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| Sunday May 14, 2006 | | 17:19 PM - kan |  Was just chatting with bktoh who came back from his Bangkok trip and he lightened up my day by saying someone could possibly donate a server to HW1. Time flies and today is the 8th year anniversary of HW1! I would have guess most of the folks who used to frequent this website have moved on with their life – getting married and having kids. This website is still running to serve as a remembrance for the good-old times.
On behalf of HW1, I wish everyone good health! |  Print Today's News
| | Thursday April 27, 2006 | | 22:09 PM - kan |  Looks like my cable ISP SlowHub is having some hiccups again. Darn, perhaps it's telling me to sleep early tonight. Oh yes, I did ask if they can refund me this month's subscription fee but I suspect they will conveniently ignore my request. PS: I'm on a 6.5 Mbps plan!!
Connecting to Server ...
Logging on to Server ...
Starting 1st download
Starting 2nd download
Download Successful !!
Download Stats:
Transfer Time: 70890 milliseconds
Total File Size: 6142976 bytes
Average Transfer Rate: 0.66 Mbps
| | 11:44 AM - bktoh |  The latest JasJar firmware (1.30.x) for the Dopod already implements most of these features a couple of months ago including Push Mail. And it is very very speedy too.
Unfortunately, BlackBerry has chosen not to support MS Exchange Push Mail. Bastids.. so will still need a Blackberry client on the PDA. Right now running on the T-Mobile firmware (v1.20 revision) which has a Blackberry client (from T-Mobile).
It is newer than the Dopod 900s shipping (older) v1.10 based firmware but no where near as fast as the recently released v1.30 ones)
ps Don't think you can get around the firewall restrictions still though. Still need the USB switch to get around that. Damn! | Print Today's News
| | Wednesday April 26, 2006 | | 19:38 PM - kan | Okay, looks like bktoh's problems should be fixed by the new ROM releases of both Dopod 818 (which wymun and myself are using) and Dopod 900 ROMs. Actually I was using the i-Mate JAMIN for a while now and found it to be pretty stable. I will probably give this new Dopod 818 ROM a skip and perhaps wait for the next release which will hopefully comes with official A2DP (Advanced Audio Distribution Profile) support. For those of you who cannot wait for the official A2DP support, check out XDA Developers on how to implement it on your Dopod 818 now.
Dopod 900 ROM Code Update (2006/4/25)
ROM Version: 1.30.111 WWE
ROM Date: 04/06/06
Radio Version: 1.11.00
Protocol version: 42.45.P8
ExtROM version: 1.30.230 WWE
Updates:
1) Provides client-side support for Microsoft DirectPush (push mail).
2) Improved Comm Manager interface for 1-click DirectPush on/off and data connection detach.
3) This update includes all prior updates.
| Print Today's News
| | Tuesday April 25, 2006 | | 16:04 PM - bktoh | So I finally got my ActiveSync 4 to sync with my Outlook in offline/online mode and even with VPN connections and Firewall enabled.
You know how?
Thanks to Dopod for providing the USB Switch utility. This is available for download on their Member site (requires registration but purchase not necessary).
Basically what USB switch does is to allow you to switch the USB connection to serial (reverts to the same mode used in ActiveSync 3 and Windows Mobile 2003).
Only thing is this switch is not permanent. Everytime you do a soft reset, it reverts back to the original network setting.
DAMN.
But I am now getting the hang of it.
If only the Dopod didn't sag my pants down so much 
*sigh* | Print Today's News
| | Saturday April 22, 2006 | | 20:46 PM - bktoh | I moved out of a PocketPC phone (O2 XDA2 mini) and opted for a slightly smaller 3G phone (Sony Ericsson W900i), seeing as I could get more coverage when I travelled (3G would allow coverage when I was in Japan)
But the trend towards BlackBerry email access on the go in my current job suddenly made a compelling argument for me to move back to a PocketPC phone again.
Problem was: the only 3G PDA phone was the Dopod 900 and it was a brick. But a good friend of mine seemed to getting along swimmingly with the device so I thought it should have been a simple process to move back.
Boy! Was I ever wrong.
First, the monstrosity of what Microsoft called ActiveSync 4.1. It was already supposed to be an update on the even worse v4.0. Can't imagine how bad that version must have been after my experience with 4.1
Geez. You'd think after Microsoft painstakingly worked on ActiveSync 2 and 3 and got them almost bullet and idiot-proof, ActiveSync 4 would make that whole process a whole lot simpler and smoother.
But you'd be wrong.
ActiveSync 3.x was a walk in the park. Install, Connect and Auto Detect. I moved through 3 or 4 PPCs with nary a hitch in the install process.
But ActiveSync 4?
I guess warning bells should have been ringing when the Read Me First told me I had to disable Microsoft's OWN built-in firewall before you could auto-detect the PPC when setting up a partnership.
In my case, the company was using Symantec Client Security (built-in AntiVirus/Spam/Firewall/etc).
Looks like Symantec was too smart for its own good. Even disabling the firewall didn't help. It was ONLY when I fully un-installed the entire Client Security suite (getting rid of AntiVirus AND Firewall) did ActiveSync 4 even detect the PPC.
Geez.
Then synchronizing data was a whole other headache. I got the dreaded 850xxxx error. Turned out ActiveSync 4 didn't like my Cisco VPN connection either.
So I disconnected it and ran Outlook in Offline mode.
No joy either. Apparently ActiveSync 4 didn't like Outlook running in Offline mode either.
I was messing about with Outlook and finally got it to work in Disconnected mode.
It was THEN AND ONLY THEN that Outlook managed to sync with the device.
I don't really blame Dopod for this. I know of the same pain when getting a Dell Axim with Windows Mobile 2005 and ActiveSync 4 to connect as well.
Can't believe Microsoft bothered to launch WM2005 and ActiveSync 4 with so many problems. It took me over an hour to install the drivers and ActiveSync and troubleshoot the connectivity issues... and I am already a seasoned Pocket PC user. Geez man!!
| Print Today's News
| | Tuesday April 11, 2006 | | 19:43 PM - kan | Looks like Starhub made it to the headlines again after numerous gamers are unhappy with the high latencies and laggy performance provided by the company. Mr Thomas Ee, SVP of Starhub issued the ultimatum to gamers who are experiencing laggy performance to email them and describe the exact problem instead of whining around in the forums.
Judging from the way how Starhub reacts to any accusations defensively, I decided to ditch MaxOnline and look for better providers.
MaxOnline well-suited to online gaming
THE article, 'Gamers upset about StarHub's sluggish broadband speeds' (ST, April 7), does not give a fair representation of online gaming over StarHub's MaxOnline service.
Gaming lag is an issue that all Internet Service Providers (ISPs) around the world face, from time to time. This is because the Internet is a large and ungoverned global network, with none of its end-to-end connectivity being operated by any single ISP or its upstream providers.
ISPs are typically connected to a small subset of upstream providers as it would not be possible to connect to all upstream providers around the world. Consequently, the end-user's access experience with one ISP may differ from another as the network of upstream providers for every ISP may be different. Hence, if there are congested links between upstream providers that are affecting the end-user's access speed, there is little that his ISP can do directly, except to have more than one upstream provider.
In the case of gaming services hosted by third parties, gaming lag is also often the result of a large number of users from around the world concurrently connected to a given server/site. Especially in the case of a popular game, there could be excessive traffic load at the server/site that can degrade the end-user experience.
The gaming experience could also be affected by many other reasons, including the condition of the modem connecting to the broadband network, and the final data path taken to/from the hosted site of the game.
Despite such challenges, we have and will continue to strive to provide a quality broadband service to our MaxOnline customers by constantly optimising the network that we operate, and balancing the traffic load across multiple upstream providers.
In addition, we will continue to monitor our network equipment closely and invest to upgrade proactively, before bottlenecks occur.
We believe that our MaxOnline service provides a good overall platform that is well-suited to online gaming. Hence, we are very concerned about the comments made by our customers in the article and are in the midst of getting in touch with them, to help them minimise the lag experienced in their games.
As an indication of our seriousness in dealing with this issue of lag, we encourage online gamers who have experienced 'lagtime' to write to us directly at helpdesk@starhub.com, explaining their experience, and indicating clearly on the subject header, Gaming Lag.
Thomas Ee
Senior Vice-President
IP Services
StarHub
This is a letter which I have sent to Starhub earlier today.
I read with interest Mr Thomas Ee article "MaxOnline well-suited to
online gaming" (ST, April 11). In the article, he has encouraged online
gamers to voice their comments over the lagtime issues which many
gamers have encountered.
Gamers are beginning to question MaxOnline network architecture and the
ability for the infrastructure to satisfy the increasing demands. Over
the past few months, many customers have complained about the slow and
sluggish access speeds MaxOnline has been providing to its customers. There
must be reasons for these accusations. Instead of looking into the
possible reasons for all these complaints, I am disappointed that
MaxOnline is quick to offer the usual bureaucracy reply by shifting the
blame to other Internet Service Providers (ISPs) where some of the game
servers are hosted in.
My first router hop outside my house has often met with high latencies.
A "traceroute" at 7 pm from my apartment on 11/04/2006 is shown below:
#traceroute www.starhub.com
traceroute to www.starhub.com (203.116.254.109), 30 hops max, 46 byte
packets
1 192.168.1.1 (192.168.1.1) 0.676 ms 0.647 ms 0.765 ms
2 10.52.128.1 (10.52.128.1) 200.214 ms 98.452 ms 41.664 ms
3 172.20.52.129 (172.20.52.129) 249.683 ms 143.295 ms 188.522 ms
4 172.26.52.1 (172.26.52.1) 87.897 ms 174.618 ms 200.989 ms
5 172.20.8.49 (172.20.8.49) 126.775 ms * 123.761 ms
6 203.116.7.13 (203.116.7.13) 146.327 ms 128.234 ms 123.786 ms
7 vlan911-an-cat6k-ts-1-rsm2.starhub.net.sg (203.118.5.3) 140.342 ms
125.764 ms 207.996 ms
8 vlan915-cat6k-ts1-r1.starhub.net.sg (203.118.1.227) 134.812 ms
129.212 ms 138.619 ms
9 ge3-0-gsrts1.starhub.net.sg (203.118.1.6) 121.634 ms 96.777 ms
254.786 ms
10 pos1-0-gsrtl1.starhub.net.sg (203.118.0.241) 265.680 ms 86.069 ms
312.261 ms
11 ge3-14-dstl01.starhub.net.sg (203.118.0.18) 124.592 ms 216.243 ms
226.333 ms
This clearly shows network congestion inside MaxOnline network. If
MaxOnline requires explanation on the "traceroute" results, I will be
glad to do so.
A quick surf to the MaxOnline Network Utilities page at
http://utilities.starhub.com/conexon/en/UtilitiesStartFrame.jsp shows
that my MaxOnline 6500 plan is equivalent to a MaxOnline 2000 plan in
terms of the average transfer rate.
Connecting to Server ...
Logging on to Server ...
Starting 1st download
Starting 2nd download
Download Successful !!
Download Stats:
Transfer Time: 24829 milliseconds
Total File Size: 6142976 bytes
Average Transfer Rate: 1.89 Mbps
Question: In this case, why am I paying for a higher subscription plan
for speeds which is difficult to attain? Can MaxOnline refund me the
extra charges I have been paying all along? Can I go to CASE (Consumers
Association of Singapore) to lodge a complaint about paying for a
certain level of service but yet unable to receive the promised service level
consistently? I am not sure and I definitely regret not doing a Law
degree.
All the above clearly shows that MaxOnline is incapable of supporting
its customers in its own internal network. How can we even expect good
performance in terms of gaming with other Internet Service Providers?
I am sure the usual response I would get from this email will be a
cut-and-paste template asking me for the type of Operating System I am
using, is the Anti-virus software updated etc, possible spyware, etc.
Please DO NOT ask me that.
My suggestion for MaxOnline is to look at the exact reasons why your
networks are congested and stop trying to invent excuses.
MaxOnline can either invest in better infrastructure to improve the
service quality - or wait for customers to terminate their MaxOnline plans.
If you have any queries, please do not hesitate to contact me at
XXXX-XXXX.
Thank you.
Updates as of 2244 hrs
This is the traceroute and download speed which I am getting right now. Playing online games is impossible at this moment.
traceroute to www.starhub.com (203.116.254.109), 30 hops max, 46 byte packets
1 192.168.1.1 (192.168.1.1) 1.070 ms 0.799 ms 0.690 ms
2 10.52.128.1 (10.52.128.1) 87.688 ms 81.557 ms 63.827 ms
3 172.20.52.129 (172.20.52.129) 62.316 ms 74.130 ms 62.815 ms
4 172.26.52.1 (172.26.52.1) 84.654 ms 293.878 ms 230.365 ms
5 172.20.8.49 (172.20.8.49) 446.881 ms 417.859 ms 392.364 ms
6 203.116.7.13 (203.116.7.13) 659.268 ms 290.125 ms 448.377 ms
7 vlan911-an-cat6k-ts-1-rsm2.starhub.net.sg (203.118.5.3) 769.836 ms 546.602 ms 403.233 ms
8 vlan915-cat6k-ts1-r1.starhub.net.sg (203.118.1.227) 1505.365 ms 720.988 ms 747.727 ms
9 ge3-0-gsrts2.starhub.net.sg (203.118.1.7) 1534.302 ms 863.836 ms 581.304 ms
10 pos1-0-gsrtl2.starhub.net.sg (203.118.1.241) 778.019 ms 226.538 ms 148.216 ms
11 ge3-14-dstl01.starhub.net.sg (203.118.0.18) 339.680 ms 225.066 ms 158.839 ms
Connecting to Server ...
Logging on to Server ...
Starting 1st download
Starting 2nd download
Download Successful !!
Download Stats:
Transfer Time: 39313 milliseconds
Total File Size: 6142976 bytes
Average Transfer Rate: 1.19 Mbps
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