Robin Majumdar 2.0

Just finished lunch (dessert was , umm, 3 yogurts…)

$499 - the regular price for this UltraSharp 2408FPW 24″ LCD monitor is $699. This is a “days of Dell deals” event and as such is valid today only - I suspect it may sell out before the end of the day.

The 2408FPW is an excellent 3rd generation 24″ LCD monitor with “full” HD WUXGA resolution of 1920×1080 pixels.

Some other features of note:

• 6ms G2G pixel response time, not staggering for gaming but good enough with the right graphics card.
• 3000:1 Dynamic Contrast Ratio
• 1080P support with HDMI, composite, componentDisplay Port, DVI-D with HDCP and HDMI 2.1 Audio Out connectors. I recommend that anyone buying a new computer monitor not even consider a monitor with less than 1920×1080 support, and Display Port will most likely be the successor to HDMI in the next few months.
• height,swivel and tilt adjustment
• 9 in 2 memory card reader
• 4 USB 2.0 ports
• 3 year advance exchange support

… and free shipping.

’nuff said.

I came across this interesting video tour of the Equinix data centre facility in which they explain their 5-level biometric security system, N+1 redundancy architecture for everything from rack cages to UPS to diesel generator to utility grid supply.

25,000 gallons of on-site diesel fuel for their generators may sound like a lot, but when you’re hosting big players such as MySpace that means a lot of power requirements. Case in point, their UPS batteries provide for “only” 7.5 minutes of runtime, but considering that their transfer switch only requires “2-3 seconds” to switch to the generators… that’s decent. Mind you, I’ve seen power transfer switches fail or go freaky… or generators refuse to start up or run stable for more than 1-2 minutes…

Worth viewing if you have any interest in data centre design or you are considering a Tier 1 hosting facility.

An absolutely superb opportunity to get one of the best PocketPC units ever made. Excellent design, ergonomics, 624Mhz processor, touchscreen, 3.7″ VGA screen, Wifi, Bluetooth, SD and CompactFlash slots, Infrared beam… I’ve used this for 3-4 years straight and it was a deal at $450… so a getting a Dell Axim X51v for $197 (even if it’s refurbished) is an absolute steal.

Coming soon: Learn how to install Windows Mobile 6.1 on the Dell Axim X51V

OK, so my super-duper HTC Touch Vogue which I have on the Bell Mobility CDMA network is still in a serious love affair with me (or vice versa)…

I did indeed manage to install Skype Mobile (Pocket PC for Windows Mobile) on the Touch and it works great for Skype instant messaging but… not so great yet for outgoing Skype voice calls. I’ll be investigating to see if this is something that Bell Mobility has perhaps locked out of their ROM version on the touch because I know other people are indeed doing Skype calls from their PocketPC touchphones…

If you’ve got similar experiences, or solutions, leave a comment please!

HP has a pretty tasty promotion running right now with $349 on the HP Pavilion dv9700t notebook - this is a great laptop (I’ve handled it in store on a few occasions) and yes, this coming from a long time fan of Dell - yes I still love Dell, but it’s been a love-hate relationship with their business notebook machines.

The dv9700t is one of those really well-built and functional notebooks, a few of the things I like:
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