Raves and Rants

Still in limbo

2009-03-05T21:02:00.000-08:00

After several months on not writing, Im back again. Yeah...yeah...Im bored as hell again. And Im back to job hunting again...nope haven't gotten a job yet ever since my last blog post. Anyways, the stock market crash has finally taken its toll for the past few months. It is safe to assume we are in the second wave of the long and grueling bear market.
Speaking of the bear market...job hunting it getting scarce as each day passes by. Everyone is almost getting paid minimum wage, which always bring the question...what is minimum wage? I guess everyone is quite unaware nowadays...even if the taxable income was already increased from 8k to 15k...it still doesnt make a dent. Factor in everything else such as rising food prices, fuel, expenses, and transporation...it would be a miracle if one could still save at least 1500.00 bucks a month out of a lets say....10k salary per month? Good luck. We are human beings with brains and a life you know.
Hay...more rants...

Circumventing hot PC rigs.

2008-10-22T04:12:00.000-07:00

I happened to run along a PC I assembled almost a little over a year ago. Its a miracle its still running since had a good amount of dust already inside the rig. But that not even half of the story.

I installed MBM 5.0 way back on this rig. The hard drive temperatures were around 48 degrees centigrade, quite normal for a drive with no hard drive cooler. What caught my attention was the processor temperature...edging at almost 90 DEGREES!!! Had to open the side of the case and direct an electric fan...and mind you, aside from a very very warm aluminum case...a blast of hot air greeted me. No wonder Windows was a bit sluggish. 10 minutes later, processor temperature was down to 45 degrees....whew...a few more months and that rig was toast. Even for a Intel Pentium 4 3.0E Prescott Socket 478 Processor, 3.0GHz, 800MHz FSB, 1MB L2 Cache, it was a miracle it was still running.

It took me a few minutes to figure out the cause of the heat buildup. Here we have a 3ghz power guzzler on a stock heat sink, an intake fan situated at the bottom front of the case (unlike side fans placed conveniently at the removable side panel of the case), two CD drives, two hard drives, and a SINGLE FAN 320 watt power supply. No wonder, hot air couldn't get out of the case, and more heat was being generated by all the things inside than what the intake and exhaust fan could handle.

After some reading from AMD.com I found a very good article detailing correct cooling for PCs, airflow wise. Mind, it applies to both Intel and AMD processors.

Causes of heat are as follows:
■ Use the proper heatsink for the processor speed used in the system. Make sure that the heatsink has appropriate sized fan(s).
■ Use good thermal grease.
■ Use an auxiliary exhaust rear chassis fan. The suggested size is 80 millimeters or larger. The fan intake should be near the location of the processor.
■ For best results, use an ATX power supply with air intake venting in the processor region, which means that the primary air intake is on the bottom of the power supply, not at the front of the power supply. Supplies with NLX-style venting (the primary air intake is at the front of the power supply) do not pull air from the processor area.
■ Make sure all the internal wires and cables are routed carefully so airflow through the case is not blocked or hindered. Using tie-wraps to contain loose items can help.
■ Many cards, such as AGP cards, generate heat. Either leave the slot next to these cards open, or use a shorter card in these slots to allow airflow around heat producing cards (typically those cards with many electrical components - which are found in many high end video cards).
■ High-speed hard drives, especially 10,000+ RPM SCSI hard drives, produce a great deal of heat. You can mount these drives in 5.25 inch frames and install them in the larger drive bays. This mounting allows greater airflow around the drives for better cooling.
■ A front cooling fan is not essential. In some extreme situations, testing has actually shown that these fans can recirculate hot air rather than introducing cool air.

Id go for dual fan, with an additional exhaust fan, and a kick ass heat sink, I hate stock heat sinks, and throw in the harddrive coolers too.

The Harsh Philippine Reality

2008-10-15T03:08:00.000-07:00

Ive been contemplating on my situation right now. The local Philippine government is drumming up "less inflation" and an "improving economy". I beg to differ, here's why.

I graduated 2003, If, I recall the cost of jeepney fares were on a minimum of 5 pesos just for me to get from my house to the nearest Light Rail Transit station. From there, I take a 15 peso ride from end to end of the line, in a steaming jam packed train. I then change trains, then take a 13 peso ride to Cubao Station, from which I take another jeep costing 7.50 pesos, to my work at Eastwood City. I work, have my measly 50.00 buck lunch, then go home spending the same amount of 5+15+13+7.50 (totaling 40.50pesos one way, 81 pesos both ways). 2620.00 pesos per month for daily expenses at the minimum for transpo and lunch per month. Earning 13k during that time, with 40% going to the government (social security, TAX, Health Plan), that brings my net salary down to 7800. Subtract Transportation and Food, I'm left with 5180.00/month or 2590.00/15 days to go to savings. Talk about living on the bare minimum.

This was from 2003 to 2004. Mind, I quit 2004, I couldn't take the stress of commuting 7 hours everyday, with 8 hours of graveyard shift without night differential. That leaves me with 9 hours of rest, dinner, and recreation from Monday to Friday.

Now its 2008. I quit my job a long time, I'm currently just doing stock trading, and by the way things are running right now, things are quite bleak since it seems the government is messing things up, I dunno how, but they are messing things, big time. I'm thinking of going back to work, but I'm plagued by the factors abound.

Everything has gone up, salaries haven't, or relatively haven't. Internal Revenue is trying to circumvent the Salary Increase Law. (pure idiots I tell you...I can't blame them you know, the law here has so many loopholes). Under the new law, taxable income has now been increased from 8k to 16k. Everything above 16k is taxable. But never mind that...lets go back to "everything has gone up" part.

From my original 5+15+13+7.50(totaling 40.50 pesos one way, 81 pesos both ways). This figure is now 10,15,13,15(totalling 53 pesos one way, 106 pesos both ways). Factor in the minimum now for a meaningful "lunch" which is 60 bucks..that brings me now to 166.00 pesos per day. Multiply by 5 days and again by 4 weeks you get 3320.00 pesos per month for transportation and expenses per month. Currently you have an average of 12000.00 gross salary. Factor in the average 40% deduction since the goverment is still confused about their own new tax laws, you have 7200.00 per month. Subtract Transpo and Expenses..you now have for year 2008, 3880.00 net savings/month or 1940.00/15 days. Oh...you're more overworked now unlike way back 2004.

Yeesh...It will take me a very long time before I can make my first 100k. Comments anyone?

useful things on the net.

2008-10-13T19:24:00.000-07:00

Yup, this is my first blog. I guess it was time to unload whatever knowledge I have in my head and impart it to the rest of the webby community (as if anyone cares). Anyway, here are some useful things I found on the net.

http://www.speedtest.net - its an online speedtest. Very accurate measure of online upload and download speed. Very useful for online speed freaks like me. Quite useful if you plan to download tons of stuff off torrent.
http://www.2baksa.net , http://www.downarchive.com and http://www.softarchive.net - online repositories of current very useful softwares I have on my PC at the moment. From games to utilities....mostly utilities.
http://www.9down.com - unless you are a person who like to endlessly update their rig with up to date and upcoming softwares. Contents? Updated NVIDIA, ATI, Creative,Microsoft etc etc softwares and drivers. Yes, its a one stop shop for all your driver needs (assuming you have up to date hardware that is).
http://www.gfxworld.org/ - another one of my online resources for graphics related needs, vectors and photoshop resources.
http://www.4shared.com - Id prefer this file sharing sans online storage alternative, much like rapidshare, its plus is the folder and file search feature. Not to mention a user friendly interface, and its FREE. Yes my friends...its free. I love that word.
http://www.plundered.org - another file storage alternative, crude but effective.
http://www.weatherimages.org - online satellite weather images. Updated every hour. Direct link to the Philippines area would be here.

*note: online content on these sites ain't mine. Sue them, not me.