Danny Tsang » Blog

Colour Test

Danny — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 22:05:15 +0000

This is a cool colour test to see how well you perceive colour.

The test is simple. Click and drag the colour boxes and re-arrange them from one colour to another. The colour boxes on the left and right are fixed and they are the start / end colours.

My results are attached. Also take note of your current state. A well rested eye may do better than a tired one.

Speed Up Your Internet for Free! Google TV Updated, Splitting Coax, DIY Automatic Remote Backup, How to Be a Product Reviewer and More!

Dormant Dart Tag

Danny — Tue, 05 Jul 2011 20:48:01 +0000

I have received a letter from Dart, the people who provide the Dart Tag for the Dartford crossing stating I had not used a Dart Tag for over 12 months and as per the terms and conditions I either should have returned the Tag or pay a £15 + VAT service fee!

The funny thing is they have not dated the letter and because they sent it to my (not so) new address since moving approximately a year ago I know the letter has to be sent fairly recently.

According to the letter I have 3 options now:

If it’s lost then I can pay the £15 + VAT and receive a new one
If I do not want to use it any more I can return it 14 days from the date of the letter… BUT THERE IS NO DATE! Otherwise the charge will be applied
I can use the dormant tag within 30 days of the date of this letter (same logic applies above) or I will have to pay the service charge.

The date from last time I used the tag was 21/11/2008 which was quite some time ago and they have decided to send the letter after breaching the T&C 2 years later.

I am also curious to know if I have the Dart Tag and pass the barriers after 10 P.M when it’s free to cross. It doesn’t scan the Dart Tag but technically I was still using it.

New User Registration Disabled

Danny — Tue, 01 Mar 2011 09:43:05 +0000

Recently I have been seeing a lot of new user registration and unable to tell if it’s bots or real users so for the time being new user registration has been disabled and only allowing OpenID sign ups for now.

3 Mifi (Huawei E585) Mini Review

Danny — Wed, 22 Dec 2010 16:12:43 +0000

When I was barred from using data because I had gone over my “fair usage” on my mobile phone I decided to buy the Mifi from Three to get around the problem.

The total cost of the package was £60 which included:

Modem (Huawei E585)
Sim card
USB cable
USB power adapter
Documents
1 GB for 1 month

The hardware was very nice and was overhauled recently (when I bought it in the summer). There is a LCD display to show the battery life and the connect status. The display turns off after a set amount of time to save battery but can be turned back on by pressing the power button. All the settings can be accessed by connecting to the device via wifi and typing in the address just like a typical home router.

The unit uses a standard mini USB to charge the unit and includes a short cable and wall plug. It can be charge from a USB port but it won’t charge as fast as using the adapter. The unit can be used whilst it is being charged.

I wished the MiFi had a built in buzzer so that you could prank it like a mobile phone to locate the unit if it’s lost. The modem’s SIM does have a phone number attached to it for this to be possible.

The battery life was very good and I was able to get through a whole work day without the need to charge it (it lasted longer than the phone!). I had tested in various populated areas and it performed very well on Three’s network.

The down side to the package was the tariff itself. The amount of data supplied or even bought afterwards would only last 1 month and does not roll over to the next month which is not very useful if the device is a backup unit. The price per GB is very expensive on a pay as you go plan but the initial package price was very reasonable to get people to purchase it.

Overall I like the modem itself. It’s a smart package and with it’s standard interface, very reasonable battery life and performance in terms of wireless tethering and HSDPA speeds. The real turn off is the tariff pricing. Per Gigabyte it seems very expensive and the time limit as to when the data has be used by is really annoying.

Error: You Are Using A High Performance Setting

Danny — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 19:12:19 +0000

I ran the Windows 7 “Power Efficiency Diagnostics Report” tool to see what can be done to reduce power consumption but it reports that using the performance power setting as an Error? Surely it should be a warning or not let users have the option to set this profile in the power management tool.

Computer Has Died

Danny — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 10:57:37 +0000

Unfortunately my computer has died on me so my blog posts may become less frequent till it is fixed / sorted.

Week 2/4(ish) Without Internet At Home

Danny — Sun, 25 Apr 2010 20:35:41 +0000

Due to a BT error I have been living at home without Internet for just over two weeks now. In that time I have got a new mobile phone which I will review once I get the Internet back.

The difficulties I’m facing is the number of premium numbers I have to dial to get things sorted like changing of addresses etc. A good side is most evenings and weekends I have been busy decorating the new place before I move in.

I have been using my new phone for around 2 week now but for some reason the browser has difficulties clicking on site links. I downloaded and tried using Opera Beta web browser but it too sometimes has problems.

I just have to hold out for at least another 2 weeks till I can order a new telephone line and then my blogging should be back to normal.

Halifax New Home Welcome Pack

Danny — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 23:01:21 +0000

I was very shocked when Halifax sent us a welcoming pack. It’s these little things that makes me glad I bank with them.

Can’t wait to move my some accounts from Santander to Halifax too.

Low Car Battery Moment

Danny — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 13:43:12 +0000

Had car trouble yesterday so I had to hook up the battery charger by Halfords.

It took between 5-6 hours to charge from just under 12v left in the battery. I was luck enough to make it home when I left my car light on whilst I was at work (it was a bad day to say the least). In the end it did the job and now the car is working… for now.

Common Craft Show – Explaining Things

Danny — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 09:06:33 +0000

From Tekzilla daily tip there is a site which has videos explaining complicated things in simple terms. It’s called the Common Craft Show and it uses paper animation to get the point across. I liked it and more importantly my girlfriend understood Twitter too.

There are only a few shows at the moment but I can imagine it would grow over time. The topic is not just limited to technology either,

Common Craft Show Website

Extending Zip Ties To Make Them Longer

Danny — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 00:01:43 +0000

I was doing some cable management recently and found that the length of one zip tie was not long enough to go around so I thought I’d try and daisy chain them together. What you know it can be done.

I only used two but it can be extended to as many as you want.

Individual Zip Tie

Take one end and slot it into the other zip tie just like you would extending a cable.

Daisy Chaned Zip Ties

Once you have all that you need the two ends should be the opposite type and therefore can be slotted in.

Happy Chinese New Year

Danny — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 11:46:48 +0000

It’s the year of the cow (Ox) which is my year. Related posts: Happy New Year Happy New Year Start Of A New Year Related posts:

Merry Christmas

Danny — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 13:45:20 +0000

Merry Christmas to everyone and happy new year! Related posts: Christmas Day Merry Christmas Happy New Year Related posts:

Why Lowering V.A.T Is So Confusing

Danny — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 19:30:23 +0000

There have been so many times where I did not realise the prices shown in store still had the 17.5% V.A.T on it and was only taken off at the till. This has highlighted the strength of e-commerce against brick and mortar stores as well as the bad idea of lowering V.A.T for just over a year. Like many shops I don’t see the point of re-printing all the pricing labels for just a year. Although products get replenished, it would made it even more confusing having some products marked with 15% and others with 17.5%.

Seeing and hearing all the speculations for what will happen after the 13 months, all the shops are likely to have to re-print new price tags for everything if the government raises the tax beyond the 17.5% rate. I feel confused as a consumer and sorry for the retailers.

First Snow Of The Year

Danny — Tue, 28 Oct 2008 21:55:56 +0000

It’s only October and we have already had snow! Didn’t think it would settle with the wet ground.

First Snow

ThinkPost Customer Service Follow Up

Danny — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 00:55:46 +0000

That’s right my email provider had sent me a follow up email to make sure everything was OK. Yes “support” and “follow up” are rarely used in the same sentence positively but another proof that I made the right choice in terms of email provider. It is worth every penny (cent as it’s charging me).

I did have some problems with my email few weeks / months ago but realized it was Thunderbird behaving badly.

Thinkpost website
Previous Thinkpost blog entry

My New (Temp) Office

Danny — Tue, 21 Oct 2008 13:09:17 +0000

I have moved some (serious) hardware up to the new flat in hope of staying up here for a while and the only usable desk space I have is on the dinning table.

Temporary Desk

Southampton Boat Show 2008

Danny — Thu, 18 Sep 2008 13:38:30 +0000

I’m not a boating person but Terina’s side of the family is and so we went along. I was up for it because it was something new.

We had left from Salisbury at 8:30 so I was up way before! We got there before it opened which was at 10:00 and we got our tickets and queued up well in advance of the crowd that gathered nearer the opening.

Boat Show Entrance

The show was huge! From 10:00 we managed to occupy ourselves till 18:00. The show closed at 19:00.

Sun Seeker

There were all sorts of things from small inflatables to the Giant Sun Seeker worth over £3M (the biggest didn’t have a price listed on the display). Some stands were showing off their after market products like massive inboard engines with over 1000BHP to solar powered chargers. One of the stands held a product that was on Dragon’s Den. There were “show girls” but lot less than there would be at Max Power Live.

Boats

It wasn’t without it’s problems. A can of Coca Cola had leaked in one of the bags which had my white fleece in. It also leaked onto one of the boats we went aboard to look at. I emptied the bag and told Terina to pour out the coke at the bottom of the bag. There was a lot and as she tipped it upside down, a hand cream fell into the water. She went to grab it and her sun glasses fell into the water. The hand cream was a floater but her glasses sank like a rock. Within seconds it wasn’t visible in the water.

Hunton

Overall it was a very interesting event to go to. I had no boating knowledge before I went but it was interesting to see different boats, the interiors and even a boat ride for free. It was a long and heavy day but I wouldn’t mind going back to it as long it is sunny.

Thinkpost.net Customer Service

Danny — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 22:53:50 +0000

I emailed my email provider, Thinkpost.net and they got back to me in less than five minutes! Not only that the president of the company replied back to my slightly technical question.

I have to give it an A for the service so far. I did not give it an A+ because the question I asked should have be on the website itself somewhere.

(Bad) Parking Design In New Homes

Danny — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 23:17:55 +0000

New estates / housing complexes are notorious with bad parking. It’s like the architects designed stunning houses and flats but forget about the parking. Perfect example is the East side of South Harbour and Long Beach Road/View/Close in the North Harbour. To highlight this fact I have taken pictures of how bad the Broadwalk area in the newly developed Eastbourne Harbour.