A Gift From National Day

31st Aug 2009 will definitely be a day to remember, as soon after this joyous day the drivers from all over the country will have to pay more for their millage.

Wonder how the authority predicts the international petrol price.
As announced by the authority months ago, the RON97 petrol unit price will raise up from RM1.80 to RM2.00 per litre.
Meanwhile, a new grade of petrol will be introduced to the market, that is RON95, RM1.75 per litre, while RON92 may be ceased.

So, 2.00 v.s. 1.75, sure we'll pick the latter.
But not all the vehicles benefit from this.
Luckily MTM just updated their article The RON List for reference.
All in all, only Honda Civic Type R, Mitsubishi Lancer Evo., Range Rover (Only manufacturer's name not model name?), Skoda (Can't forget it's rather weird logo), Suzuki Swift Sport are being affected. But guess the rich owners won't bother this.

There's also an older version of RON List with RON92 compatibility I received earlier with email.
Gosh! I used to fuel in my lovely New Saga with RON92!
Well, according to Caltex RON FAQ, only some lag in performance.

Now that I noticed from the Proton New Saga Owner's Manual the recommended fuel for New Saga is Unleaded RON95.
Ha, who will read through all those words, if nothing happens?

MS Virtual PC 2007

I've been using this for months to experience the notorious Vista.

Virtual PC is a platform that allows you to use an guest OS right inside your existing OS.
For instance, you can use Windows Vista right inside your existing Windows XP without having to mess up with the partitioning or re-installation. What's more, you can use and switch between several OSes at the same time.
This implies a great saving in cost & time as no need to prepare a testing kluge as well.

Official intro: If you are running Windows Vista or Windows XP on your physical machine, you can still use Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 to run multiple operating systems at the same time on the same physical computer. Switch between virtual machines with the click of a button. Use virtual machines to run legacy applications, provide support, train users, and enhance quality assurance.

Oh! Forget to mentioned VPC is just like other great software acquired by MS. It's been purchased from Connectix Corporation more than 5 years back.

Sealed this up.
Let's take a glimpse:

Upon executing, there's a main console where you can choose guest OSes.
For this instance, I have only Vista added.



However, the list is empty by default.
You have to create a virtual machine with the step-by-step wizard:



After a few dummy-proof steps, you'll stuck here:
{I'll explain this later}



{I'll explain this later}




DOWNLOAD:
MS VPC 2007
There's also a hacked Chinese Simplified version around the internet which no installation is needed.

Windows Live Messenger in x64 WinXP

For more than a month my Windows Live Messenger BETA refused to function properly.
It pops up an error message telling that it can't connect then closed automatically with error report.
I didn't pay much attention on it until I really need to use it.
There's an easy way to solve this, which is only to delete folders with random numbers,
under Application Data\Microsoft\MSN Messenger (or Windows Messenger),
or under Local Settings\Application Data\Microsoft\Windows Live Contacts.
Just soon after trying to delete a few folders with the oldest date,
my WLM functions normally like it was before.

Since I've been using this BETA version in my 64-bit environment for over a year,
guess there's a more updated version to grab for from WLM.
However, it ended up with this:



As far as I remember there was no problem while installing WLM 2009 Beta in Win XP x64.
Seems that they didn't like x64 geeks to chat with each other.
There's one of the ways to have it done:
Windows Live Messenger 2009 on Windows XP 64bit

But I'll stick with the Beta one since it's functioning well now.

FUELLY - Share Your Fuel Economy

Since the purchasing of my 2nd car Proton New Saga, I came across a fine website to record(manually, of course), to calculate & to share your fuel expenses & mileage.



One has to add a car to start tracking & building the statistics for fuel economy.
Since I joined in December 2008, there is no option for Proton cars to choose from.
I e-mailed to ask the website builder if they could kindly add options for Proton cars, with no respond, for months.

This disappointed me.

There are lots of such websites around the internet, like Your MPG, maintaining by US government, could be an alternative.

But I just love at my 1st sight. XD

So I re-e-mailed them and got quick respond from Paul:
"Thanks for the suggestion. I just added Proton to the system."

Not only that, he added "Saga" in the Proton model.
Proton owners would be thankful to him.

So I'm going to start my fuel economy statistics.
Here show you my fuelly badge:

Get Stucked By User Profile Service In Vista

Scenario
After keying-in password and hitting enter on the Windows Vista logon screen, error message "The User Profile Service service failed the logon. User profile cannot be loaded." pops up, followed by automatic logging off.

Background
One of my housemates took out the fully-charged battery from his newly bought laptop, and using the AC-adapter as the sole power input. He switched off the AC power supply after turning the laptop into Sleep mode.

Problem-solving
Dell Solution Network: Knowledge Base Article
The User Profile Service Failed the Logon Error Occurs When Logging Into Vista
In this scenario, "Delete the Corrupted SID Within the Registry" on the official solution does not help at all, as logging in is prohibited by the automatic logging off after the error message.
So I restarted the system, pressed F8 during startup until I got into the Startup menu. I chose the 1st option, Repair Computer, followed by Restore the System. It just simply works!

Discussion
The major cause could be due to user SID or user profile not being properly saved into hard disk.
"Sleep" is totally different from "Hibernate".
During Sleep mode, data is temporary stored into RAM that is maintained by power supply; while in Hibernate mode, data is physically written into hard disk.

Conclusion
Thus it is advisable not to bother the battery while using laptop, unless you really want to elongate the life span of the laptop battery, and that you have UPS with you.