Today Dell came by and took away my old 2209wa monitor. What i didn't expect was that instead of a refurbished 2209wa i got a refurbed Ultrasharp U2311h instead. I still can't say whether it's a blessing or a curse really, since my monitor is used mainly for work and i kinda like the 16:10 resolution. But i guess i'll have to live with 16:9 from now on.. 

Few quirks about the 2311h... the biggest one so far would be that the panel luminance is not uniform! It's pretty obvious that the right side is brighter than the center/left side by 20 or 30% (can't tell for sure since i just eyeball it). Plus i think i get contrast shifting when shift my head which results in uneven colour response. Note to self to stay an even longer distance and stick my head in the center when i'm using the monitor from now on. It took most of today to get familiar to the panel and calibrate and recalibrate the gamma and colour, which makes me miss my 2209wa even more... but i think i got the colour close to neutral and the gamma curve correct by now. Will be using it to do some editing the next few days and AB-ing to check out the colour in the next few days.

It seems that windows 7 does wonders to audio quality. The amount of details i get is mind blowing, not to mention the more lifelike soundstage! But the downside to details is that transients gets much sharper.. which makes it hard to tolerate lower quality recordings. Time to get some tubes perhaps..

On a separate note, the new rig is amazing, the new intel i5 2500K processor is so easily overclocked that i managed to get to 4.5Ghz on stock voltage and stock cooler on the first try. The only thing holding the speed back is the Green edition W.D. HDD 500gb which i use for my windows installation, but i don't think i will be upgrading anymore in the near future so i'll just leave it as that.

Called Dell today and they are still sorting out my monitor warranty issue. Cross my fingers and hope that i'll get good news from them tomorrow.

As is customary every year, i stop blogging by december/january and resume by april. Though i have to admit that i'm somewhat late this year. 

But anyway like every big purchase i make i blog about it so that my puny brain doesn't have to remember all the dates. As of today i can finally say goodbye to my old pc rig which have been huge part of my life since Feb 2005 (which makes it like 6+ years). The whole rig is still usable and I wouldn't have bothered to upgrade it if not for the fact that i can't run Lightroom smoothly on it.

Ok i lied.. being able to play Dragon Age II/Starcraft II/Diablo III is also a slight concern but being able to work still comes first. 

And so the results of the purchase: 

Intel Core i5 2500K, Asus P8P67 motherboard and 2x4gb Kingston PC1333 D3 ram. 

What i don't like about new boards is that i'm forced to give up my still functioning PATA Pioneer DVDRW and HDD..

So i had to spend additional monies to replace the PATA DVDRW to a SATA Pioneer DVDRW and a 2TB Green WD HDD.

Total damage: RM1900

Shall have to stick to a regime of economy rice + plain water for some time i guess...

On a seperate PC issue.. my Dell 2209wa is starting to show black streaks on the left side of the monitor. I should call in to ask if it's under warranty to get it replaced pretty soon i hope...

I can't believe times flies so fast. It's the end of the year all of a sudden again and i don't think i'm even ready for it. 

December had been a blast with tightly packed schedules between shooting and teaching. Aside from the routine stuff, i managed to squeeze time to visit Wen Cheng in penang for his wedding dinner. It really was unexpected since he was supposed to be in Japan studying, and all of a sudden he not only has a Shanghai lady falling in love with him, but he got married with her too! Gotta dig some juicy details from him later on :D But anyway, think I probably wont be seeing him much in the future.. hope that they get to live a happy and blissful married life.

Finally, I'll be looking forward to the 27th when I'll get to fly to China with Hong Chang and my fellow music teachers for vacation. Nothing like 10 days in the snowy outskirts of china to spend new year's day!

Today shan fei called up to have lunch together, which was rather unusual seeing that he's always busy so i gladly accepted his invitation to do so. It was great to hang out with my old buddy again and after lunch we ended up re-watching our old concert videos and practised dizi. Later on we went back to his place to have some fun at the gym (god knows i havent excercised in how long by now) and swam in the pool. I honestly can't remember when was the last time i was in the pool.. it was probably some time at Ying Ying's house after graduation or it was probably during form 5 with the pmo gang at sunway lagoon. That makes it like plus minus 10 years lol. But anyway, i can finally swim! Thanks to shan fei's tips, i can now swim (albeit at a rather slow pace) and change my breath the proper way. So i guess this might be an indication that i might be going to the pool abit more often now lol.