Martin Jr

Tansek’s Siew Mai has arrived!

Martin Jr — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 17:37:34 +0000

Siew Mai arrived in Vietnam last night by Lufthansa Airlines from USA, it took us more than 2 hours to bring him out, snail pace and greedy eyed officials prevented us from speedy pick up. He was a bit nervous at first but was much calmer after introducing him to our 3 other Chows, he’s certainly energetic and extremely curious with his new surrounding. He doesn’t seem to have much appetite at the moment, could be jet lagged! Here are some of his photos after reaching home

Tansek’s Siew Mai on his way to Vietnam!

Martin Jr — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 05:27:29 +0000

After waiting for more than 2 years for a specific litter from Forestway Chows kennel the long wait is finally over. Tansek’s Siew Mai, a handsome cream male chow chow, will be making his way to his new home this Wednesday. A journey that will take him across the globe from Detroit USA to Frankfurt Germany and finally to Saigon Vietnam, he will depart tomorrow (Wednesday) and expected to arrive this Friday, a gut wrenching 35hours and 20mins travel.

Fingers crossed and hope all the paperwork is in order for his flight tomorrow, looking forward to receiving him!

File is too large for destination file system error message

Martin Jr — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 17:51:59 +0000

Whiles trying to move a relatively large file (4.3GB+) yesterday to my external Western Digital HDD storage system I encountered an error “File is too large for destination file system” message. A quick check online and I discovered that my storage system was under Fat32 system which only support 4GB max per file, to rectify this I will have to change the file system to NTFS. Further reading shows the procedure to be relatively easy and painless but as a precaution always make a backup!

The error

Fat32 file system

Using command prompt heck the volume name (in my case it’s “My Book”) by typing vol d: and type convert d: /fs:ntfs to start converting

It will prompt you to enter your volume label before conversion, mine was “My Book”. Press enter and after a couple of minutes it’s done. Easy

Let’s give it a go….. perfect

Samsung SyncMaster P2370H

Martin Jr — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 18:48:41 +0000

My new monitor was delivered to my office today, Samsung’s 23″ SyncMaster P2370H for VND$4,750,000 (with 10% VAT). The good thing is it has HDMI option which unfortunately is the only video port my Alienware M11x supports. Another cool thing I like about this monitor is the menu option besides the power button, it automagically appear when you touch the transparent screen. It’s touch sensitive! The downside is the glossy frame, at each corners you’ll see your screen’s reflection… I know it’s nothing but it bugs me!

Samsung SyncMaster P2370H box

Available ports at the back of the monitor, power, DVI, HDMI and Audio

Connected to Alienware M11X

Touch sensitive menu and power buttons

Damn reflection!

Ninite, your one-stop easy PC software setup

Martin Jr — Sun, 18 Jul 2010 18:30:32 +0000

I stumbled upon Ninite.com while searching for tutorials on how to maximize Windows 7 and Alienware M11xR2 performance as I was about to replace its stock 320GB HDD with an Intel X-25M 80GB SSD. One of the most time consuming chores for a freshly installed PC/notebook is installing all your favorite softwares. You have to download each of them, installs them one by one manually and pay close attention not to install junks like tool bars and whatnot.

Well, this is where Ninite.com steps in. What they provide is a one stop automated download of a list of essential softwares that you really need for your machine. From a list of popular softwares you just tick to your preference and at the end of the page hit the “Get Installer” button. After that all you need to do is double click on the installer and let it run on the background silently while you go something to bite or do a quick 10-15mins exercise. It’s that simple! Thumbs up to the folks at Ninite.com!

Quick and easy SOCKS5 SSH tunnel set up with putty

Martin Jr — Tue, 29 Jun 2010 16:30:13 +0000

Whenever I’m on travel and needed to check my mails I always feel uncomfortable doing it over hotel internet or free WiFi establishment such as Coffeebean or Starbucks. Worst if I don’t have my notebook with me, NEVER EVER access secure sites from public computers, most of them contains keyloggers or some nasty trojan horses/viruses.

The best way in my opinion is to sign up with a vpn service provider, install the dialing application on your notebook (again, not on public computers, keyloggers damn it!) and surf with much relief. Such service is not expensive, roughly $5-$10 per month or higher if premium service is included such as selections of multiple country IPs, your own personal IPs, etc.

Now in my case I have several VPS accounts (for web hosting), I can easily turn one of them into a secure proxy in a few seconds. Below is a quick and dirty tutorial

What you will need
1. Download Putty
2. Your notebook
3. Your web hosting account (which allows shell access)

Step 1 Configuring Putty
Open Putty application. Enter your hostname or IP and connection port, this is usually 22 unless your host changed them.

Once that’s done go to +SSH on the left menu of Putty and select Tunnels. Enter “8080″ for source port, select “Dynamic” and press “Add”. You will see “D8080″ being added.

Then go back to Session on the left menu of Putty and select “Open” to connect to your host. Enter your username and password. Once logged in you can minimize Putty.

Step 2 Configuring Firefox
Open your Firefox browser, go to “Tools” and selection “Options” a popup window will appear. Select “Advanced” then “Network” and click on “Settings”. A 2nd window will appear. Select “Manual proxy configuration” and under “SOCKS Host” enter 127.0.0.1 with port of “8080″. Make sure “SOCKS v5″ is selected and press the “OK” button to close both windows. That’s it! You’re done!

Check your IP now