…so I bought a new toy…I replaced my 22″ display with a 24″ one. Even more screen real-estate with the 1920×1200 resolution…and what a fast (2ms) and nice panel it is…sweeeeet!

…pictures from my vacation to Sharm el Sheikh, Egypt coming soonish….

…and I would like to say pics from my new display coming soonish, too….but I can’t as it still hasn’t been delivered…grrrr…..

…just ordered a new display….24 inches baby…1920×1200 resolution…hmmm….tasty….pics after I get back from vacation….I’ll be heading to egypt on tuesday….two weeks of soaking in the sun….I’ll post an update, hopefully with some pics of the new panel when I get back….

You might remember that I bought a new laptop back in april. I’m still really satisfied with my choice, although the battery runtime is not really up to par. The small, standard battery is just a little too weak to support the dual core cpu and ati video card for a long time. That being said, it still lasts for up to 2h, but that’s not really fly, so I decided to get myself the high capacity battery…

The original standard battery is 2600mAh…this baby is 6000mAh…so more than twice the up time…sweet…

Well, well…after waiting for a long time, Sony made my decision easier today. Dropping the price of the PS3, while introducing the “new” PS3 (40GB model without PS2-backward-compatibility)…

As I’m a fan of the first edition (60GB) and a fan of added value, I went with the 60GB-model including two games and two wireless gamepads…499 €…still a lot of money, but a good bang for the buck if you consider that it includes the console itself, two wireless controllers, two games and a blueray player…now all I need to “fully” enjoy it is a sick HDTV…hmm…maybe come christmas I’ll work on that one…

I decided to give repair of my good old Laserjet 5 a shot and it worked out pretty nicely. After getting the new toner cartridge and printing some dozen test prints everything is back to normal. Groovy. To celebrate the “success”, I decided to upgrade the printer…so I fired up ebay and started looking for a duplex-unit, the last available upgrade for my printer. I found one pretty quickly and I’m happy to say: not only is my printer up and running again, no, it’s more than that. It’s a fully equipped printing beast now ;-)

Speaking of updates: As you might have noticed I decided to get a new theme…Ingoal’s Insight is about to hit the three year anniversary…so I thought a new look would be a nice touch…hope you all like it…

Yesterday something ugly happened. My trusty old network printer, a HP Laserjet 5n, bugged out on me. I printed some documents and there was a paperjam. Usually that would be no big deal, but this time it was. The toner cartridge thought it was a good idea to spill loads of toner onto the paper in print. Combine that with the paperjam (in the fuser) and you have the ultimate ugly ugly ugly result. The toner pile on top of the jammed paper melted into the fuser. Did you ever see how some grams of toner look like after they’ve been cooked? Me neither…until yesterday that is :-(

So now the big question for is: should I try to repair the damage or should I buy a new (used) printer to replace the whole thing?

I think there’s a chance that I can clean out the fuser…if that was the case I would just need a new toner cartridge and it would be as good as new. But if not…it’s really not worth the effort as the fuser unit is the most expensive part of the whole printer and what’s even worse, you can get one of it’s successors (e.g. the 4050n, sometimes even the 4050dn including the duplex unit) for less than 100 Euros these days…

So, today the UPS man dropped off my new laptop and I started to play around with it. This is really one fine machine:

1. It looks terrific with the black piano finish on top (I hope that I can keep it from getting majorly scratched by using a tucano second skin, which is like a diver suit, neopren, fitting the laptop like a glove)

2. The display is nice…1280×800…more than enough screen real-estate for my needs

3. It’s light (2.39kg)…

4. It’s fast (I didn’t grab a screenshot of the windows performance ranking, but the lowest score is 3.8 on 3D, everything else is well above 4 (4.6, 4.8, etc)), I like! High-five!

5. Battery life could be better…it ships with a 4 cell battery so the actual runtime is somewhat limited (roughly 3h)…maybe I’ll get the highcapacity battery (double capacity, 8 cells) in the future…for now, I’m fine though as it’s not going to be “on the road” (without a power outlet in reach) for an extended period of time…

So…I’m exited and looking forward to using this bad boy to do some (semi)mobile writing and playing in the months (and/or years) to come :-)

I finally ordered my new laptop today. I was looking around for months now and it seemed that I just couldn’t find “the” perfect model. My requirements were:

1. max 14.1″ screen…15.4″ screens are fine, but having a 15.4″ screen means that the things is at least 16.x” wide (15.4″ + frame)…usually models sporting a 15.4″ screen are heavy (around 3+ kg)…and due to the big screen the battery runtime is usually low(er) too…

2. decent vga…integrated intel and stuff is cool, but not really…especially as I tend to hold on to laptops for quite some time (I bought my current laptop, an IBM Thinkpad, 6 years ago), so it should be at least up to par now so that’ll still be “okay” in a few years…

3. at least 1GB of ram…better 2GB…dual channel…yadda-yadda…

4. don’t care much about hdd size but 80GB would be fine and a DVD burner would be nice too…

5. shipped with Vista

6. not the most expensive one out there

7. service…at least two-year warranty with at pickup service or better…

8. screen resolution of at least 1024×768…but preferred would be some widescreen format (e.g. 1280×800)…

Given those requirements, it was a real hard task to find a compromise between some of them - 14.1″ models are usually far more expensive than 15.4″ models as 15.4″ is the biggest seller these days, so I guess the panel prices are way cheaper. Some models are still only available with Windows XP. Other models have 14″ screens, but only a 1024×768 resolution. Some models are looking good in pictures, but when you touch them in real life, they feel cheap and not really fit for everyday operation. etc etc

To make a long story short, I finally decided to go with the new Samsung R20-Aura line. There are only two models available in that line, so not much to chose from, but they are exactly what I was looking for. The difference between the models (Deva / Declan)? They’re exactly the same…except for the CPU…so chipset, ram, video card, hdd, dvd burner, software, everything is the same…

Deva - Core 2 Duo T7200 (2×2GHz, 4MB Cache)

Declan - Core Duo T2350 (2×1.86GHz, 2MB Cache)

Now, I always want to go with the newest stuff and all and a Core 2 Duo system would be nice, but I decided to go with the Core Duo model. Why? Let me explain…

Yeah, Core Duo isn’t the current line of Intel mobile processors, but it’s a kickass CPU and probably more CPU power than I’ll ever use (as this notebook will be used as a mobile computer, not as a desktop replacement) and you just can’t beat the price difference. I ordered it with 2GB of ram, 120GB HDD, DVD burner, Vista Home Premium, the whole shebang…and what’s the price difference between the two models (which are exactly the same minus the CPU)? 400 Euro (that’s roughly 545$)…you can keep your 2 between the Core and Duo for that fellows

…the best thing is that I ordered it this afternoon and they called me up five minutes after I had placed my order to confirm everything. The said it would be shipped tonight and earlier on I received a mail with the UPS tracking code…wheee…it really left their shop tonight and now, in the middle of the night, I just rolled into the UPS depot for my area…so…I expect to be playing on and with it tomorrow…the excitement

Specs:

T2350 - 1.86GHz Core Duo

2GB Ram

Ati x1250 video card (max 256MB, which will leave me with 1.79GB of ram)

120GB HDD

DVD-Burner

Vista HomePremium

14.1″ Widescreen WXGA screen (1280×800)

Piano-style finish (shiny black)

I’ve been in the hunt for a new notebook for ages now and I’m finally getting tired of it. There are just so many models to chose from and it seems that “the perfect one” just isn’t out there, or at least I can’t find it.

If it got everything I want (nice screen, at least 1GB ram, DVD burner, 80GB HDD, Windows Vista), it’s battery life sucks - how come that a NEW super-duper notebook with kickass technology has a battery life of 2 hours?! Are you serious…my 6 year old notebook used to run that long…sigh.

Then again, if the battery life is awesome, something else just doesn’t seem right. Sigh.

This is really getting annoying and I think I finally settled on a model. 14.1″ WXGA (1280×800) seems the perfect match for me as I don’t like the cloggy 15,4″+ screen models…either I want a notebook or a desktop-replacement…and I don’t see myself hauling a 15,4″ notebook around. Downside: 14.1″ WXGA screens are not the norm (which would be 15,4″ these days) and so those models are usually quite expensive. Sigh. So I had a long look around all the different models and I ended up with the Samsung R20-Aura line. Now the only question left is…go with the highend (2×2GHz Core 2 Duo) or subtract a little cpu power and 1GB of ram (same chipset, same mobo, same DVD, same hdd, but 2×1.83GHz Core Duo) and save 500 Euro…decisions, decisions. I’m leaning toward the Core Duo model though…yes, it’s not the latest cpu, but hey, it’s more computing power than imagine myself using on the road anyway and saving 500 Euro, seems like a good thing to do…

Now I only need to wait for the Samsung people to get back to me as the specs are screwed up on their sites and flyers…one is saying that the CPU is 2×2.16GHz, which can’t be right, but no shame in asking, same goes for the battery…there’s a normal battery (38,48Wh) and a longlife battery (76,96Wh)…but there’s no mention about which battery is included? The normal one, the highcapacity one, both? I guess I’ll find out soon enough if their email-support get’s their behinds into gear…

Wow…just had the chance to watch the stream of Steve Jobs’ keynote…

iPhone - I want one…end of story.

Source: Apple Inc.

Well, it’s been a while since I last upgraded my pc…almost 3 years…

So, I decided it’s time for a new one…some funky dual core stuff or something and yup, there are lots of possible configurations.

First decision: Intel or AMD?

I know that Intel’s Core 2 Duos are powerful, fast and sexy…but they’re a little more expensive too…so I thought I’d go with AMD, yet again…(my current system is an AMD Athlon XP, the one before that was an AMD, ……

Second decision: Fastest/expensive, medium/alrighty, lower end/cheap

I decided to go with middle ground…an AMD x2 3800 it is, the Energy Efficient version of it - that’s perfect for a smaller case and it’ll help me save some energy costs, after all my pc is running most of the time. Combined with a funky mATX board, 1GB of ram (for now), 500GB Samsung SATAII (16MB Cache), DVD-burner, DVD-Rom and a nice mATX case by aplus…

The case arrived today and I’m hoping that the rest will arrive tomorrow (it was sent off by the shop today)…it’s going to be fun to build a pc, haven’t done that in a while…

Ooooh and I almost forgot, I ordered a new copy of Windows XP Pro…117€ including an Express upgrade coupon to Vista business….sounds like a good deal

I’ll post some pics once I’m done building…

Wow…so it’s finally here…the new MacBook (the laptop formerly known as iBook ;-) ). Available in the classic white and now, new, in black too. Cool stuff there. I’m so getting one soonish!!!

Specs of the three models:

1. White, 13.3-inch widescreen display 1280 x 800 resolution, 1.83GHz Intel Core Duo, 512MB memory (2×256MB SODIMMs), 60GB 5400-rpm Serial ATA hard drive, Combo drive (DVD-ROM, CD-RW) - 1.099$ / 1099 €
2. White, 13.3-inch widescreen display 1280 x 800 resolution, 2.0GHz Intel Core Duo, 512MB memory (2×256MB SODIMMs), 60GB 5400-rpm Serial ATA hard drive, SuperDrive (DVD±RW, CD-RW) - 1.299$ / 1299 €
3. Black, 13.3-inch widescreen display 1280 x 800 resolution, 2.0GHz Intel Core Duo, 512MB memory (2×256MB SODIMMs), 80GB 5400-rpm Serial ATA hard drive, SuperDrive (DVD±RW, CD-RW) - 1.499$ / 1499

Now I don’t get the difference in price between the white and black top-model. 200$/€ more for a 80GB HDD along with another color? Seems a little strange to me?!

So, finally Apple has updated the Mac Mini. Welcome to the Intel age. There are currently two models available - one with a Single Core (1.5GHz, 512MB, 60GB HDD, Built-In WLAN+Bluetooth, Apple Remote, 599$ / 639 € ) and one with a Dual Core (1.66GHz, 512MB, 80GB HDD, Built-In WLAN+Bluetooth, Apple Remote, 799$ / 849 € ).

I think I’m going to wait for some tests and then I’ll try to get my hands on the top model… :-)

Wow, it’s been a while since I last posted something around here. With all the christmas, new year and different other stuff coming up, it was hard to find the time, but now I’m back.

Server, Domains, etc: Although Ingoal’s Insight… is still hosted with Dreamhost, I’ve got my dedicated server up and running now, finally. So, I’m probably moving this site over sooner or later, as there’s no point in paying twice, although Dreamhost’s hosting packages have just been updated once again: quatrupled (space) and octupled (bandwidth) to be precise, so you can get 20GB of space along with 1 TB of bandwidth for as little as 7.95$/month. Check it out!

Apple: Does MacBook Pro ring a bell? Intel Core Duo (dual core Pentium M) along with the possibility to run Windows (although not officially supported by Apple). This is certainly good news, and I’m really considering switching to a Mac in the near future (although I’ll wait for the update of the iBook, MacMini and PowerMac series before I make a decision about which way to go).

Fantasy Footie: After the good run in the old year I started to drop in ranking again and it’s going to be a hard fight until the end of the season, I’m not sure I can surpass Mr. Price, but at least I’m giving it my best shot - and one way or another, it’s has been fun.

Uni: I’m currently taking some time off and I’m in the need to find an internship, as this is the last thing on my todo list before I head into the final exams in March/April…then I can start my diploma thesis, which I can hopefully complete before the end of the year.

Ingoalnetwork: The sites are finally completed and some network sites have been added, for news about the network head over to the new network blog.

Chitika: After the bad experience in October I stuck around and since then they’ve been working hard at improving their overall solutions (the product of emini-malls themselves, almost real time audits, etc) and I’m happy to report, that their reports are now much more accurate and with the addition of european support the clicks and hence the revenue has really been stabilised. On another note: I receive the first payment (for november) just days ago, so I’m really satisfied now, I’ll keep you updated about it the following months…in the meantime feel free to check their blog and our give their emini-malls a test run.

Poker: For all the newsworthy stuff about my new passion poker head over to my poker-blog.