Apple Mac-Intel Simplified Buying Guide

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Apple, Technology

With the release of MacBook, now Apple has complete line up of Intel Macs. If you’re planning to buy a new Intel Mac here is a good Apple Mac-Intel Simplified Buying Guide.

I want to buy a MacBook Pro for myself but with the first hand experience of heat…I’m not sure. I’m tempted for MacBook now. The price is right for the power it offers, just want to wait a week to see if it is plagued with same heat problem. BTW, we’ve sent our MBP to repair for the third time yesterday. It was returned back from repair center saying that the "heat was within apple spec". I called the tech support and talked to them for around 40mins. so, they’ve asked to send it to another repair center where another very qualified professional will take a look. I’ve written a message to the person who’s going to test:

"Pls turn it on, use it normally for 2 hours and put your finger on top of the function keys. If you can keep your finger there for 2-3 mins. without having blisters then return it back to me".

Frankly, I don’t expect any good news. I found this article End the Whine – May 20th 2006. Hopefully Apple will take this matter seriously. If the May 20th campaign is successful then I can decide which Mac I want to buy.

Anti-spam company shuts down after DDoS Attacks

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Network, Security, Technology

After being Spammed and Attacked, Blue Security has shut down its anit-spam service. According to the Netcraft’s Performance Chart Blue Security’s web site was unavailable for an extended period on Sunday and Monday, and again this morning.

The founder of Blue Security says it has shut down its anti-spam service, citing the impact of powerful DDoS attacks on its web site that began in late April. "After recovering from the attack, we determined that once we reactivated the Blue Community, spammers would resume their attacks." the company said on its web site. "We cannot take the responsibility for an ever-escalating cyber war through our continued operations."

Workplace IT Security & Communications Solutions for Today’s Business

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Hong Kong, Network, Reviews, Security, Technology, VPN

Today I attended a seminar called Workplace IT Security & Communications Solutions for Today’s Business organized by one of our technology partner. It was an interesting event where several networking vendors presented about the IT Security Technology and the latest and greatest products they’ve in offer.

Opening speech was given by the Senior Inspector WONG Hung-Fu of Technology Crime Division, Crime Prevention Unit, Commercial Crime Bureau, Hong Kong Police Force. Unfortunately he choose to speak in Cantonese (which I don’t understand) but from his slides and later explained to me by other participant he was showing figures of increasing cyber crimes in Hong Kong specially Phishing, Spyware and P2P related crimes.

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BackupMyBLog

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Admin, Blogging, Technology

BackupMyBlog is a remote blog backup service. It’s first of it’s kind. With explosive growth of blogs I think we’ll see more similar services in the future. It’s free during beta testing period. Looks like they’ll start to charge once on production. The service can be used by any MySql and PHP based blogs. Currently they’re providing 10MB of storage per account which I think is not enough.

Meditation Found To Increase Brain Size

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Body, Mind & Spirit, Life

It’s interesting and encouraging to know that researchers at Harvard, Yale and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have found the first evidence that meditation increases thickness of the Brain parts which are responsible for processing sensory input and dealing with attention.

"Our data suggest that meditation practice can promote cortical plasticity in adults in areas important for cognitive and emotional processing and well-being," says Sara Lazar, leader of the study and a psychologist at Harvard Medical School. "These findings are consistent with other studies that demonstrated increased thickness of music areas in the brains of musicians, and visual and motor areas in the brains of jugglers. In other words, the structure of an adult brain can change in response to repeated practice."

This is a good news but it doesn’t happen overnight. The increase in size is proportional to the amount of time one has been meditating.

Zazen, vipassana, mindfulness meditation

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Body, Mind & Spirit, Life

Lately I’ve been reading a lot about Buddhism and am practicing (experimenting) mindfulness meditation. Just found an excellent article about mindfulness meditation (Zazen, vipassana, mindfulness meditation) which I wanted to share with you all. When we talk about meditation we tend to think that it should be done by sitting in a lotus position but zazen can be done anywhere anytime with positive physical and psychological benefits.

But it isn’t necessary to practice zazen sitting in a lotus position. You can use everyday opportunities to practice. When you feel like flinching while talking with someone, that is an excellent time to practice because it will help you deal with the situation. Observe your experience — the person you’re talking to, your surroundings, your bodily sensations, the thoughts arising in your mind. Just pay attention without withdrawing or flinching. It is very calming.

What kind of Internet addict are you?

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Life, Technology

This article points to a new study which suggests that between 5 to 10 percent of Internet surfers might have dangerous type of addiction related to the Internet.

One problem with the term "Internet addiction" is the looseness of the term as it can be applied to any number of problematic behaviors. The researchers in this case broke the term down into five specific behaviors:

  • Cybersexual addiction
  • Cyberrelationship addiction
  • Net compulsion
  • Information overload
  • Interactive gaming compulsion

You can take an Internet Addiction Test (IAT) to see how addicted you are. I scored 45 which means I’m an average on-line user. And might surf the Web a bit too long at times, but I have control over my usage. I personally think that I might be suffering from Information overload at this moment 🙂

Travel blog writes about Hong Kong

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Hong Kong, Life

I just came across a travel blog gzthinkpad.com with very detailed and useful information for travellers comming to Hong Kong.

Hong Kong travel tips

The most popular tourist attractions are Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Gardens, Hong Kong Park, Aw Boon Haw Gardens, Kowloon Park, Victoria Park, Ocean Park, Hong Kong Space Museum, Hong Kong Museum of Art Centre, Hong Kong Science Museum, the Museum of History, Old Wan Chai Post Office, the Central Markets, Man Mo Temple, Hung Shing Temple, Tin Hau Temple, Tsim Sha Tsui tourist slum in Kowloon, and the islands and beaches of Deep Water Bay and Repulse Bay.

Hong Kong holiday accomodation

Travel tip … if your flights are for travel to Hong Kong at a different time of the year, hotel rooms are generally lower priced – up to 50% less – and it’s well worth asking if there are package deals or room specials so you can organise the cheapest possible holiday.

Shopping Mall Guide for Hong Kong

Hong Kong is a holiday paradise for shopping.

All goods sold in Hong Kong except alcohol and tobacco are tax-free and negotiating at the many street markets can win you some great bargains for quality items.

I’ve lived in Hong Kong for almost 7 years and have been to most of the places mentioned in the travel tips. Basically Hong Kong is a modern city, very beautiful but crowded, diverse in nature and is definitely a shopping paradise.

Buddha, Buddhism and it’s myths

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Body, Mind & Spirit, Hong Kong, Life, Nepal, Reviews


This bas relief depicts Maya Devi with her right hand holding on to a sal tree with a newborn child standing upright on a lotus petal, shedding an oval halo, around his head.

During my recent visit to Po Lin Monastry I found some conflicting information about Buddha’s birth place. I saw some paintings with information saying Buddha was born in Nepal and some other info saying he was born in India. It might not matter to most, but those who are serious about history and Buddhism itself should know the facts. I’ve known many serious Buddhists who really thought that Buddha was born in India until they met me. I had to point them to reliable sources to get the facts across. The truth is that; Buddha was born in Kapilbastu, Lumbini, Nepal.
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Photos from my visit to Giant Buddha on Buddha’s Birthday

by niranjanPosted on Posted in Life, Random

Yesterday was Buddha’s Birthday, a public holiday in Hong Kong and I went to visit Giant Buddha at Lantau Island with my wife and son. It is the world’s tallest outdoor seated bronze Buddha. A quite interesting day for my son, on our way to Po Lin Monastery he saw some live buffaloes and bulls for the first time in his life. I just thought if you were in Nepal it would be a daily scene :). It was a sunny day with clear skies at Hong Kong Island but as we went up hill the Lantau Island we found it covered with fog, and it was quite windy. I’ve taken some photos and here they are..

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