Archive for the ‘Tech’ Category
Sri Lankan ISP – Review
I just bought my 1st Mobitel HSDPA connection yesterday and I’m disappointed to say it’s just as bad as the rest of ISP solutions in Sri Lanka. I bought the package “zoom 1290” which is supposed to have the following.
Free data bundle – 8GB
Download Speed up to – 3.6Mbps
I have been doing some speed testing with the speedtest.net web site and as usual I get a similar response to what I get with my 2Mb ADSL connection. (Testing done after 8pm)
SLT (2Mbps)
Mobitel (Zoom 1290)
I’m a heavy downloader and I NEED a high speed internet connection. Some people might ask me “Why do I need this much of internet speed?” To answer it in a simple manner would be to “satisfy my daily entertainment needs”. Just like most Sri Lankan youngsters, I too download a lot of tv episodes and movies. I don’t download them cuz I’m too greedy to spend money on them. On the contrary, I spend more money on downloading them rather than going to the movies.
The reason for me to download these is because I don’t want to waste my time on the road. It takes about 1 hour for me to reach a decent film hall and I would have to be at the counter at least 45mins before the start of the movie. Add another 1 hour for me to get back and I total falls at around 3 hours. This means every time I want to watch a 3 hour long move at a decent place I have to spend 6 hours total.
With the addition of new Mobitel connection, I have to spend around 9000.00Rs (around 90US$) for my internet connections monthly. So how do I justify all this spending? Assume I watch 2 movies and 5 tv episodes per week. If I had to watch them as a normal Sri Lankan I would have to spend 6 hours a week on the road for the movies and I would have to wait 2 or 3 years till they air the tv series. In other words, I spend 9000.00Rs to save 24 hours and to watch 20 tv episodes 2 years earlier.
If an ISP service comes to Sri Lanka that can offer better service even for the same price I would switch my ISP providers in hart beat. But sadly I’m stuck with SLT and Mobitel for the time being.
FYI – I had a look at the Verizon US site and found the following details.
Verizon High Speed Internet – Fastest Plan (Download 4 to 7 Mbps) – Regular price is $54.99/mo.
FiOS Internet – Tier 2: Faster (Download 25 Mbps) – $69.99/mo.
I wonder how much our ISP providers will charge for a 25Mbps connection.
Finally got my VGA :)
I’ve been away from my blog for far too long now. I’ve been waiting for my VGA for 4 weeks or so. (After I ordered it.) And finally I got it. 
I should have written this a week ago, but as any game addict, I installed some of the resent games and started playing them. All I can say about it.. “OMG”
First things first. I bought an Asus EN8800GT (512MB) VGA card. This is PCI-E 2 and DDR 3 supported card, which has the G92 GPU core.
My new com and my gaming life..
Hey guys.. placement sure sucks. Working is no fun at all, it seems. Not to mention the nice traffic in Colombo. It takes roughly about one and half hours to go 2 work, and another 1 1/2 to get back. A total of 2-3 hours per day. Add 9 hours of work (Well actually about 8 1/2 
) That leads to a total of 12 hours max. So if I take 8 hours of sleep (I need my sleep alot), that leaves around 4 left for my self.. 
Been a Sri lankan really sucks. But then again, its not like i have much of a choice. lol..
Well enough about that. This post is about my new com and my new currier choice.
Dynamic DNS
As i promised before i’m go’na write about Dynamic hosting today. What is DNS? In simple form its a way to have a DNS assigned to a dynamic IP. Where you can have you web site running in you home. For in depth details on DDNS the following page will take you to the wiki.
How to create your own webcam feed
To day I’m going to show you all how to create a a cheap web cam feed from machine. This is quite easy to do if you follow the steps.
First of all I’ll start with the media servers. In oder to broad cast your video (any type) you need to have a media server which is the one which actually broad casts the video feed. For that you have various sorts of media servers. For example – Flash media server for flash video streaming, Helix server for real media streaming, Windows media encoder (acts both as server and encoder) for windows media player and so forth. from the above list the only thing which come in a truly low price is the WME (Windows media encoder). And the Flash media server costs around 7000$ (if you willing to pay that much can you send me a copy as well .
But since Microsoft is Microsoft, I’ll be using a separate media server, called the VLC media server. (all of you know VLC right? If not, you are either new to the internet or you are too old to use a com ) For those who doesn’t know about VLC, its completely free, reliable and is easy to work with. When installing make sure you install the Firefox plug in for VLC. All you have to do is to check the tick for installing Firefox plug in.