My 2nd hoot from SITEX 2010 is the A.C. Ryan Playon! HD (SGD$349). It comes with a 2TB Samsung harddisk (Spinpoint F4EG) and free Wireless N Dongle. The reason I chose A.C. Ryan instead of other brands is because it can play almost all formats including RM & RMVB. I know Western Digital Live TV can’t play those formats.

The A.C. Ryan Playon! HD also supports NAS functionality and hence I will be off loading all my media stuffs into it from my NAS.

In terms of UI, it is simple and easy to use but I think the graphics element within the UI can be improved to make it more visually appealing.

The only complain I have so far with the Playon HD is the network only supports 10/100Mbps which makes transferring files to it extremely slow. The speed I am getting for transferring files to Playon HD is only 5MB/s. I may switch to using the free Wireless N Dongle that comes with the Playon HD, at least it supports up to 300Mbps which is 3x faster than the wired option.

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Playon HD Front View

Playon HD Back View

Samsung HDD

UI

When I posted my pictures of Iomega 1st Blogging Event which happened yesterday, many thought that Iomega is dead after their Zip Drive failed to penetrate the market because of the widespread of USB flash drives. But in fact they have been bought over by EMC which is a Fotune 500 company and specializes in data storage for USD$213 million.

But yeap, now they are back. I kinda like Iomega products, I got their 100MB, 250MB and 750MB Zip Drives and I got a few old computers which is using their CD Writer and it is still working till today. BTW, TDK DVD Writer sucks, mine was spoilt before even reaching 2 years.

EMC acquisition of Iomega is to bring their storage technology to SMEs and home users at a more affordable price. The selling point of Iomega network and portable harddrives is not the harddrive itself but the software that comes with it.

Iomega vClone is one such software and it allows you to clone your computer into a harddrive and run it at on another computer as if it is your own personal computer. They have partnered with VMware for this to happen.

Capture a complete virtual image of your PC — including the operating system, all applications, your settings, and all your files to your Iomega hard drive. Access the cloned copy and use it seamlessly on another computer, just as if you’re working from your own PC. When you reconnect, automatically sync your data to your primary PC – everything is always up to date. Only Iomega offers this powerful solution.

Iomega Products Offering

Iomega Harddrive Features

Another technology they built into their eGo portable harddisk drive is the Iomega Drop Guard feature which protects the drive when dropped up to 1.3m. But seriously, I hope I do not ever drop my harddrive.

I did ask where is Iomega RMA center, they just told me it is in Sim Lim Square but did not give me a specific address. After Googling, I found out Iomega products are being distributed by Acecom and their service center has move to Ubi. Here is the address:

No 1 Ubi View #03-11
Focus One, Singapore 408555
Tel: (65) 6326-4098 / (65) 6326-4097
Fax: (65) 6509 0825
Mon to Fri : 9:00 to 18:00
Sat/Sun/PH : Close

Iomega Aluminium UltraMax & UltraMax Plus External Harddrive

And Their Respective Boxes

I am pretty interested in the Iomega UltraMax External Harddrive as it will be a great companion to my Mac in terms of design and I shall use it for my Time Machine backup.

More Photos

My D-Link DNS-323 decided to give up to me 2 days ago and I have to find a temporary storage to transfer the data from my DNS-323. Unfortunately, I do not have enough space on my computer to store the data and my old external HDD has only 300GB and it is running on IDE. So I decided to get a new external storage as a temporary solution before I get a new NAS or if D-Link is reading this post would be so kind to RMA my DNS-323 (the warranty is over by 3 months).

More on the death of my DNS-323 in the upcoming blog post.

Hooted the Western Digital My Book Essential 1TB from Challenger at VivoCity for SGD$169 (member’s price) and I get to claim SGD$2.00 off for the carpark, so the final amount is SGD$167.

On top of that, for every SGD$50 spend at VivoCity shops, you can get to redeem SGD$1.00 worth of parking at VivoCity. So I got SGD$3.34 in carpark rebates by VivoCity and plus the SGD$2.00 given by Challenger, I got a total of SGD$5.34 in discount!

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Front View

Ports

Woke up at 10am today, left my house at 10.30am to Suntec City with my brother for the IT Show 2009. I decided to park at Marina Square instead of Suntec City to avoid jam at the carpark. Reach Marina Square before 11am, and still manage to eat McDonalds Breakfast.

After breakfast, immediately went to wait outside level 6 of the Suntec exhibition center. While waiting, there is this lady from MediaCorp Radio approaches us for interview. She talked to me in English first and then ask me whether I can do a Mandarin interview, I agreed since I got nothing to do. She ask some questions like what are you buying at the IT Show, how often you come to this type of fair and how much savings you can save. I am so handicapped in Mandarin. I have no idea how to translate laser, router, switch, wirless USB adapter to Mandarin!

Exactly at 12pm, the doors are opened and the security personnel got Zerg rushed! Went to the Ban Leong booth first as my brother wanted to take a look at Razor mouse as his is dying soon. As usual the promotion for Razer is nothing fantastic, I think you can get even cheaper outside for certain Razor products (eg: Lycosa Keyboard).

Went to the D-Link booth and asked if I buy above SGD$500 got discount, the sales guy said only if I pay cash he can give me 2% which I thought it is definitely not a good promotion at all. If I pay by credit card, I get free gifts as well as points! UOB is having some promotion, I think if you spend above a certain amount, they will give you some things free. I am aiming on the sure-win lucky dip if you spend more than SGD$850.

Damage at D-Link Booth

• D-Link DIR-855: SGD$299
• D-Link DGS-1008D: SGD$100
• D-Link DWA-160: SGD$119
• Total: SGD$518

After getting my networking stuffs, went to level 4 to Samsung booth to get my multifunction color laser printer. Saw Kelvin from Fuwell and Daniel’s Samsung colleague which I met at BlogOut! 2009. Fuwell is selling Samsung LCD Monitors whereas Harvey Norman is selling the Samsung printers. Samsung printers come with trolley but pushing the trolley though the crowd is no easy task! The printer box is quite bulky whereas the printer is quite small itself. The price for the CLX-3175N is still the same but this time instead of giving Abalone (during Chinese New Year promotion), they are giving a free black toner and you are entitled to buy additional toners at 20% off. Pretty good steal I would say.

Wanted to pay by UOB for my printer and toner but it got rejected! My mom literally max out every credit card when she is in Japan as well as for the down payment of the BMW. So end up paying with HSBC and there goes my sure-win lucky dip. Instead I got a SGD$5 Starbucks voucher for spending above SGD$350 for my UOB card. I kinda like the lucky draw form in IT Show 2009, every SGD$100 spend entitled you for one lucky draw form. I don’t really make an effort to get the lucky draw forms normally so I maybe a bit noob in this area. The lucky draw is carbonized, so you just have to write on 1 and it will be carbon copied to 4 other copies! Also the forms are short and sweet, just fill in your name, NRIC and contact number!

Damage at Samsung Booth

• Samsung CLX-3175N: SGD$698
• Samsung CLT-P409C: SGD$184 (Toner Value Pack)
• Total: SGD$882

After buying all the stuffs that I set out to buy, we went home to put the stuff before my brother send me to school for my Statistics tutorial at 3pm to 4pm.

D-Link Networking Products + Samsung 3-in-1 Multifunction Color Laser Printer And Toner

After my tutorial, went to the IT Show again with Kelvin and Hong Jun. Kelvin went there and got a ViewSonic 24″ monitor with built-in speakers and he helped his girlfriend to get an iPod Nano (Black). Saw Rayman : Raving Rabbids for Xbox 360 at the PlayCraft booth and I immediately bought it! Finally there is a “family” game on my Xbox 360 besides Bomberman to play with Li Xiang. I wished that Raving Rabbids 2 will also be out on Xbox 360, but I think that will not be the case.

Rayman : Raving Rabbids For Xbox 360

Damage at Playcraft Booth

• Rayman : Raving Rabbids (Xbox 360): SGD$49.90
• Total: SGD$49.90

Saw from Hardware Zone that the Ovation booth are selling Western Digital internal harddisk, so went there to get 1TB Western Digital Green Power for Li Xiang, but it is out of stock and the stock will be coming in at about 7pm.

Instead of waiting there till 7pm, the three of us when for dinner at Marina Square food court. Hong Jun, my family and I Just love the curry noodle there! Met up with my secondary school friends there as well. When they came, Hong Jun and Kelvin went home.

After dinner, I went to the IT Show the third time within the same day and immediately went to buy Li Xiang harddisk. This time it is so crowded that I could not even make a call out when I am in the hall! It seems that the base station has been overloaded either that of my iPhone 3G sucked.

Li Xiang’s Damage at Ovation Booth

• Western Digital Green Power (1TB): SGD$165
• Total: SGD$165

I injected SGD$1,449.90, Li Xiang injected SGD$165 and Kelvin injected about SGD$600+ into Singapore’s economy!