» 2008 » December

My blog has been alive for over five months and has been growing slowly everyday. I just want to give a big THANK YOU to all of you readers out there who have visited and revisited my blog over these months. I will continue to deliver more quality contents to everyone and I hope all of you will enjoy my blog for the years to come! Again I want to thank you all because having readers is the most rewarding gift a blogger can ask for.

So again, thank you and I hope you all have a wonderful New Year!

We have heard of keyless entry for cars for a long time. But have you heard of keyless entry for your home? A company called Axxis Biometrics provides advanced fingerprint identification locking mechanism generally available for Biometric firms. Each fingerprint lock can store up to 100 different users, or finger prints. Some locks also have a built-in LCD screens that display who has requested for access. And if for some reason there is a power failure, the lock can be opened with a traditional key or with an emergency PIN code.

I actually like this idea of not having to worry about what to do when you forget to bring your keys. I know you would ask, well if you forgot to bring your keys then you could have gone back in without unlocking your house door because it was never locked in the first place. True, but that also meant some one could have entered without a sweat. Or in my case, my parents would have locked it when they went out without knowing that I forgot my keys in my room. So when I got home I would have no way to get back in until they return.

Axxis Biometrics offers three different types of fingerprint locks – deadlock, latch and mortise. Beside fingerprint locks, the company also offers the more traditional PIN code door locks and complete fingerprint access control systems that support fingerprint entry, PIN Code access and access card.

I know this technology isn’t the newest of the newest but this is the first time hearing keyless entry for both residential and commercial buildings, and quite affordable too.

Which has a better chance of actually happening – forgetting your house keys and having your fingers chopped off?

 

 

Tech-On! has posted something that caught my eyes this early working morning. Panasonic has introduced 2 models of its High-security Electronic Whiteboards.

The only difference between the two models is one being “a film-board type that can be hung on a wall and a steel board-type on which documents can be posted by using magnets”, based on the article. Each model is further divided into more trims with film-board type having the “UB-5838C” color wide model and “UB-5338C” color standard model and the steel-board type having the “UB-2828C” color wide model, “UB-2328C” color standard model, “UB-2828″ monochrome wide model and “UB-2328″ monochrome standard model

What interests me the most is the fact that it can be plugged into a PC through USB where you can transfer whatever is on the board onto the connected computer so you can save whatever you have drawn on the board and bring it with you (to your PC or USB key). It doesn’t say if the reverse is true whether its possible to transfer data from a computer onto the boards unfortunately.

I’m not sure about its security feature though. Although its great to have password feature that will restrict from being printed or stored. If the person really wants what’s drawn on the board, he/she can still either hand-draw or take a picture of the content.

Unfortunately, these fancy Whiteboards are quite expensive which range from “approx US$2,020-3,123, including tax” while the printer is approx US$289.58 (I did this calculation based on the current exchange rate, the article didn’t have the US price for the printer for some reason).

Image source: Tech-On!

I’m sure a lot of you have at least one web site and I am also sure ALL of you want as much exposure and traffic to your site as possible. Traffic, and preferably quality traffic, is one of the most critial keys to enable you to monetize your web site.

In order to drive quality traffic is by ranking high on search results from search engines like Google, Yahoo and MSN etc. Search engine optimization or SEO in short will enable you to achieve this goal. SEO can be intimidating to many people, especially for beginners because they have to deal with finding quality keywords, keyword phrases and long tail keywords which is just one of many tasks you have to do when performing SEO. There are companies that provide effective SEO for your web site and one such company is iMajestic Internet Marketers. Established since 2001, iMajestic not only provide search engine optimization but also provide other optimization services such as pay per click, local search, reputation and social media to complete web development.

What iMajestic differs from other SEO service providers is the fact that you only have to pay after your desired goals like keyword ranking in particular search engines, for example, is achieved and maintained. This performance based service is perfect for those worried about not getting the results they asked for because now they don’t have to pay a cent if they don’t see the expected results.

I was looking for web site templates and I stumbled upon EasyTemplates.com. The first word that came out of my mouth (literally) was “WOW!” after previewing this Flash template. This is only one of many Flash templates available from the site and it also offers traditional HTML templates, as well as e-commerce templates that utilize PHP and mySQL database. The templates are categorized to suit everyone’s needs.

Why do I recommend these Easy Templates? You can edit the text, button labels, email form, background music, and pictures in Notepad or any other text editor. So anyone, even those who don’t know anything about Flash can make changes to personalize their web site. If you don’t want 100% Flash only website but rather a normal HTML website template with Flash elements at the top, Easy Templates offers templates with both HTML and Flash elements. There are also the more advanced Flash Templates for those that know Macromedia FLASH MX 7.0 , 8.0 or CS3/4. For photographers, with over 50 Flash photography templates to choose from, they can use these photo album templates made to show off their photographs, in a “Flashy” way.

The price for these templates are also resonable that range from USD$42 for a Flash intro template or you can have your own full-blown YouTube-style video web site to share movies with friends or to your potential customers for a mere USD$199.

Also want to note that EasyTemplates.com also offers its customers a 1-year free web hosting and for $1 per month from then on through Hostgator. Honestly you really can’t find a hosting service for $1 a month.

So if you are looking for professionally done web site templates, be it written in HTML or Flash, take a look at what EasyTemplates.com has to offer.

My friend was talking about joining WoW and was saying how he wouldn’t have time to level up from the very bottom. I told him that’s the only way, a rewarding way that is, to get to the high level. After our conversation, I remember there used to be sites or companies offering MMORPG accounts. One such site is BuyMMOAccounts.com where you can buy wow accounts. It has basically all character classes for sale with most of them being level 70-80 already. It even has Wrath of the Lich King’s character for sale as well.

You can click on each character for more infomation on it. The infomation is very detailed as it shows base stats, melee stats, defense stats, range stats and spell stats. It also shows what items and how much gold, silver and copper this character has. These info are guaranteed to be 100% accurate since the data is pulled directly from the Armory.

You can also purchase U.S game cards from the site for more play time.

You can buy characters from BuyMMOAccounts.com with confidence because based on its 100% Account Guarantee policy, you are provided with the confirmed Full Name, Secret Answer and Email for the account you are buying, these are the most important pieces of information to claiming ownership of a new account.

So if you are looking for high level WoW characters, BuyMMOAccounts.com should be your first and might also be your last stop for your WoW character shopping needs.

  

So I downloaded the demo for The Lord of the Rings: Conquest while playing LittleBigPlanet Metal Gear Style. After going through the rather short demo, I am pretty sure I won’t be getting this game, yet another failed EA game.

  

The Lord of the Rings: Conquest to me is basically Dynasty Warrior where you hack and slash your way through numerous enemies with swords, arrows, axes and you get to cast magic as well. The demo allows you to play through the tutorial of the game and you start off with the Warrior class and you will get to actually capture a flag which I haven’t seen before in a single player game (this game supports multiplayer co-op by the way). You have to hold off the enemies during the capturing and once its captured you can change your class. The second class unlocked is the Archer, you can zoom in/out while shooting and you have three different arrow types – ice, fire and poison and you can also shoot multiple arrows at more than one enemy. Third class that you get to experience is the scout where you can cloak and perform backstab, its fun to watch for the first few stabs but it gets repetitive afterward.

  

Last but not least you will yet unlock another class – Mage. With mage, you can chain lightning multiple enemies, cast fire or shock or just perform the plain old hack and slash with the staff. Finally once all 4 classes are unlocked you will get to face dark lord Sauron himself. He is pretty strong and tend to come at you all the time, now you get to fight using a Hero class character, which is basically a stronger version of the warrior class I assume. The demo ends when you defeat Sauron.

  

I also want to mention each class has its own special attack as well and you can use it when the special attack gauge is full. But the effects are nothing compare to Dynasty Warrior though.

The background of this game is poorly done in my opinion with the two sides’ soldiers fighting each other and they all look exactly the same. Almost feels like its just a simple copy and paste job. The game play range from small scale to large scale battles with more than 20 AIs all fighting each other, but just like Dynasty Warrior, the AIs are pretty dumb. The game’s music is pretty nice though since its basically from the movies. Overall I don’t think this game is worth buying, even if you are really into hack and slash and you are a LOTR fan like me.

  

As promised, I bought these packs as my Christmas presents, well a bit too early but what the hell. I have purchased the two DLC packs for LittleBigPlanet – the Metal Gear Solid Premium Costume Pack and the Premium Level Pack. All I can say is its worth the money!

  

As you know there are 5 Story Levels as well as 1 Challenge Level along with 6 costumes and a lot of objects, stickers etc. The first level is basically an intro, you don’t really get to do anything but the scene is nicely done. The second level is where the fun begins because you will get to play with THE PAINTINATOR. I think that’s basically the meat of the level pack and also a break through for LittleBigPlanet because its the first real weapon for LBP. This level will have you practice on non moving targets then move on to the harder, moving objects and dodge away from bullets (huge green balls), not too hard there. A HP meter is also introduced which I find it very innovative, for LBP that is. An enemy will have a HP meter so you will keep shooting it until its meter is empty. Again HP is nothing new in the gaming world in general but it is for this game.

  

The third level is where the actual “story” starts and you will fight your way through this level then progress to fourth and finally the fifth level is the boss level where you will get to fight a Metal Gear which in my opinion, beautifully designed. Its weapons are insane too as it will try and kill you with machine gun, rockets, lasers and the huge laser gun.

  

Overall the 5 levels are pretty shot, about 30 minutes or so, but extremely fun, even better if you play with friends. The Challenge Level, your goal is to surive as long as you can while you blast away the laser cannons on the ceiling. Again pretty fun if you play with others.

  

The costumes are also very detailed and really do resemble the characters from Metal Gear Solid. I personally like Raiden but I think Screaming Mantis has the most detailed features of all costumes. It even has the two hanging dolls behind (see screenshot).

  

I’m not sure about other packs, but these two packs are a definite must for MSG fans as well as LBP fans! Get them now! Treat yourself two special Christmas presents BEFORE Christmas!

And I look forward to more new levels with weapons in the future.