Thanks to Dell Singapore, I have a chance to play with the Dell UltraSharp U3011 30″ Monitor for 2 weeks. The Dell UltraSharp U3011 30″ Monitor is retailing for SGD$1,509.

Monitor is like a computer, once you upgrade, you will never look back. Few years ago, 17″ monitor is the norm, now is 24″ and in a few years time 27″/30″ will be the norm.

I am currently using the Dell UltraSharp 2408WFP 24″ monitor which I bought back in April 2008 for about SGD$920, now the successor to the monitor, Dell UltraSharp U2410 is only retailing for SGD$699.

When it comes to monitors, I prefer Dell, Samsung or Apple. But right now only Dell is offering the 30″ monitor with 16:10 aspect ratio (2560 x 1600) while Apple and Samsung are offering the 27″ with 16:9 aspect ratio (2560 x 1440).

Dell UltraSharp U3011 uses an IPS (In-Plane Switching) panel which supports up to an impressive 1.07 billion displayable colors and a maximum of 100,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio. It has an average of 7ms (gray-to-gray) response time.

It does not come with in-built speakers but it has support for Dell Soundbar, which is retailing for SGD$69.

All Dell’s UltraSharp monitor comes with Dell’s Premium Panel Guarantee, which means you will receive a panel exchange even if there is only one bright defective pixel on your monitor during the limited hardware warranty period which is 3 years. I have been using the Dell UltraSharp 2408WFP for 4 years and counting and have zero defective pixels, so you have nothing to worry about.

Dell U3011

Specifications

• Diagonal Viewable Size: 30″ (75.6cm)
• Aspect Ratio: Widescreen (16:10)
• Panel Type, Surface: IPS (In-Plane Switching), anti glare with hard coat 3H
• Optimal Resolution: 2560 x 1600 at 60 Hz
• Contrast Ratio: 1000: 1 (typical), Dynamic Contrast Ratio: 100,000:1 (Max)
• Brightness: 370 cd/m2 (typical)
• Response Time: 7ms (gray to gray)
• Viewing Angle: (178° vertical / 178° horizontal)
• Color Support: 1.07 billion colors
• Pixel Pitch: 0.2505mm
• Display Type: Widescreen Flat Panel Display
• Connectivity:
  • 2 High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI)
  • 2 Digital Visual Interface connectors (DVI-D) with HDCP
  • 1 DisplayPort (DP)
  • 1 Video Graphics Array (VGA)
  • 1 Component Connectors
  • 1 USB 2.0 upstream port
  • 4 USB 2.0 downstream ports
  • 7 in 1 Media reader
  • DC power connector for Dell Soundbar
• Color, Size & Weight:
  • 481.3 mm (compressed) ~ 571.3 mm (extended) x 694.5 mm x 211.3mm
  • 18.95 inches (compressed) ~ 22.50 inches (extended) x 27.34 inches x 8.32 inches
  • Dimensions without stand (H x W x D): 453.3 mm x 694.5 mm x 94.4 mm (17.85 inches x 27.34 inches 3.72 inches)
  • Preset Display Area (H X V): 641.28 mm (25.25 inches) x 400.8 mm (15.78 inches)
  • Weight (panel only – for VESA mount): 9.3 kg (20.40 lbs)
  • Weight (with packaging): 14.46 kg (31.88 lbs)

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Got a chance to played with the Alienware M14X and my very first impression when I carried it home is it was so heavy (2.9kg)! But hey, it is Alienware, they make good gaming laptops which is not meant to be light in the first place.

The base model starts at SGD$1,899 with the following specifications:

• Processor: 2nd generation Intel Core i5-2430M 2.4GHz (3.0GHz with Turbo Boost, 3MB Cache)
• OS: Genuine Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 64bit (English)
• Memory: 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM (2 x 2GB)
• HDD: 500GB 7200RPM Hard Drive
• Display: 14″ (35.6cm) WLED HD+ (900p) display (1600X900)
• Graphics Card: 1.5GB DDR3 NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M using NVIDIA Optimus technology (Stealth Black)
• Optical drive: Slot Load 8X DVD+/-RW Drive with DVD+R double layer write capability
• Wireless: Intel® Ultimate N WiFi Link 6205 a/g/n 2×2 MIMO Technology
• Security Software: McAfee Security Center – 15 Months Version
• Primary Battery: 8-cell Primary Battery
• Warranty: SG 2-year Premier Service with 1-year CompleteCover

The review unit that I have has slightly better specifications but it seems that the processor is slightly outdated so you cannot get the exact same specification online.

The main difference is the processor (Intel Core i7-2630QM 2.0GHz), memory (8GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM – 2 x 4GB), HDD (750GB 7200RPM Hard Drive) & Graphics Card (3.0GB DDR3 NVIDIA GeForce GT 555M using NVIDIA Optimus technology).

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IT Show 2012 starts today, 8th March 2012 till Sunday, 11th March 2012 at Level 1, 2, 3, 4 & 6 at Suntec Singapore. Opening hours are from 12pm to 9pm.

As I gotten quite a few emails regarding IT Show 2012 promotions, thought I would just like to share it in this blog post. It will not be as comprehensive as websites like IT Fair (Singapore) or Hardware Zone: Tech Show Portal.

Going forward, I might do this for every IT fair in Singapore. There are 4 major IT Fair in Singapore every year. IT Show (March), PC Show (June), Comex (September), Sitex (November).

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Server Specifications
This site can be considered running on a dedicated server as it only host 30 other domains which belongs to friends and families of both Michael and I. This server is housed at M1 Connect (previously known as Qala). It has 1mbps guaranteed and 10mbps burstable bandwidth.

• Dell PowerEdge 860
• Single Dual-Core Intel Xeon 3050, 2.13GHz, 1066MHz front side bus, 2MB cache
• 2x 1GB ECC DDR2 667 SDRAM
• 1x 250GB & 1x 500GB 7.2K RPM SATA II Hard Drive
• CentOS Release 5

I also have a backup server provided by Vodien Internet Solutions which I will rysnc to manually every week.

• Dell PowerEdge 2950
• 2x Intel Quad Core Xeon E5420
• 16GB Ram
• 4x 300GB SAS RAID 10
• CentOS Release 5

If you are looking for web hosting, do check them out, their support response time is fantastic!

WordPress Theme
This theme is developed by me and hence it is not available to the public as I want to keep it unique. I am using Facybox to display single images in a modal window. Yes, I am using jQuery as well. For some of my feeds like my Twitter feed and WordPress Plugins feed are retrieved and parsed using SimplePie which is included in WordPress.

There is also a iPhone version which is optimized for iPhone viewing, just visit this site in iPhone and it will redirect you to the iPhone version.

Most if not all of the pages in this website is validated as XHTML 1.0 Strict.

WordPress Plugins
I am a WordPress plugins developer however not all the plugins I developed are used on this website as I think plugins like WP-Ban and WP-PostRatings are not necessary as I don’t wish to ban any people from my site or getting my post rated.

I modified only one plugin which is the Breadcrumb plugin by Dan Peverill to have my plugins’ breadcrumbs such as WP-Email and WP-UserOnline displayed using it.

There are also two plugins which I created personally for this website, lesterchan.net Plugin houses several of the functions used in this website and WP-GalleryViewer powers my Gallery. Both of them are not available to the public as it is highly customized to this website.

• Akismet
• Breadcrumb – Modified
• Digg Button
• Google XML Sitemaps
• lesterchan.net Plugin – Not Available
• WordPress.com Stats
• WP-CommentNavi
• WP-DBManager
• WP-DownloadManager
• WP-EMail
• WP-GalleryViewer 1.00 – Not Available
• WP-PageNavi
• WP-PluginsUsed
• WP-Polls
• WP-PostViews
• WP-Print
• WP-RelativeDate
• WP-ServerInfo
• WP-Stats
• WP-UserOnline

Full Details on my Plugins Used Page.

Tracking
I am using the following statistical tools to track and analyze my site traffic.

• Webalizer
• Google Analytics
• WordPress.com Stats
• Extreme Tracking (Depreciated)

URL Shortener
I am using lc.sg as my personal URL shortener and it is powered by YOURLS which is initially developed by me but now, it is developed mainly by Ozh himself. Ozh if you see this, thank you!

Others?
If I missed out anything and you wish to know more about it, do leave it in the comments and I will try my best to add it in.

My mom ordered 4 Dell Vostro 220 Mini Tower Desktop computers for her company last week. This week, 3 units came on Tuesday and 1 unit came on Wednesday. I was there on Wednesday to help her setup the computers. I managed to setup everything for the 3 units that came on Tuesday. So happen when I wanted to setup the unit that came on Wednesday, there was a problem! The first time I switch on the PC, I got a BOSD after reading Dell’s EULA. After rebooting, it will load Windows XP and then hang at the “Pre-installing Factory Settings”. I tried like 10 times, all the same results. Ran the diagnostics CD that came with the PC as told by the Dell telephone support personnel, but I can’t seem to find any problem with the hardware like the HDD or the RAM. So I suspect it must be either the motherboard or the integrated graphics card as those are not tested in the diagnostics.

Dell’s engineer came down today and said there was a problem with the motherboard bios configuration and he changed the whole motherboard and now everything is fine.

Here are the customized specifications of the Dell Vostro 220 Mini Tower Desktop:

• Intel Core 2 Duo Processor E7400 (2.80GHz, 3MB, 1066MHz FSB)
• 4GB (2X2GB) NECC Dual Channel DDR2 800MHz SD RAM Memory
• 320GB SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive with Native Command Queuing
• 16X DVD + / – RW WITH Dual Layer Write Capabilities
• Dell E1910H 18.5″ Widescreen Flat Panel
• Integrated 5.1 Channel (Audio) Capable
• Windows Vista Business SP1 with Windows XP Professional SP3 Pre-installed
• Microsoft Office 2007 Small Business OEM
• Norton Internet Security 2009 OEM with 15 months subscription
• 3 Yrs Next Business Day Onsite Service

Each unit cost SGD$1,532.24 after adding in 7% GST.