花墟公園, Canon 450D + Canon 100-400mm @ 400mm.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Friday, September 10, 2010
Decoupling of price and value
In these days, the price is determined solely by demand and supply, and therefore, there's a decoupling of price and value.
For example, when you eat a lunch box, the foam box was very cheap because of the law of supply and demand. However, the environment cost of the foam box is extremely big, it takes hundreds of years to decompose. And the processing of rubbish is expensive as well.
Such a phenomena is best exploited in the stock market, in which you can drive the price away from the value given you have enough money in the first place. And then after distorting the price, you can "create" value in this process. Of course, those were not really "value" since there's no production afterall.
For example, when you eat a lunch box, the foam box was very cheap because of the law of supply and demand. However, the environment cost of the foam box is extremely big, it takes hundreds of years to decompose. And the processing of rubbish is expensive as well.
Such a phenomena is best exploited in the stock market, in which you can drive the price away from the value given you have enough money in the first place. And then after distorting the price, you can "create" value in this process. Of course, those were not really "value" since there's no production afterall.
Wednesday, September 1, 2010
Replacing the keyboard of my Asus Eee 1005HA
A few keys were found to be not responsing just 7 days after the expiry of the warranty. Called their service center and they said that they will charge me $300 HKD for inspection, and the cost for replacing a keyboard would be like $4xx HKD! It sounds crazy since this Eee costs me only $24xx one year ago.
Therefore, I went to ebay to buy a replacement keyboard and replace it myself. I ordered one last Friday and I got it now, and it's around $200 HKD shipped.
To remove the old keyboard, you need to loosen the clips under the battery.
After the above step, you can life up the keyboard with ease, no force required:
Remove the keyboard from its connector, put in the new one, and done!
Every keys work now!
Therefore, I went to ebay to buy a replacement keyboard and replace it myself. I ordered one last Friday and I got it now, and it's around $200 HKD shipped.
To remove the old keyboard, you need to loosen the clips under the battery.
After the above step, you can life up the keyboard with ease, no force required:
Remove the keyboard from its connector, put in the new one, and done!
Every keys work now!
Thursday, August 12, 2010
Great tool for USB bootable Linux
http://www.pendrivelinux.com/
Simple and yet powerful, it helps you to put a Linux distribution that you like on a USB thumbdrive. This is good for system recovery, emergency bootup, etc.
Highly recommended.
It's great for these days when USB thumbdrives are cheap and highly portable, a handy boot disk shall be great. It won't occupy much space as well.
Simple and yet powerful, it helps you to put a Linux distribution that you like on a USB thumbdrive. This is good for system recovery, emergency bootup, etc.
Highly recommended.
It's great for these days when USB thumbdrives are cheap and highly portable, a handy boot disk shall be great. It won't occupy much space as well.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
Amazon and foreign currency
I just realized that Amazon offered to pay in HKD (or your native currency) instead of USD, this seems to be very convenient at the first glance, but the evil is in the detail.
Yes, they will charge you HKD (or your native currency) and you will know the exact amount that you will have to pay very clearly. However, if you do a simple exercise with a calculator, you will immediately know that it's not going to be a good deal. I suggest you to try it out yourself.
I would advise you to use USD for the payment, and your credit card will do the conversion for you. The exchange rate of bank is far more reasonable in my experience.
Yes, they will charge you HKD (or your native currency) and you will know the exact amount that you will have to pay very clearly. However, if you do a simple exercise with a calculator, you will immediately know that it's not going to be a good deal. I suggest you to try it out yourself.
I would advise you to use USD for the payment, and your credit card will do the conversion for you. The exchange rate of bank is far more reasonable in my experience.
Paypal currency switching
I've some paypal balance in USD. Transfering it to the local bank would not incur a charge but the exchange rate is pretty bad. Therefore, it makes more sense to use it to buy something else.
Today, I tried to buy something in GBP, however, paypal would not allow me to use my paypal balance in USD. After some google work, I realize that if the amount to be paid is more than your balance would allow, it will not let you use the balance but instead, it will charge completely by the credit card!
To solve this problem, I asked the vendor to separate the paypal request into two parts. The first part is less than my paypal balance, so that paypal would allow me to use my existing balance. And the second part is to use credit card.
Quite simple, but of course, since there's a currency switching, I expect poor exchange rate again.
Today, I tried to buy something in GBP, however, paypal would not allow me to use my paypal balance in USD. After some google work, I realize that if the amount to be paid is more than your balance would allow, it will not let you use the balance but instead, it will charge completely by the credit card!
To solve this problem, I asked the vendor to separate the paypal request into two parts. The first part is less than my paypal balance, so that paypal would allow me to use my existing balance. And the second part is to use credit card.
Quite simple, but of course, since there's a currency switching, I expect poor exchange rate again.
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Great freeware video tools
If you want to do one of the followings, you might want to have a look on a freeware tool.
It allows you to do the above easily, and for inserting a video clip in PowerPoint slide, it helps by converting your existing clip to wmv, which I found is the best for PowerPoint purpose.
- Download video from youtube
- Insert video clip in your PowerPoint slide
- Convert videos from one format to another
- Simple video manipulations
- and more!
It allows you to do the above easily, and for inserting a video clip in PowerPoint slide, it helps by converting your existing clip to wmv, which I found is the best for PowerPoint purpose.
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