Jimmy’s Junkyard » IT/Gadget

Travelling with Nokia Lumia 920 [Camera Quality Review]

Posted on Saturday, 23rd February 2013 by Auw Jimmy

Maybe you still remember my old article here. It was Nokia Lumia 800 used during my trip to Singapore. Now, visiting similar place but with slightly different ‘gun’, the Nokia Lumia 920. I know that Nokia Lumia 920 has been released for quite some time. But just now I have enough time to play more with it. My impression? Surely it has a better photo (and video) quality. Impressive Image Stabilizer function which is very useful when taking video and also impressive low light camera performance.

Picture should mean thousand of words, so let’s enjoy it

A shoot of coffee should light my day (with only around 5 hours sleeping time on the night before). It’s a free complimentary for ANZ card holder (4 times in a year for food and beverage, or 8 times for beverage only). BCA Prioritas would give you an unlimited one, though Back to the topic, the low light camera performance played important role here. A bit of grainy noise on the back, but the detail of the creamy chocolate coffee remained delicious

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Tags: Camera, Image Stabilizer, Lumia, Nokia, Nokia Lumia 920, Windows Phone
Posted in IT/Gadget, Personal | Comments (2)

ASUS Xonar Essence One: Preliminary Exploration

Posted on Monday, 17th December 2012 by Auw Jimmy

ASUS seems so serious to jump into sound card industry. Since the first Xonar sound card launched several years back, ASUS keeps doing a lot of innovative things. I think, ASUS tries to change the game play on this industry. As on its motherboard lineup which offers a lot of tweaking and/or upgrading opportunities, ASUS seems apply the same policy to its sound card. We’ll see more later.

So we welcome ASUS Xonar Essence One. Long story short, this is an USB sound card with capability of becoming a stand alone DAC. Specification wise, this is ultimate an USB and DAC with 8x oversampling capability up to 352.8 kHz (for 44.1/88.2/176.4 kHz input) or 384 kHz (48/96/192 kHz input). Well off course you have the option to let the signal ‘as-is’.

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Tags: Asus, DAC, Essence One, Xonar
Posted in DIY Audio, IT/Gadget | Comments (6)

Raspberry Pi

Posted on Thursday, 20th September 2012 by Auw Jimmy

This could be related with audio. Probably. A Raspberry Pi, a credit size computer with Broadcom BCM2835 SoC. This contains an ARM1176JZFS, with floating point, running at 700Mhz, 256 MB RAM, and a Videocore 4 GPU. The size is 85.60mm x 53.98mm x 17mm, with 45 grams of weight.

The rest of the features could be seen on some photos below.

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Tags: pocket computer, Raspberry Pi
Posted in Collectible Stuff, IT/Gadget | Comments (0)

Restoring Vintage Gear: HP Palmtop 200LX

Posted on Tuesday, 19th June 2012 by Auw Jimmy

This weekend, I play a bit off topic from my regular hobby, which is audio. This is an old HP Palmtop 200LX. I own several units but due to improper storage, the LCD is ruined. What a waste and sad news as I realized this few years ago. But what has happened just couldn’t be reverted back. Sigh!

Okay then, from a good friend somewhere in Makasar, I got a working unit (LCD included, off course) of this Palmtop. The chassis and everything isn’t that good, but I believe I have enough spare around as shown below. Then I start to disassemble and building a fully functional unit.

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Tags: 200LX, HP, Palmtop
Posted in IT/Gadget, Personal | Comments (5)

Travelling with Nokia Lumia 800 [Photo Quality Review]

Posted on Monday, 9th January 2012 by Auw Jimmy

Let’s forget a little bit about audio and move a little bit to another hobby of me: photography.

Recently, I rarely bring my camera during short trip. Why? Because mostly I visit a similar place which no longer interesting. If you have been there to a place multiple times, then the rest would become a boring day. Agree?

By the way, before continuing this, I have to admit that I’m not a professional photographer – not even close. My gear mostly an obsolete one (now I’m using Canon SX10 IS and Nikon D90). And I love night and macro photgraphy. I think it’s quite obvious throughout pictures on my blog here.

When I first time got the Nokia Lumia 800, I’m quite impressed with the camera quality. I think it can compete with most smartphone on its class. Not to mention the f/2.2 Carl Zeiss Tessar lens could give you better capture.

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Tags: Lumia 800, Nokia, Windows Phone
Posted in IT/Gadget, Personal | Comments (3)

Nokia E7 ‘USB On-The-Go’ Connects to USB Sound Card (It Works!)

Posted on Friday, 16th September 2011 by Auw Jimmy

“USB On-The-Go” is not really a new thing actually. But since I have ‘exiled’ myself from the glamorous gadget world, probably I have missed this one. So, I just acquire a Nokia E7, featured with USB On-The-Go. Basically, you can plug a standard device like keyboard, mouse, or flash drive on it (and get a flexible control over your supported device). But I would like to try a different approach. How if I plug standard USB Audio Device (USB sound card)?

I read somewhere that the maximum power supply current supported is 200 mA. Well, probably some USB sound card could take more. But, no risk, no gain, right? I check several of my USB sound card collection and start playing around. Btw, I also plug my Samsung MP3 Player. The idea is to copy some music file from it. But eventually it starts to charge the device itself (damned, charging from battery to battery?). My Nokia E7 “screams” by showing a warning message that the connected device is consuming a lot of power (or similar warning – sorry, forget the detail).

I plug my MAYA EX5 USB sound card. Nokia E7 recognizes the device, but it says ‘limited function’. I think because MAYA EX5 uses non-standard USB audio device (it’s multi channel which is not common in USB audio peripherals). Since I think it needs special driver, then the Nokia E7 couldn’t redirect the sound into this sound card. So, we remove this from our list.

Then I find out a standard USB sound card, the ASUS Xonar U1 USB. This sound card is quite nice, with adequate headphone output quality. Nokia E7 recognizes this device with no problem and suddenly the music is redirected into the ASUS Xonar U1. I plug my headphone then start to enjoy the music.

FYI, the ASUS Xonar U1 used on this and shown on the photo below has been modded completely, especially on the capacitor side with Black Gate and Elna Cerafine. Click the link to find out the modification detail. The sound has improved in quite significant margin.

Below is the Nokia E7 connected to the heavily modded ASUS Xonar U1 via “USB On-The-Go” feature.

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Tags: DAC, E7, MP3, Nokia, sound card, usb, USB On-The-Go, WAV
Posted in DIY Audio, IT/Gadget | Comments (7)

QLS QA-550 SD Card WAV Player “Naked”

Posted on Thursday, 3rd March 2011 by Auw Jimmy

My new digital transport has just come, QLS QA-550.

This is actually a SD Card WAV Transport, as it only has digital out (either Coaxial or Optical) and internally I2S pin-out.

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Tags: Digital Player, SD Card Player, Transport, WAV
Posted in IT/Gadget, Uncategorized | Comments (33)

Playing with Asus O!Play Air HDP-R3

Posted on Thursday, 18th November 2010 by Auw Jimmy

I got chance to try ASUS O!Play Air HDP-R3. Short words, it’s a digital storage player (you can use external HDD connected via USB or e-SATA or use the build-in card reader) and support RCA Composite or HDMI video output up to 1080p and analog or SPDIF out via Optical. Wired LAN also supported and for the R3, it support WiFi to. The core is based on Linux so completely upgradeable (or hackable).

It supports following formats:

Video: MPEG1/2/4,RM/RMVB,VC-1,H.264
Video File Extension: .trp,.mp4,.mov,.xvid,.avi,.divx,.asf,.wmv,.mkv,.rm,.rmvb,.flv,.ts,.m2ts,.dat,.mpg,.vob,.mts,.iso,.ifo
Audio: MP3,WAV,AAC,OGG,FLAC,AIFF,Dolby Digital AC3,Dolby Digital Plus,DTS Digital Surround,Tag ID3,Dolby True HD (downmix)
Image: JPEG,BMP,PNG,GIF,TIFF
Subtitle: SRT,SUB,SMI,SSA,TXT

For you who is interested to read more, click here.

Enough the introduction, this is not an advertorial. Straight to the point, I connect it to my audio system. I also need small display to navigate the menu, so I use 3.5″ LCD normally used as car reverse camera display shown below. Not the highest or sophisticated resolution though’, but who cares the display quality anyway On the back is my Duelund CAST Silver capacitor as output coupling of my Aikido Preamplifier.

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Tags: Asus, DAC, O!Play Air R3
Posted in DIY Audio, IT/Gadget | Comments (12)

Inside (Disassembly) O2 Exec

Posted on Sunday, 18th January 2009 by Auw Jimmy

I have some problem which force me to disassembly my O2 Exec. So here is some pictures.

The whole unit inside of my O2 Exec.

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Tags: exec, o2, Pocket PC
Posted in IT/Gadget, Personal | Comments (0)

Notebook Power Consumption on Test

Posted on Sunday, 21st September 2008 by Auw Jimmy

So far, I’m very anxious to see how much power I can save with my laptop (let’s say – if I turn of my screen, my speaker, my ODD, etc). Well, this time I have chance to test myself

I use my laptop, ASUS F3JC. Powered with Intel T7400 (2.16 GHz), 2 GB or RAM, 120GB of SATA HDD, 15.4″ screen, and a Super Multi ODD. What else? I use standard 65 Watt adapter.

I use a device that can measure the power consumption directly. You just need to plug this device on to the wall outlet, then connect your peripheral to this device. Then, this device can measure the power consumption of your peripheral instantly (real time). Take a look of the device below.

This tiny little device can measure the Voltage, Current, Power Consumption (in Watt or VA), Frequency (Hz), Efficiency (Power Factor), and Power Usage (kWh). This is a great device, but somewhere not available in Indonesia.

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Tags: consumption, energy, notebook, power, watt
Posted in IT/Gadget | Comments (8)

Eee PC 900 on Hand (A Short Review)

Posted on Sunday, 11th May 2008 by Auw Jimmy

I just received Eee PC 900. Here is some photos and comparison with my old Eee PC 700 series (4G). Enjoy it!

Photo above is the comparison between Eee PC 700 series (left) and 900 series (right). Not much different in size (and weight) between those two. The black frame surrounding the Eee PC 700 screen now has been removed on 900 series. On 900, The speakers is moved to the bottom side. The 900 series will have 8.9″ screen, compared to 7″ on 700 series. Note: I forgot to remove the plastic on 900′s screen

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Tags: Asus, Eee PC, IT, Windows
Posted in IT/Gadget, Personal | Comments (2)

Biaya Roaming Satelindo Matrix di Shanghai (dan Narik Duit dengan ATM BCA)

Posted on Sunday, 11th May 2008 by Auw Jimmy

Sekitar bulan Maret lalu, gue ada pergi ke Shanghai (transit di Hong Kong). For some reason, gue beli SIM Card di sana juga (cuman ada dua pilihan, China Mobile atau China Unicom – dan gue beli China Mobile yang merupakan operator besar di Cina). Tapi seperti biasa, SIM Card Satelindo Matrix tetep gue nyalain, in case ada telepon penting yang masuk. Gue juga pernah mencatat biaya roaming di beberapa negara lain yang kebetulan gue kunjungi. Silakan liat di sini.

Berikut kita liat biaya roamingnya…