Thought out loud

Its now the 6th time I’ll be going to the Open Air Rock Festival in Gampel (VS). Until now, every Year was full of Music, fun, and of course, Lots of beeeeer. Last year we even had a Fondue. I can’t wait until I’m back in Wallis, enjoying the fantastic scenery and the good music. The atmosphere is just magnificent. Easy people everywhere, you get to know the people around you and just have a good time.

This year, we’re already 4 people who will be there definately. Hope the others will join us as well.

And now I just got the order-confirmation of the Tickets. YAY.

If someone of you is going to be there as well, please do drop me a line.

In the Widget-Bar you can see the countdown to the Open-Air. GoGoGo

Just stumbled over a remedy for men exposed to excessive noise.

Chinese Feel-good patch

(found on sheng-fui.de)

I just looked out of the window, and its raining like hell. I even see the raindrops bounce of the windowsill.

This will piss off every summer-lover and sun-griller, but I LOVE RAIN! At least when I’m at home on the sofa, with a blanket and a nice cup of coffee (more milk than coffee, acutally).

A colleague just told me that the IPhone is now sold at CHF 1.–!!!!!

Here’s the proof:

I’ve seen these Videos a few times now on the Internet. Last on eigent.li/ch.

Everone who has a cat, knows that it’s exactly like that.

Simon’s YouTube site

(via eigent.li/ch)

Today I used the GO 930 to get to work. I know, its somewhat over-delivery but its good to measure the accuracy of the nav in an area you know. After driving out of the garage, it had a lock almost instantly. about 3 mins later the TMC-Data was downloaded. It kept receiving the TMC-data on a regular basis <4mins.

My journey to work leads me aroud Zurich over the “Nordring”.  And usually its jammed. Via TMC my Nav was informed that there would be a delay of approx. 15 mins before the Gubrist-Tunnel. WOW. Of course it wanted to keep me away from the jam and re-calculated the route. Through the City. Not so cool. But still i’m surprised how fast and well it worked. Eventually it took me more than usual to get to work, but the trip through the city gave me a interesting sample of the capabilities of the nav. It guided me safely through the city and gave instructions precisely then, when I needed them. When driving through tunnels, it briefly lost connection to the satellites, but re-locked very quickly after exiting the tunnel.

The Telephony-functions really knocked me off my shoes. Usually, linking two devices of different brands via bluetooth is somewhat tricky. If one of the devices then offers a functionality which is not the core-competence of the manufacturer (Handsfree -> TomTom), trouble should be pre-programmed. The Go 930 taught me better. After pairing my phone, which is a SonyEricsson K800i, the nav asked me if I would like to copy the phonebook. After about a minute, over 400 contacts were copied.

While I drove on, I received a Text Message. 10 seconds later, the nav showed an envelope and gave an audible signal. Tapping the envelope showed me the message and gave me the possibility to either reply or call the sender. WOW! Because typing is not advisable while driving, I chose to call the sender. The sound quality coming from the nav was very convincing. Everything loud and clear. Also, my friend heard me loud and clear, almost no background noise. OK, there was not much noise, because I was still standing in the traffic Jam. I’ll test it on the Highway at 120km/h when I get the chance.

When making a phone call, you have the option to either use a Bluetooth headset, the Internal Speaker, the Line-Out connector or the built-in FM-Transmitter to give out the sound. I gather that except with bluetooth, the internal microphone is used. If you discuss confidential stuff on the phone, I would refrain from using the FM-Transmitter. Although you can choose the frequency it transmits on, everyone around you can tune in and listen what the person on the other end says. Its not very probable, but technically possible.

All in all, I am still very happy with the nav. I’ll update on this once I’ve used it for a bit longer.

The Nav already impressed me on the drive home. Operating is very intuitive and doesn’t require long study of the handbook. Although I recommend reading it to take advantage of all the features. I would like to go into a bit more detail and describe the features i’ve used so far.

Box Content

The packaging makes a practical and solid impression. the Nav itself is held securely in its own box, separated from the accessories. I suppose that is so the devices for the separate countries can be easily replaced. Apart from the Nav itself, you get the following:

• In-Car Charger
• Windscreen-mount with suction cup
• TMCpro antenna with 4 suction cups
• Bluetooth remote control
• Desktop dock
• Quick Start guide
• Installation Poster
• CD with full handbook as PDF
• Accessories-Catalogue

What I’m really missing here is a pouch to keep the Nav safe from scratches when it’s not used.

Installation

The Installation was quite straight-forward. Stick the holder to the windscreen using the suction cup. It says that you should clean the glass before sticking the support on it. I didn’t, and it holds just fine. Next was the TMC antenna. I chose to route it up the windscreen and then across towards the rear-view mirror. The “Egg” I positioned behind the nav. The Power-plug is angled to the rear. This means you can almost sit the nav on the dashboard, thats what i’ve thought. Too bad that the plug of the TMC-Antenna is straight down and about 4cm long. No sitting on the Windscreen in that case. The Suction-Cups of the Antenna don’t hold as well as the one from the support, but that might also be because I didn’t clean the windscreen prior the installation. When I get time, I’ll re-route the cable to go across the bottom edge of the windscreen.

The Power-Charger is a standard cigarette-lighter model which holds quite firmly in the socket. First thing that surprised me was, that the charger has its own fuse. The power cord is long enough to reach from the nav in the lower left corner of the windscreen across the cockpit and down to the ashtray where the cigarette lighter is. so much for therory. Too bad that i’m driving a car that isn’t exactly built to standard. My cigarette lighter is between the two front seats under the armrest. If I route the cable directly from the socket, across the steering column to the nav, it fits. I’ll have to either get a USB-Extension or a Extender for the Cigarette lighter socket.

Handling

If you ever used a TomTom-Nav before, you know exactly how to operate it. If you never had one in your hands, you’ll learn it quickly. The basic functions are found very easily. The configuration for the more advanced features (Hands-Free, FM-Transmitter, etc), which are not necessarily core-functions of a nav, are also easy to find and the on-screen-explanations are very simple and understandable.

The screen is bright and easily readable. It even switches from day to night-view automatically when it gets dark. This function is nice, but until now, it switches a bit fast.

I’ll try the TomTom on my way to work on monday and let you know how it went…

If anyone would like the left over panini pictures, just let me know. If noone wants them, I’ll throw them away.

Everything is now running on the new servers. The move went without any major hitches.

Only thing to wait for now is the refresh of the DNS-records.

Bendy.ch will move to a new home in the next few days. Until now, I was a subtenant on mickdunde’s web-server. Now the time has come to move to my own home.

I apologize if some parts of the blog or the board won’t work right from the start. Usually it takes a few days until all DNS-records are updated.

Will keep you posted