Finally.... It arrives...

After waiting for 3 months, instead of the 6 weeks as quoted by the seller... My newest gadget at my home (DLink DNS-323) has arrived. I had actually paid for this in the last PC show (Commex) in Sept, and was told that I will have to wait for 6 weeks (stock ran out early)... Well, from 6 weeks it became 3 months... After 6 weeks, you get some threads in Hardwarezone forum with people asking if anyone got their goods...

If it has not been those who kept track and posted in the forum, I wonder how long they will take before calling me (they had promised to call when it arrives, since they were asking for contact numbers then). Went down today, as some of them wrote in the forum that stock has arrived... Got there, walked in, and ask... "Has DLink DNS-323 arrive?"... "Yes, yesterday..." and then proceed to grab one and place it at counter (while the other person writing on the receipt that I collected it), and I ask why there was no call to inform... Sheepish reply that "stock only arrive yesterday"... Yes, it arrive yesterday, so by this morning, we should be getting calls - No?!?

Anyway... It's now set up time... So I guess, I will be busy setting this up...

Wonder: If they did not call by Thursday and there were no news of collection... Could I make a police report for fraud/cheat case as they got stock for Sitex, but no stock for those who paid for it during the last show??

2 more days to.....

I believe that I did blog about wanting to dine at Kaisen in one of my previous entry... Well, before I got that chance, I have heard that the chef has left and open his own shop in town (from a food blogger who is big on Japanese food, pointedly on sushi and sashimi). Well, the countdown has started, and in 2 days time, I will be dinning in Tomo Dining and get to experience what she has been raving about... I just can't wait... Drool...

I can still remember my first encounter with Japanese food, it was not a very good experience mind you... In fact, I hated the taste of the meal - it all tasted the same to me, which is the miso taste. I have to say this, I hate the taste of miso, and I am not sure why, especially now that I have tasted so many different types of Japanese food, that at that time, all I could taste from the food, was just plain miso. Puts me off immediately, and from then, I never did touch Japanese food anymore. Oh, and I still don't like anything with miso, which is why I don't drink the miso soup that comes with the bento sets...

Fortunate, well depending on how you look at it - it could be unfortunate on my bank account considering the $$$ you have to pay for a quality meal, I was re-introduced into it by accident, in an unexpected place. It was only till my stay in Brisbane, on a short trip to Gold Coast with a few friends, and was hunting for food to eat. Now, do note that this was eons ago, and well, it was a different time and place from today - today, Gold Coast is literally littered with lots of Japanese Restaurants. Back then, it was more like small scale, "food-court" like type of setting, and very suitable for student's budget! Needless to say, I was hooked since that day. Of course, when I started working, then I got to know more about the cuisine as well as the quality of it... Heh...

But.... With this meal, and tomorrow's family dinner at Asia Grand (and Christmas is just round the corner), haiz... there goes my waist line...

Album Artworks & iTunes

Ok, I acknowledge that I finally bought the iPod, instead of another branded mp3 player... But along came with it is iTunes. Now to some iTunes is "god-send" while to others it's a nightmare... and I am sort of in between but nearing to nightmare... While Apple prefer people to use their AAC format, I am still a mp3 person, fro want of compatibility. Of course, for the higher-end mp3 player this is not an issue, but well, AAC is just too exclusive...

Next, they open the mind to the idea of cover art - or album artwork. They have this cover-flow thingy and well, it does look good if you have the cover of the album in there... Now if you are happy with the program placing the artwork within the mp3 track (which majority seems to like as they say it can be used not only by iTunes but also other players like wmp), I for one, would not want to increase the size of every song in which I have the entire album tracks in the folder. However, try as I may, there is no way currently that I know of that would take in the artwork into the iTunes database and not importing to the track itself. The only way iTunes would do that is if it gets downloaded from its store!!!! Now what happens if you are not in a country which iTune store is open... You can't even register with iTunes store just for the sake of getting album artwork... Really in convenient and I am still at wits on how to get this done.... Been searching the internet via the trusty Google search... Nothing!!!

Found a product call iTSfv, which in the features it says that it does import artwork without embedding it, but so far, i have found no instructions on how to do that... Read all forum pages that mention this product but zilch...

Haiz...





On a far more happy note... Congrats to TehPeng and miz snooze on their new born baby - nat... I still can't figure out who he takes after... At a glance it's the father... but yet another look, it's the mother... oh well... Maybe that's a good thing :P