Broadband on Mobile and Essential Softwares for your E61i

Recently, I subscribed to Singtel's broadband on mobile, and it's has been working wonders for me! At just $22.42, I am given a limit of 50 gb to utilize every month (It's really impossible to even use 2 gb on your mobile device). With it, I am now able to surf, IM and check my emails on my E61i all over Singapore. Don't belittle these functions because they surely come in useful and can even help you save up on communication costs if used in a smart way. Some suggestions:-

• MSN Live

With MSN Live on my handphone, chatting with all my online contacts has never been easier. But the amazing thing is not just common instant messaging. Did you know that it can turn your handphone into a 'walkie-talkie'? How I do it, is to send voice clips over and vice versa receive voice clips from the other party that I am communicating with. Although there is a latency of about 10 seconds due to data transfer, but it surely does come in handy when you need to communicate non urgently. I fully utilized this function together with Jason during the last zone camp, when one of us is in Singapore and the other in P.Ubin. In this situation the conventional walkie talkie doesn't work due to the distance, however as MSN Live sends data via network, the distance did not matter at all.

• Twitter

As I shared in one of my previous posts that Twitter is able to send your updates to the devices of the people following you. One great way is really to use it to send free SMS. With Fring, you are able to utilize it just as if you are sending a SMS. Very convenient! However, make sure your counterparts do not reply to the number that sent the 'tweets' as it is an international number.


With just some brainstorming and creativeness, your E61i can become a powerful tool that makes communication more affordable and life more interesting.

Some links that might interest:

1. Singtel Broadband on Mobile
2. Mobile One Broadband
3. Starhub Mobile Data Services
   

E61i

I have been using E61i for about a year and it is still continuing to amaze me with it's amazing capabilities. In the next few posts, I will write about how you can use your E61i to enhance your productivity and tips on using it as well. Stay tune!

Twitter - A Great Way To Stay Connected

Twitter, a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send "tweets" or updates to the Twitter website, where updates are instantaneously posted on to the user's profile page and also delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them via SMS, instant messaging and etc.

Personally, I felt that this service is exceptionally useful especially in groups that constantly need to update members within with new information. Simply by logging on, typing in a 140 character length text and clicking update, anyone who is 'following' you will be notified immediately through the means they have chosen to receive updates. Did I also mention that it is FREE?

Imagine this senario:-

In a cell group of 20 people, everyone subscribe to Twitter and is a follower of the rest in the cell group. If there is a message that needs to be passed on to everybody, going through Twitter saves you 20 SMSes. In a month, this method can easily help you save up to 100s of SMSes. Cool right?

Suggested way to implement: -

1. Get everyone in the group to create an account with the group's name as initials. For e.g. N363_Desmond or MJ_Desmond
2. After the creation of account, start 'following' others in the group.
3. Start sending "Tweets"!

Easy as abc! Technology certainly helps to save time and maximize productivity!

GSync

Symbian 60 users, have you ever felt frustrated with the speed of your mobile phone device? Most of the time, the amount of SMS/MMS messages that are stored on our mobile phones actually take up precious memory space and even chalked up lots of processing power. However the issue is that many of these SMS/MMS messages contain important information and we would love to keep them for reference. Well, fret not! GSync by Psiloc is here to save the day!

GSync is an intelligent, convenient and unique way to backup all your SMS/MMS messages. GSync allows you to automatically archive all of your SMS/MMS messages on the Gmail™ account. The SMS/MMS messages appear as e-mails, are marked as read and labelled as SMS/MMS. Messages exchanged with the same people are grouped into threads. It even separates your sent and received messages very cleverly.

An example of a MMS message after being processed by GSync:

However, good things don't come free. The software comes with a 10 day trial period, after which it would cost SGD26.70 to activate it.

(PS: If you are thinking why my gmail interface look so cool, well you can leave me a comment and I will teach you how :D)

Visual To-Do List

As the saying goes, "A picture speaks a thousand words" and having camera phones so easily available, it can be a great idea to have a To-Do list that has its contents represented by photos instead of words. Furthermore, snapping a photo of a task that needs attention takes much less time than penning it down and it makes life much more interesting too, since people are visually oriented.

One way to implement a Visual To-Do List:

1. Create a To-Do folder within your phone.
2. Begin snapping tasks that need to be done (Packing your desk, an uncompleted project, toothpaste that is running out, etc).
3. Upon every snap, transfer it to the To-Do folder.
4. Have a look at the To-Do folder from time to time to ensure that tasks are completed.
5. Upon completion of every task, delete the photo.

Simple as that. This idea is not unique as there are people using it already. Do go try it and let me know if it works for you.

Singtel's MIO Mobile

Wikipedia: "Mobile VoIP will become an important service in the coming years as device manufacturers exploit more powerful processors and less costly memory to meet user needs for ever-more 'power in their pocket'."

Nowadays as people travel more frequently, a need to stay in touch economically with family, friends and colleagues back at home has surfaced. Voip or Voice over Internet Protocol is a technology that has the ability to provide such service at low cost. If you have not been living in caves or hanging around with the Flintstones, you would probably have heard of such services like for example, Skype.


Just 9 months ago, I received a Nokia E61i from an uncle as a gift. This phone is awesome and one of the most used feature by me is probably the ability to connect to wireless access points. With it I check and reply my emails, do instant messaging and most important of all make VoIP calls. VoIP calls on your mobile save you big bucks, no kidding! Currently I am a Singtel user and I subscribe to their Mio Mobile plan, which require me to pay a mere $10 on top of my subscription fees. With this service, I can make unlimited amount of VoIP call to any local number(when I am connected to a wireless access point and the fact is you can easily find one nowadays with the Wireless@SG network implemented all over Singapore). Just last month, I made a total of 36 hours of outgoing call (34 hours estimated to be VoIP) and my total phone bill came up to approx. $50. Cool!

I would highly recommend that you get this service (especially CGLs), if you have a wireless enabled phone and that you are on the Singtel network. The money that you save for an entire year, can easily cover your year-end retreat + shopping. LOL!
More details of the Mio Mobile plan: http://home.singtel.com/mio/mio_mobile.html

Dell XPS M1330

I really need a new laptop... My old beat-up Fujitsu S6240 is driving me crazy by the day. After sending for servicing at Fujitsu's service centre, now it's only running at 512mb of RAM instead of the initial 1Gb. Well done, Fujitsu.

Anyway, I have been looking around and a classmate recommended me to get the Dell XPS M1330, in which I went online and tried to 'build' my own. Here are the specs:-

1. Intel(R) Core(TM) 2 Duo Processor T7250 2.0GHz, 2MB Cache, 800 MHz FSB
2. Genuine Windows Vista(R) Home Premium 32 bit (English) DVD Media Included
3. 13.3" UltraSharp Widescreen WXGA (1280X800) Display with TrueLife (2.0MP Webcam)
4. 4GB (2X2048MB) 667Mhz Dual Channel DDR2 SDRAM
5. 160GB SATA 7200RPM Performance Hard Drive
6. Internal 8X DVD+/-RW Combination Drive with dual layer write capabilities
7. NVDIA(R) GeForce(TM) 8400M GS with 128MB GDDR3 dedicated graphic memory
8. Intel(R) 4965AGN Wireless-N Mini-Card
9. Dell(TM) Wireless 355 Bluetooth Module

It cost only $2244.86! One of the highlights is the hard drive that is running at 7200RPM! Fast read and write capabilities. If finances allow, I would get a 9-cell battery too (+$308.16). That would be like running on steroids. Let's hope this will happen in the near future.

Any kind soul would like to donate to Buy-Desmond-A-Dell-XPS fund, please call 1900-912-BUYXPS. LOL.