ones eat bangus whole.

There is a rest, food, refreshment, and souvenir area at the entrance as well as at the halfway point. At the entrance, you can also choose to take a boat into the lagoon where scary big arapaimas lurk. Since the tour involves a lot of walking, it is recommended that you take advantage of these two areas.

General

A4Tech X-710 Gaming Mouse

By Jay Lagare on Wednesday, March 28, 2007

I bought a new mouse last sunday. I decided to get a new one because although my previous mouse is still working, it is not ergonomic and not responsive because of its ball mechanism. It was also already scraping material off my tabletop because the mouse “feet” had already fallen off. My friend Vinz, who was also looking for a mouse because his mouse is also not ergonomic and was probably a major contributor to his shoulder ache.

I had wanted a Razer or Logitech gaming mouse but they were either hard to find or too expensive. Luckily we chanced upon some A4Tech gaming mice at one shop. We tested a few. They felt right and the price is also right so we each got one. I also had good experience with my second mouse ever, also an A4Tech, so the choice was easy.

The build was excellent. Almost as good as a good Logitech mouse. Mine has a matte black finish with glossy black trim. It is symetrically shaped: important for a lefty like me. It has the usual primary button, secondary button, and wheel. In addition, it has 2 thumb buttons on its left side for additional functions. Unfortunately, it is only easily accessible to right-handers. Somewhat disappointing but no matter, I mostly just use the standard controls anyway. At the bottom is not 4 but 6 mouse feet, for better gliding. Finally, it has a thin mouse cable to reduce drag.

Its optical mechanism can be switched between 400, 600, 800, and 1200 dpi resolutions with just the press of a selector button situated unobtrusively behind the wheel. When you change dpis, the wheel changes color from white, to green, to yellow, to red. This dpi switching mechanism allows you to easily and quickly switch mouse responsiveness depending on your needs e.g. office applications, to RTS (real-time strategy) game, to FPS (first-person shooter) game. I kept mine at red or 1200 dpi. Not only because I like the response at that resolution but the red glow is so cool and sinister as befit a gaming mouse.

As expected, the mouse was very responsive in actual use: office applications and Starcraft. Unfortunately I couldn’t test it with an FPS game since my laptop doesn’t meet system requirements. However, I’m sure it would perform just as well.

Rating: 5/5

General

Undetectable USB Devices in Linux

By Jay Lagare on Friday, March 23, 2007

Finally was able to find a solution to the problem that had been bugging the Linux laptops at the office for quite some time already. The problem was that USB devices were not being detected. The error messages go like:

USB: device not accepting address 2. Error -110
USB: device not accepting address 3. Error -110
USB: device not accepting address 4. Error -110
USB: device not accepting address 5. Error -110
Unlink after no-IRQ? Controller is probably using the wrong IRQ

After quite a bit of searching. I finally found this thread. It turns out that the solution is quite simple. You’ll need to go open your boot loader configuration file (in my case it’s /boot/grub/grub.conf) and put irqpoll as one of the kernel parameters. Reboot and voila! USB devices are now detected.

General

Tanabe Super Medalion Racing (SMR)

By Jay Lagare on Saturday, March 17, 2007

Today, I finally installed the Tanabe Super Medalion Racing (SMR) that I had bought second-hand six months back.

The SMR is a canister-type free-flowing perforated-core muffler developed specifically for racing. It features Tanabe’s Advantex muffler packing material. Advantex is a chemically treated composite material that resists acid, heat, rust, and many other forms of deterioration. So it supposedly lasts far longer than fiberglass wool which is the most common muffler packing material. In addition, the SMR is riveted so that if need be, you can open it up, refill the packing material, then rivet it close. Nifty.

The SMR looks great but it was bigger than I had anticipated and I had reservations about installing it. But after a long time, I eventually realized it’s just gathering dust and I finally relented.

Early in the morning, I went off to MufflerLand where they ripped off the stock muffler and welded the SMR in place. It was reasonably quick and I was driving off in no time at all.

The first thing I noticed about the SMR is the sound: a full-bodied bass across the RPM range. The sound does not break up at some RPMs like lesser mufflers. As for power, many people claim mufflers lessens restriction and thus increase power. I’m not sure about that but one thing is: It sounds powerful :P

BTW This is a huge muffler and if you are on lowering or– heaven forbid– cut springs, you might scrape the tip on the pavement once in while especially on steep ramps.

Rating: 4/5