Duronto 22207 – Review

Duronto 22207

Something that’s has been heard for long, Couple of months back people in Trivandrum also got the facility to travel to Chennai on it.

And I got a chance to travel on one that’s between MAS – TVC. That’s train number 22207.

One of the advantage ( for some disadvantage) is that Duronto doesn’t got any stop other than origin and destination. But it will stop at three places, but that would be just technical stops. Also, this train got only third AC and above level of coaches, No sleepers or General compartments.

Seats where easily available while I was booking tickets, was wondering why it was available two weeks before the travel date, while all other trains where sold out. The reason was the advantage I mentioned above. I was even surprised to see there are empty seats on the train reported by the local newspaper on the travel day,which includes tatkal seats.

Reached the station early to find multicoloured coaches, the exterior looked kinda dirty. But the interiors were clean and tidy, and the bathroom was the cleanest and dry, should I say that it was one of the rarest sight. Been to many places on train, but I haven’t seen any coach like this. Maybe just to the fact that it’s a new train and less used.

Train started on time, there where lot of empty seats and few of the adjacent seats was not occupied even after reservation.

Just as the train started an attendant came out distributing a local evening newspaper and a bottle of water(Rail Neer) to every passenger. Newspapers were available on both English as well as Tamil.

By 1700 hours, the same attendant came out handing over a tray to each person, it was tea and snacks. IRCTC outsourced the snacks to The French Loaf, they had provided a neat box with couple of eatables inside. It was accompanied with a small packet of juice, either a Jumpin or Frooti. The Green box contained a small veg puffs, a veg sandwich, couple of sachet of ketchup and four bars of chocolate.

Almost an hour later, the same attendant came with choice of tea/coffee. It contained one packet of coffee powder/tea bag, two sachet of milk powder, and one packet of sugar. And he provided with hot water and a stirrer. And the rest DIY. 😉

The train had a short stop at Katpadi Junction for a minute or so. That’s the first of three technical stops as reported during the inauguration. This happened at 1815.

Later by 1915 or something the same attendant came with some butter, a long shaped rusk and tomato soup.

When I boarded the train I had a thought that dinner was the only meal that would be available. After all these, that thought changed, understood that we are in for a treat.

By 1930 hours, dinner was served. I had opted for non-veg while I booked the ticket. Till now all the food items were vegetarian. The dinner was two chappathis, a good portion of rice(not plain, with peas and some stuff), Chicken curry (ample amount of chicken was there, while those who selected veg meals, the chicken curry was replaced by panneer masala ), good amount of dal, few vegetables that includes cucumber, carrot a tiny piece of lemon and a chilli, then a small tub of curd. And after sometime they provided us with a small ice cream.

Later we all settled down to get some sleep, the train did it’s second stop at Erode Junction by 2124,this one was a bigger stop it lasted for 5 mins or so.

Personally i felt that it is equal to or faster than the shatabdi trains, Did some diagnostic for 15 mins using the My tracks app on Android. The speed averaged between 105-110 km/hr, while the speed peaked at 110.5 km/hr. Didn’t do much diagnostic as I had to save battery for the whole night( I don’t trust charging phones on trains). The ride was kinda shaky as it depended on the track and the speed.

Later it did stop at many places, maybe for crossing or so, i do remember Ernakulam jn.

The next day morning, the train reached exactly on time. Total running time to be exact 12 hours and 45 minutes. Much lesser than many superfast trains between these two stations.

Final Words : It was indeed a good train, people who travel between chennai and tvm can choose this over the volvo buses, as both are charging almost the same(third AC), plus the comfort and food.

How to improve bat­tery life in android?

Hi Guys, bat­tery life is always a prob­lem for an android phone. I have been using a Galaxy Ace for the past year. To be frank it got one of the worst bat­tery life one could buy. Here are some of the few tips and tricks that could increase your android bat­tery life to an extent.

1. Always keep the bright­ness to the min­i­mum. Screen bright­ness is one of the main rea­sons for bat­tery life to get empty.

Tip: You can keep a power con­trol wid­get on home­screen to switch between bright­ness lev­els quickly when in need.

2. Turn off the data con­nec­tion when not in need.

Tip: If you use only Edge/GPRS net­work, it’s bet­ter to be in a 2G net­work all the time. You will have an option “Use only 2G Net­works” under the mobile net­work set­tings. Only pos­i­tive of using edge on a3G net­work is that the data con­nec­tion won’t dis­con­nect when you are on a call.

3. Use an auto­matic task killer to close the unwanted apps in back­ground at a reg­u­lar interval.

4. Turn the GPS on only when you require it the most, use mobile net­works to deter­mine you posi­tion for basic needs.

5. Recharge your bat­tery only when it is at 0% and unplug the charger when it is at 100%.Dont keep the charger con­nected after 100%.

6. Set an appro­pri­ate screen time­out based on your usage.

7. Turn off the Google data sync, if you don’t use gmail/gtalk/google con­tacts on phone. Else, Auto-Sync can be unchecked.

8. Acti­vate the prox­im­ity sen­sor to turn off the dis­play when you are on a call.

9. Please don’t use live wall­pa­pers. 😉

10. Use less widgets.

11. If avail­able, keep your android updated to the lat­est version.

For advanced android users:-

1. Install a cus­tom rom with bet­ter RAM man­age­ment and apps. (for eg Cyanogen­mod ‚Coderom etc)

2.If you are using a third party launcher (ADW ‚GO, Zeam), Keep only one launcher installed in your device at a time. Even if you don’t use the launcher, both the launcher will be run­ning at the same time, eat­ing up RAM as well as battery.

Hope this helps somebody. 🙂

Smirnoff

Sample bottle and a torch.

2011, The year it was.

2011 : The year it was.

2011, one of the amazing years in my life. My life changed in 2011. Writing down a few important things that happened in the year.

Firstly, i became graduated, became an engineer, my passion for technology has reached a certified level.

The ambition to expertise in network field lived deep inside me, as trivandrum didnt give any hope for me, i moved to chennai with help from my brother and sister in search of a job.

But, God almighty had different plans for me. Got a job as network engineer in a company based in UK, it took me back to trivandrum.

It changed my life, entered the corporate world. My life changed. Too busy with work, no time for the rest of the things.

Only thing that kept me sane was the android device with me. Been doing all kinds of crazy stuff in the fone. Installing new roms, checking out performance scripts.

ROMs are less for Galaxy Ace compared to the availability for Nexus devices. Tried out almost all the roms available for the ace.

Started using custom roms when the official gingerbread update was late for the ace, the nerd inside me couldnt hold back from updating to the latest firmware. All the custom roms had the latest version of android underneath.

Started off with Coderom, installed it using Odin, the hard way. Then tried Coderom V2X- 2B. One of the most stable rom. Used the rom for a long time, a point of time came when the internal memory got filled and the OS got clogged with apps leading to a lot of FCs.

Then i gave thought of installing unofficial port of cyanogenmod 7.1,had to throw it as well as version 7.2 because of FCs. Then a savior came in the form of Jusada. His second ROM – Ice Cream Sunday 2. Pretty amazing ROM, fast than any roms, just the barebones of the operating system build over a stable cyanogenmod 7.2.

Then another important thing happened was the revival of the black beast to all its glory. After reading numerous amount of reviews, finally decided to invest on a 560 GTX graphics card, still there were plenty if choices, decided to get MSI GTX 560 twin frozr II edition, gave order for it along with a couple of 4 gigs corsair vengeance memory modules.

End result was me getting forced to move to 64-bit OS. And an awesomely beautiful rig to work upon.

Then all the games that got released was tested and enjoyed thoroughly on the beast. Cant select one game to be the best of 2011, if i have to, then it would be two titles.

1. Call of Duty : Modern Warfare 3. – For its engaging gameplay and smooth graphics.

2. Battlefield 3 : Best graphics in a game for the year 2011,also technically best game. Everything is perfect, only if it had a strong storyline to back it up.

Then Need for Speed : Run, a pretty good game, visually beautiful and engaging but too small for racing game.

Writing this post on last day of winter holidays, (perks of working in a company based on UK) on a Monday morning from hometown, using WordPress for android and swiftkey on my little ace. Back to normal work from tomorrow, hopefully i may find time to do some blogging.

Looking out in 2012.

More android works. Maybe a ROM of mine. Also, maybe a new Android device.

Looking forward for the launch of windows 8.

Gain more knowledge in the field of networking.

Read more books, not e-books but real physical books.

Official cyanogenmod release for my ace.

2012 will be the year of Ice Cream Sandwich.

Happy new year 2012 to all!!

Posted from WordPress for Android

Me and Android.

After a long wait I too got an Android Smartphone.Samsung Galaxy Ace has become my first android phone.

First impression was mind-blowing.Android OS market impressed with the endless amount of the apps available(but the malware attack did scare me a bit.)

Using the phone for more than a month had made me think.Android phone should have some basic hardware for the real android experience.
1. 1 Ghz processor – Some apps or games need 1 GHz for the smooth execution.

2. Internal Memory must be atleast 2 Gigs or above. From Android 2.2 apps can be stored in secondary memory(SD Card).But some apps like widgets or system applications cannot be moved onto SD card.One strange thing that I noticed is that even if the application is installed into the SD card a small amount of data will be stored in the internal memory.It wont be a huge matter but when the internal memory is limited (180mb for me) ,we cannot simply keep unused apps in the phone.
Now about the problem with low memory,when the internal memory goes less than 10% the low memory warning comes up.Some of the apps simply refuse to work,they just crash eg Gtalk. Then the inbox memory goes full and none of ur incoming messages gets delivered. The thing is all these problems are caused if ONE mb go less from the 10% mark.

3. The third factor in a good android experience is a good display,3.5 inch or more with good resolution is expected.If the display is a Super AMOLED,then it would be awesome.

4.A long lasting battery is a must.Android means connectivity,always synced with your mail accounts,Social networking sites etc So the battery gets drained if on edge,saves a lil bit in Wi-Fi while it finishes up quickly on 3G.

5.Android Version must be 2.2 in the present times,2.1 will be just OK.

APPLICATIONS.

Apps are available in plenty or should I say infinite..? You will find an app for anything,from IM clients to an app to select the correct lens suitable for your DSLR.Here are few of the apps I use regularly.

1.Twitter Client- As I am an addict to microblogging, a twitter client will in be use 24/7 in my mobile,the number of apps for the sole purpose are plenty For eg Twidroyd,Seesmic,Twitter for android(official app),Plume,Tweetdeck,Hootsuite are some of the major apps available.Among these I will suggest Twidroyd.

2.E-mail Client – Gmail is available by default,also I have installed Yahoo mail app.

3.Facebook for Android – Another important app in the list,One major feature I missed in the app is the “Poke” button.;-)

4.Foursquare for Android – Another must have app for me.

5.Advanced task Killer – To kill the unwanted apps running in the background.

6.GReader – a feature rich substitute for Google reader.

7.Winamp for Android – Better than the default music player.

8.Moboplayer – the best video player in the market.

9.Games like Angry birds(3 versions),Fruit Ninja etc will always have space in my mobile.:-)

10.The default browser is good but I still rely on Opera for android.

Then the miscellaneous apps in use are Adobe Photoshop Express,Shush,App2Sd,CNN News, Dropbox,Flashlight,Compass,Evernote,Whatsapp,Ringdroid,Wordpress,Zedge,Zippo etc.

About ACE.

Samsung Galaxy ACE is a nice phone,the best looking and feature rich phone for the price.It comes with Android 2.2.If someone is about to buy a new phone I will surely suggest ACE if he is very tight on the price ,if  he could stretch his budget a bit I would suggest him to buy the Samsung Galaxy SL.Better specs for the a slightly more amount of money.

After using the device for a day,I understood one serious fact.The battery is pathetic.It wont last for even a day with my usage.Then desperate measures had to be implemented to save the battery,GPS/Edge/GPRS were turned off and used only when needed.The default touchwiz Interface was removed and various other interfaces like GO Launcher,Launcherpro was tested,In fact it seriously improved the performance of the battery.

The lack of Flash in the browser is also a negative related to the phone.

In whole Samsung Galaxy Ace is a good phone,only thing is that the battery could have been a better one.

PS.this blogpost was done on WordPress for android version 1.4.1 🙂 except for the Pics.

How to enable old school Snake in Gmail?

Here is an efficient way to kill time in office. 🙂

 

How to enable this hidden feature in GMail…

 

Step 1. Enable Keyboard shortcuts in GMail.Press ? ie “Shift+/”  then give enable.

Step 2. Enable “Old Snakey” in GMail Labs.Then save the changes.

Step 3. Press & ie “Shift + 7” to launch the game.

Use Arrow keys to control the snake,Zero to pause the game and Spacebar to restart the game.

How to do the real hibernation in Windows 7 ?

Hibernation is the popular feature that enables the user to power down their PC and to resume back to the exact state when needed.It was available as an option in Windows XP,helping us to easily access.While in Windows 7 it was not so easily accessible,but it kept hidden deep inside the core.;-)

So heres a method to do the hibernation in Win7 that we all did in WinXP but a slight modification,we cant initiate it via OS,u will understand it once u read this post.

 

Step 1 : Enable Hibernation via command prompt.

Goto start–>All Programs–>Accessories–>Command Prompt

then type in “powercfg /hibernate on”   without the quotes. 🙂 like this..

 

if its correctly entered command prompt will appear again like this.

 

 

Step 2 : Enabling option in Control panel.

Go to start–> Control Panel–>Power settings–>Choose what power button does

change the option to hibernate.

 

 

 

 

The power button here is the physical power button on the CPU.

Save the changes,and Voila! u are done.So now if u need to hibernate,just press the power button and see,and resume back via pressing the button again.

PS: For better performance,you should have atleast 2 GB of free space in OS drive.Any doubts,ping me.:-)

 

Opening up a harddisk….

First of all…Wish you all a very Happy New Year,let your year be filled with lots of gadgets and gizmos and make the world an easy place to live…. 🙂

After lot of injuries(due to lack of information),i finally opened up the harddisk.

The experiment was done on a Samsung Barracuda 7200.7  “ST380817AS” .

On top its six visible screws and 1 hidden screw under the label ,which opens the metallic cover and on bottom four screw which separates the circuit from the main body.

Opening up the top cover,u would see the head mechanism then magnetic platter(there is only one in this 80GB ),and two heads attached to the platter.The platter looks similar to the mirror maybe even shinier than normal mirrors. 🙂

 

Thanks to @saisoccer for his dead 80 GB. 🙂

Fun-filled yet craziest gaming session of this year…..

Everyone might have heard of Nintendo wii and its endless capabilities with the controller, but we few PC “only” gamers wondered when will such a controller be available in mainstream and supported by the games.Had a lot of gaming sessions together,enjoyed gaming in high def,co-op mode,multiplayer,one-on-one,LAN….but recently we had a different session,one which had a different controller,suited to play the game…It was @agentsj ‘s Samsung Wave and the game was the Formula 1 2010.

All this was made possible with the help of a BADA app called bControl (one of the very few apps in bada platform that felt useful) .

The app connects to the PC via either WiFi or Bluetooth,here WiFi was made to use,chose the steering wheel controller and it was good.The feedback was good,couple of tweaking and it would be perfect to play racing games,we were quite able to control the F1 car,even though its a little bit difficult to tame via keyboard.The app actually uses the accelerometer detecting the movements made by the user (during the steering wheel mode.)

At the same time,the device along with the app can be used in place of wireless keyboard+mouse,the touch screen makes it easy and fun to use.

Heres a small video we captured during the session (apologize for the low quality 🙂 ).

Review-Need For Speed:Hot Pursuit

Review – Need For Speed : Hot Pursuit

Nobody needs an introduction to the Need For Speed series,the ever popular series of games that captured the people’s imagination of “how cars need to be driven” for generations.Sixteen years since the first game released.Every november we look upon a release of a new version of the game. Played almost all those Fourteen releases ,have seen the ups and down of the series.To be frank,till Hot Pursuit i felt Most wanted was the best game in the series.

A New Studio(in the long no of studios who created NFS over the years) takes up the challenge to make one of the biggest NFS ever to be made – The studio that brought us Burnout(PS3,PC) series of games.

Coming onto the game,the trailers were pretty interesting as it depicted the same scenes from the original game which was a hit also with the addition of all the exotic cars in world (except the Ferrari-s).

The game takes place in Seacrest County.The Game has two modes – play either as Cop or as Racer.Both has  a seperate ranking level,reaching upto the maximum of 20.Both of them has unique cars,the police cars looks pretty awesome in their custom paint job.

The Gameplay is different,the tracks are wider,the crashes are realistic,cosmetic damages are realistic too,but lack of story mode,no customization at all(changing the paint job is the only customization available.).The lack of strong motivation to play the game is very high,except for some facts like good cars and visually pleasing tracks.All the gizmos in the car makes it challenging to play such as EMP,turbo,spike strips,jammers for racers while Cops had roadblocks,spike strips,helicopters and EMP.

Overall the game is short lives,even if u complete all the races in the game,u may not unlock all the cars or reach the level 20.we have to play the races repeatedly to reach thats status.

The cars are very realistic,From Alfa Romeo 8C Spider  to Porsche 918 Spyder and to Bugatti Veyron.Some cars to be mentioned are..

Aston Martin One-77

Audi R8  5.2 FSI quattro (both Coupe and Spyder)

Bentley Continental Supersports Coupe

Bugatti Veyron 16.4 Grand Sport

Koenigsegg Agera

Lamborghini Reventón Roadster

McLaren F1

McLaren MP4-12C

Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG

Mercedes-Benz SLR McLaren Stirling Moss

Pagani Zonda Cinque Roadster

Porsche 918 Spyder (Concept Study)

Porsche Carrera GT

The Graphics are better,but lacking the extensive use of motion blur,ie as we hit the NOS,the only effect we feel is increase in the speedo and the growling of the car,graphicwise there aint any change,but they have saved the motion blur for the turbo mode,which is unique to racer.In turbo mode the car gets accelerated in power equals that of four times the NOS helping them to escape from the cops.

Rating

Gameplay : Short but engaging,Interesting gadgets,awesome car details. 7/10

Graphics : Neat,Realistic,glitch prone. 8/10

Story : None,just plain mission type. 5/10

Sound : Vehicle and surroundings are good 8/10

Overall : Playable,just for the racing part and the NFS hype,loads loads better than the releases we saw in last 2-3 years.But not at all upto the level of NFS Most Wanted. 7/10

Reports are that the new NFS Shift 2 is getting released in march next year.Looking forward to that.