Blog Relocate

Just want to let you guys know that.

I’ve recreated this awesome blog at http://minhd.net

Operating System Chart

Choose your operating system or stick with the one you have

He is not a Jerk!

Warning: This is a random thing, if you think you are not part of this, stay out of this, I would expect no comment.

Guys, I am deeply disappointed on every single feature you branded him. Some he does deserve, but not all. Not all. Why do you have to be so offensive about him?

He is not a jerk, you just treat him like so. It may be fun, it may be true for THAT single moment. But unlike you guys, I do look back, I look back on what I said. And I feel that what we’ve done is no difference than a group of housewives lacking serious things to do… sit around and bitch about the persons we do not like.

Spare me the lectures and the philosophy of which you think is right.

He is not a jerk, he does not deserve to be. I said that from the bottom of my heart.

Upgrade RAM for Laptop

I’ve been harassed with this type of question by various people. And now, this blog post is the way to go.

Can I install some RAM?

You have to make sure that you need more RAM, you need more speed and firepower for your laptop before doing anything. You have to confirm that there is at least 1 slot of RAM available in your machine so that you can install a new RAM in. Open up the machine to check (refer to the last section) or use an utility to check. I use cpuz.

How much RAM do I need?

The more the better, do you need more speed? do you want firefox to open faster or your laptop to reach a “usable state” faster when you turn it on? So, get more RAM and stop bitching about how slow your lappy is.

I’d spit this out, for the moment, 2GB is the bare minimum for most laptop (if you buy a new modern laptop and it got less than 2GB, you are being ripped off), 4GB is the absolute overkill for now. You wouldn’t need more than 4GB (just as Bill Gates said we never need more than 640KB of RAM) for now. In the near future, who knows. Get either 2GB or 4GB and you’d be running just as everyone else. Most laptop now comes with either 2GB or 4GB nowadays. If you get a 2GB one and experiencing slow speed startup time or slow processing time… get another 2GB stick and plug it in.

Some laptop use integrated graphics, that means RAM will get shared to the processing of videos, images, anything that appears on the screen. Look for this when you buy laptops. Integrated Graphics sucks when you are looking for a gaming laptop.

What type of RAM do I need?

Of course the same one as you already have! Look for that information using a software like cpuz or something. You will know the exact type, brand and stuff for the existing RAM on your lappy.

Current types of RAM on laptop ranges from DDR2 to DDR3 and their bandwidth and speed varies, so be a little careful here.

• DDR2 400 / PC2-3200
• DDR2 533 / PC2-4200
• DDR2 667 / PC2-5300 hoặc PC2-5400
• DDR2 800 / PC2-6400
• DDR3 800 / PC3-6400
• DDR3 1066 / PC3-8500
• DDR3 1333 / PC3-10600
• DDR3 1600 / PC3-12800

If yours not on here, that’s a problem, consult someone

DDR2 400 / PC2-3200 means the type of RAM is DDR2, the speed is 400Mhz and the bandwidth is 3200. Simple? the rest of the type of RAM comes self-explanatory. Of course, the more speed the better, the more bandwidth, the better aswell. I wouldn’t go into details and explaining those here. Remember that simple rule of thumb.

There is a problem is availability of those RAM too, because as technology develops, older technology gets dumped. What if you have a PC-2700 RAM and the slowest out on market is a PC2-3200? That’s a problem! You will now have to look whether the laptop motherboard support any larger bandwidth of the RAM…. (which will result in a lot of google work)

Your target RAM will have to be in the same technology (DDR, DDR2, DDR3), your motherboard must support the bandwidth for the RAM (PC3200, 4200 and so on…). The memory will only be as fast as that supported  or as slow as the slowest installed RAM.

Once you find out which type of RAM you are, what you need, time for some installation.

How do I install the RAM?

If you don’t know how and absolutely scared to get a screwdriver to open up your laptop…. get someone to do it. A professional would have no problem, 2 minutes work.

Most laptop comes with a slot in the back, a small one, to open, stick the RAM in… and voila, it’s done (remember to cut the power beforehand). It’s that easy. The problem is where is that small slot, and how to open that small slot. This option varies from machine to machine of which I do not have the intention to describe for every model. And also, I can’t describe for all model because I do not own most of the models… Ok, I’m rambling now, but listen… it’s easy.. try it! without breaking your laptop apart.

War of The Giant

No Comment. Image collected from somewhere on Flickr.

Thredbo Recap

So, the moment as come for me to write a blog recapping our Thredbo trip. For those who thinks Thredbo is a type of food, Thredbo is a place for skiing, snowboarding, sight-seeing… and of course, in this weather, they are covered in snow

The day starts at 12pm or 0:00. We had to wake up like 4am, we ate dinner at late 11pm so me and my girlfriend have decided not to go to sleep. We had trouble waking up in long sleep…. So, we actually DOTA and War3 till morning. I hold up till 3h30 am and starting to feel dull. Drank some Mother energy drink and have music running in the background to prevent me from falling asleep. I know, the weather is cold, and human needs energy to produce heat to warm themselves up. We will also be on the coach for 3hours consecutively so that’s our nap time.

Got a taxi booked. The guy who might be somewhere Iran or Pakistan… doesn’t know the way to Civic from my house. Though he had like 2 GPS lying next to him.. Plus he managed to find where my house is… He still needs help pointing out direction from my house to civic. That’s a facepalm for ya.

getting to civic -> get on coach -> sleep -> we’re there. Not much has to be explained in this part. Pretty straightforward and nothing of trouble. I slept the whole way so I didn’t have much time sight-seeing through the windows… plus I’m not sitting right next to the window, so not much of a choice.

Once we get there, we step on snow, as anyone would. And realize, this is manufactured snow, they are as thick as rock… and branded “made in refrigerator” everywhere. The snow was slippery as they are mostly water. It’s a crowd, not much of a space to move anywhere. We had a look around and this is what we get

We only wants to hire some smallish board so we can sit on them and slide down the slopes. But they prohibited it…..The only option left is to learn how to ski, because snowboarding is too hard. And then we learn how to ski, the hard way. We need skiing material, they composed of a lot of smaller skiing equipment, including helmet, stocking, skiing board, boots, gloves….. and they are expensive! To travel to another skiing area, or higher area, we have to go by lift… and the lift is…expensive. To hire someone to teach us private lesson on how to ski, they are expensive as hell….

After doing a lot of major researches, me and my gf decided to throw the money issue away and hire 2 ski packs for both of us. My bro who is also coming along refuses to try, he got a minor injury in the foot and skiing would be hard. We don’t need lifts, we don’t need instructors. All we need are stocking (2 pointy sticks that help us balance), the ski board (long thing that attached to our boots), and a 5kg pair of boots.

The pair of boots are major, they are heavy, as they are big. It takes roughly around 15 minutes to properly choose, put on and learn to navigate around in that big pair of boots.

Once everything was hired, and put on. We can’t walk.

It’s heavy, its hard to walk, it’s hard to navigate….. But I decided to use the poke stick (stock as they call it). To poke poke the ground, pushing myself forward while keep my leg stable…. I moved!!! and effortless, I moved!! That’s how we ski, and it’s easy. I’ve been ice skating before, I can’t walk, I can’t slide and spend 30minutes of ice skating just trying to grab the wall and travel across the room. The fear to fall is too large. Skiing on the other hand, I learn much quickly, I can slide my way across and reverse… Just pushing myself in the desired direction. It’s hard to fall…. though I fell once… and can’t stand up without help…

Skiing is fun!

After messing around for a bit, we decided it’s time for lunch. Foods are expensive, but affordable. Fish & Chips doesn’t come with Tartar sauce….of which is strange. The thing is, we have to keep watch for our hired stuff, since we have to leave them outside while eating inside… And the lost of the hired stuff incur a BIG BIG fine.

After lunch, the place is getting crowd-er and crowd-er by the time… And no place for novice to ski anymore… The only place to ski now is to use the lift (which is expensive) and get to other less crowdy places. And then we decided to return the stuff, we had enough, too  lazy to put on the 5kg boot and trying to maneuver around a crowded place… we went for a walk.

After a slight minor mistake with the map…. We found out that where we’re playing is not the center of the place, a very minor place it is…. We… walk to the big place and realize how dumb it is to return our stuff…. We can actually play here….and there’s a lot of places to play. And we touched real snow, step on real snow. I mean real, real.

Real snow is… vastly different from any type of snow we’ve ever touched, stepped on…play with. Including the trip I’ve gone to snowy mountain with the embassy. Real snow is … soft and fertile. It’s not wet, it’s just cold.

Anyhow, we messed around until its time to come back. I skipped some minor detail such as

• How I sux myself by falling into a pond, resulting a change of shoes
• How bored and sleepy it is by waiting in a warm room while it’s snowing outside
• How fucked up I am when I get back to Canberra, feels like my body is falling apart….
• & How I and my gf managed a Dota match before going into hibernation for emergency strength recovery.

Lọ Lem

sưu tầm, chả ghi rõ nguồn nên cứ nhét vào đây

Giờ học văn bắt đầu. Hôm nay thầy giảng bài Chuyện Cô bé Lọ Lem.

Trước tiên thầy gọi một học sinh lên kể chuyện Cô bé Lọ lem. Em học sinh kể xong, thầy cảm ơn rồi bắt đầu hỏi.

Thầy: Các em thích và không thích nhân vật nào trong câu chuyện vừa rồi?

Học sinh (HS): Em thích Cô bé Lọ Lem Cinderella ạ, và cả Hoàng tử nữa nhưng không thích bà mẹ kế và chị con riêng bà ấy. Cinderella tốt bụng, đáng yêu, lại xinh đẹp. Bà mẹ kế và cô chị kia đối xử tồi với Cinderella.

Thầy: Nếu vào đúng 12 giờ đêm mà Cinderella chưa kịp nhảy lên cỗ xe quả bí thì sẽ xảy ra chuyện gì?

HS: Thì Cinderella sẽ trở lại có hình dạng lọ lem bẩn thỉu như ban đầu, lại mặc bộ quần áo cũ rách rưới tồi tàn. Eo ôi, trông kinh lắm.

Thầy: Bởi vậy, các em nhất thiết phải là những người đúng giờ, nếu không thì sẽ tự gây rắc rối cho mình. Ngoài ra, các em tự nhìn lại mình mà xem, em nào cũng mặc quần áo đẹp cả. Hãy nhớ rằng chớ bao giờ ăn mặc luộm thuộm mà xuất hiện trước mặt người khác. Các em gái nghe đây: các em lại càng phải chú ý chuyện này hơn. Sau này khi lớn lên, mỗi lần hẹn gặp bạn trai mà em lại mặc luộm thuộm thì người ta có thể ngất lịm đấy (Thầy làm bộ ngất lịm, cả lớp cười ồ). Bây giờ thầy hỏi một câu khác. Nếu em là bà mẹ kế kia thì em có tìm cách ngăn cản Cinderella đi dự vũ hội của hoàng tử hay không? Các em phải trả lời hoàn toàn thật lòng đấy.

HS: (im lặng, lát sau có em giơ tay xin nói) Nếu là bà mẹ kế ấy, em cũng sẽ ngăn cản Cinderella đi dự vũ hội.

Thầy: Vì sao thế?

HS: Vì… vì em yêu con gái mình hơn, em muốn con mình trở thành hoàng hậu.

Thầy: Đúng. Vì thế chúng ta thường cho rằng các bà mẹ kế dường như đều chẳng phải là người tốt. Thật ra họ chỉ không tốt với người khác thôi, chứ lại rất tốt với con mình. Các em hiểu chưa? Họ không phải là người xấu đâu, chỉ có điều họ chưa thể yêu con người khác như con mình mà thôi.

Bây giờ thầy hỏi một câu khác: Bà mẹ kế không cho Cinderella đi dự vũ hội của hoàng tử, thậm chí khóa cửa nhốt cô bé trong nhà. Thế tại sao Cinderella vẫn có thể đi được và lại trở thành cô gái xinh đẹp nhất trong vũ hội?

HS: Vì có cô tiên giúp ạ. Cô cho Cinderella mặc quần áo đẹp, lại còn biến quả bí thành cỗ xe ngựa, biến chó và chuột thành người hầu của Cinderella.

Thầy: Đúng, các em nói rất đúng. Các em thử nghĩ xem, nếu không có cô tiên đến giúp thì Cinderella không thể đi dự vũ hội được, phải không?

HS: Đúng ạ.

Thầy: Nếu chó và chuột không giúp thì cuối cùng Cinderella có thể về nhà được không?

HS: Không ạ.

Thầy: Chỉ có cô tiên giúp thôi thì chưa đủ. Cho nên các em cần chú ý: Dù ở bất cứ hoàn cảnh nào, chúng ta đều cần có sự giúp đỡ của bạn bè. Bạn của ta không nhất định là tiên là bụt, nhưng ta vẫn cần đến họ. Thầy mong các em có càng nhiều bạn càng tốt. Bây giờ, đề nghị các em thử nghĩ xem, nếu vì mẹ kế không muốn cho mình đi dự vũ hội mà Cinderella bỏ qua cơ hội ấy thì cô bé có thể trở thành vợ của hoàng tử được không?

HS: Không ạ! Nếu bỏ qua cơ hội ấy thì Cinderella sẽ không gặp hoàng tử, không được hoàng tử biết và yêu.

Thầy: Đúng quá rồi! Nếu Cinderella không muốn đi dự vũ hội thì cho dù bà mẹ kế không ngăn cản đi nữa, thậm chí bà ấy còn ủng hộ Cinderella đi nữa, rốt cuộc cô bé cũng chẳng được lợi gì cả. Thế ai đã quyết định Cinderella đi dự vũ hội của hoàng tử?

HS: Chính là Cinderella ạ.

Thầy: Cho nên các em ạ, dù Cinderella không còn mẹ đẻ để được yêu thương, dù bà mẹ kế không yêu cô bé, những điều ấy cũng chẳng thể làm cho Cinderella biết tự thương yêu chính mình. Chính vì biết tự yêu lấy mình nên cô bé mới có thể tự đi tìm cái mình muốn giành được. Giả thử có em nào cảm thấy mình chẳng được ai yêu thương cả, hoặc lại có bà mẹ kế không yêu con chồng như trường hợp của Cinderella, thì các em sẽ làm thế nào?

HS: Phải biết yêu chính mình ạ.

Thầy: Đúng lắm! Chẳng ai có thể ngăn cản các em yêu chính bản thân mình. Nếu cảm thấy người khác không yêu mình thì em càng phải tự yêu mình gấp bội. Nếu người khác không tạo cơ hội cho em thì em cần tự tạo ra thật nhiều cơ hội. Nếu biết thực sự yêu bản thân thì các em sẽ tự tìm được cho mình mọi thứ em muốn có. Ngoài Cinderella ra, chẳng ai có thể ngăn trở cô bé đi dự vũ hội của hoàng tử, chẳng ai có thể ngăn cản cô bé trở thành hoàng hậu, đúng không?

HS: Đúng ạ, đúng ạ!

Thầy: Bây giờ đến vấn đề cuối cùng. Câu chuyện này có chỗ nào chưa hợp lý không?

HS: (im lặng một lát) Sau 12 giờ đêm, mọi thứ đều trở lại nguyên dạng như cũ, thế nhưng đôi giày thủy tinh của Cinderella lại không trở về chỗ cũ.

Thầy: Trời ơi! Các em thật giỏi quá! Các em thấy chưa, ngay cả nhà văn vĩ đại (nhà văn Pháp Charles Perrault, tác giả truyện Cô Bé Lọ Lem – chú thích của người dịch) mà cũng có lúc sai sót đấy chứ. Cho nên sai chẳng có gì đáng sợ cả. Thầy có thể cam đoan là nếu sau này có ai trong số các em muốn trở thành nhà văn thì nhất định em đó sẽ có tác phẩm hay hơn tác giả của câu chuyện Cô bé Lọ lem! Các em có tin như thế không?

Tất cả học sinh hồ hởi vỗ tay reo hò.

Shitty Lectures

I don’t always bitch about lectures, but this is quite over the limit. If someone prosecute me for this post, this is a mere “chém gió” that won’t affect anyone. And if necessary, this post will be deleted or ‘visibility off’ at will.

As usual, the starting point of how bad this course starts with a ni hao lecturer with bad pronunciation. It is extremely hard to follow, understand what he’s been saying, or screaming, about. Maybe I’m not that into lecturer who is not fluently in English.

Second, this is a COMP course, and as many other COMP course, the number of female students stay low, stay under 5, I must say for every COMP course I’ve done so far. And now, it’s more than 20 female students in this class…. Not that I’m allergic to girls, but as far as I know, female students in COMP class is either a super duper pro or a complete noob, no where in between. And now, they infested my idea of a COMP class….. so much!…

Third, this is not a joke. A friend who is enrolled in another course with me, doing post-grad with me (in the same semester) is a tutor for this course. Very very hard to explain the feeling that I’m having now. This is a shitty course.

Fourth, I have no alternative.

walk with the giant

Can’t change one’s fate by repeating one’s mistake.

This is a random rambling, if you do not like the way I whine, the way I bitch about my life, before you judge me, try hard to understand my feeling. The pain of those who made a thousand dollar mistake….

Earlier this year, I have made a grave mistake by choosing to do Masters, especially Master of Computing, not an ordinary MIT, and have paid the dear price.

Often when people make mistakes, they will try to correct it. And by correcting so, they have a chance to worsen the situation themselves, rather than cure the source of the problem.

I dropped 1 course, attempting to do a 3 semester course, rather than a 1 year one. With only 3 courses in a semester, I kind of think that it’ll be a piece of cake. A complete tragedy that it was more than I could chew and ended up miserably. (can’t emphasize enough)

I was suggested to drop Master of Computing and enroll in Master of Commerce. Yeah, a weird choice coming from a pro. I did not take that into account. As I have learnt, the risk is too high. I have to redo my Master year, considering those 1 semester a total waste. I have to deal with a new field of knowledge, and being judge in a totally different level. Masters being scaled, and judged differently from undergraduate.

Today, a lecturer emailed me that, the easy course that I’m enrolled in is incompatible with one of the courses I’ve done in my undergrad. Thus, I have to swap to another course, another hard course.

Now, I am with 3 hard subjects, hard to chew, hard to swallow. And most of all, I am walking the road with giants. People who have vast knowledge and experience are sitting in the same course with me. He who lectured me in my undergrad is now my best mate in a Master course.

The probability that I would fail would only decrease if I lose hope. I don’t want that to happened. I have vowed to get over my Masters…. I have to do so… For the sake of my future.

God speed.

last day…?

Well, I’m not the type to brag about last day stuff and stuff… but really, tomorrow is the day I have to go back to school and do lectures and tutes and stuffs… and today is the last day I don’t have to worry about assignments, lectures….

Well, seriously, that day has come like…3 months ago, and I’ve constantly under massive attack since then. And I know “that day” is nothing of importance. it’s not the end of the world, it’s just I have to move on, with work, with life, and achieve another level of “freedom”

There are times when you have to stop and think about life, think about what’s right and what’s not. I hate those days.