Cleaner power.

As a Singaporean, I only remember the rare blackout, and do not remember having any brownouts at all.

Not so much living overseas. At my London rental, I've noticed the lights slowly dim and brighten. Brownout. But this particular apartment in Montreal is quite bad. Everytime the fridge's compressor kicks in, the lights will flicker, and it will flicker at odd times as well, which I would assume is the neighbour's high power appliances engaging. I've already had one short blackout a few weeks ago.

To protect my electronic babies, I've got a Tripplite Smart 1500LCDT. Compact little thing but weighs a fair bit. It's main use is as a UPS during blackouts, which I don't really need since I only run laptops, but the other features like voltage regulation - to combat brownouts - were exactly what I needed.

After installing it, I found some of my headphone outputs no longer humm and buzz. Previously, they did, even with the volume knob at zero. Win! Testing the UPS today, it seems like the 1500VA capacity is probably overkill. A pair of studio monitors, audio interface, laptop and sample drive don't seem to consume much power at all, with the UPS indicating over an hour run time on batteries.

Guess if I ever get a new UPS, I'll definitely be scaling down my requirements. Heck, now that I think about it, the laptops don't even need to be plugged into the UPS powered sockets, just the surge protected sockets.

Alternatively, instead of a UPS with voltage regulation, a line conditioner will probably do just as well. Ah well. Live and learn.

In other news, I've decreased my room's lighting consumption from 3x 40W incandescent lights to 2x 6W LED lights (which produce 40W equivalent lighting each).

I wonder if the cost of running LED lighting outweighs the cost of actually producing the LED lighting. Previously in London, I'd swapped most of my lights to LEDs as well, and don't remember seeing it impacting that much on my energy bill. The flipside is during winter, incandescent lights actually help warm my room, not so much with LEDs!

Evidently my phone is the epitome of wireless connection.

Finally got internet access today! Took awhile to sort out the passwords and stuff, and also had to figure out some hardware difficulties. The wireless router that came with the package, a Sagemcom 2684 was choking over the wireless connection for both my linux and osx machines. Packets were dropped when I tried to ping google. Oddly enough, my Nexus 4 was using the connection at full speed.

Switching over to ethernet (good lord, first time I touched an ethernet cable in years!), my macbook was running at full speed. Seems like the laptops didn't like the Automatic Wireless A/G/N setups. Setting it to Wireless G and presto! Stuff works now.

Got a new toy: Neato XV-11

Got a Neato XV-11 in the mail today. I'd always imagined the robo vaccums to be the size of a small pizza, but MadCat was of a more generous proportion. Out of the box, all I had to do was unscrew one of MadCat's battery compartments, and connect a battery pack. There are two batteries, and the other was already connected.

As I had to pull some extra time at work today, I arrived home later than I hoped, so only ran MadCat for a short while in my tiny kitchen. It does as it says on the box, avoiding stuff and sucking up crap. Very loudly, I must add.

I only let MadCat clean a tiny portion of the kitchen, and upon checking the collection box, was quite surprised at how much it sucked up.

Unlike my London studio, this new place in Montreal is very windy, and I was very dismayed to find out how quickly dust accumulates in the living room. A sweep + mop doesn't last more than a day before I find things becoming dusty.

I get this "eww must dust feet off before climbing into sofa" before bedtime. Yes, I do not have a bed. Yet.

MadCat still needs to be upgraded with some key components, like racing stripes and maybe a Singapore flag. Ideally, I'd like to mount one of those usb mini-rocket launchers on MadCat (two, LRM20s...) but I think the laser rangefinder won't like obstructions.

Anyways, enough crap. I've read loads of bad reviews for the XV-11 online, so I thought I'd post some stats from MadCat's LCD. I also bought this from Costco.ca on Saturday, and got it in the afternoon today. Pretty swift!

MadCat is also very adorable. When I pick it up, the LCD displays: "Please put me down on the floor" :D Awwwwww! Using personal pronouns is just so cuddly! :3

I think MadCat will be a fine companion in my travels, and I hope NOT to write more about him, unless things go sour and I'll record my experiences in the blog.

Strangers In The Night

Took forever! I recorded this months ago in Singapore, but only got my example drive unpacked last week. I think the Audio Technica ATR3350 is a great mic for the price, and pairs well with the Zoom H1.

Weekend!

It's the long weekend, and my plans to buy a piano have failed. But whatever, I've got more things I need for my flat - like a lamp - and now I can actually read books at night without hanging out in the mini-kitchen :P

Went over to MoogAudio to pick up a midi controller today, and found that the wall besides their building that was cleaned out has been replaced with new art. Saaaweet!

I also had a package to pick up (on a Sunday!), seems like the post office is open every single day! OMG. I also finally tried the busses today, man they are good, quick and the two buses I took had really friendly drivers.

And after a month in Canada, I finally bought some maple syrup to try :P Has a hint of a smokey flavour, I'm not sure if this is due to the brand, or natural.

My addiction

Yesterday evening was the start of a surprise 3 day long weekend, with next week ALSO another long weekend. Which is nice, as this week has been rather long at work. Headed over to a big music shoppe, Archambault to get the French edition of The Lion King - in the hopes that watching a film that I am very familiar with, I can pick up some of the language.

They have a whole floor, and a large floor at that, dedicated to music and sheet music of all sorts. I was like in heaven. There were so many version of The Well Tempered Clavier in print, as well as beginner versions. The photo above shows one of the many, many display units. This particular one filled with just Bach related pieces. Another section to the right had loads of chopin. ARGH!

Another set of shelves featured loads of music from film and video game music. I seriously had a hard time resisting the urge to pick up the Super Mario piano books, and there were piano pieces from The Piano (Michael Nyman), The Life Of Pi, The Lion King and sooo many others. After much deliberation I set down the Super Mario book.... walked around the corner and BAM this was staring at me in the face. I had to get this. The pieces inside are rather difficult for my level, but I just had to.

Now... I really need to replace my beloved CP33...

Lol power outage.

Just when I was checking out surge protectors, UPSes and line conditioners, the power went out lol. Synchronicity or what? I really want to get brownout protection, UPS? Not so much.

The new pad

I've finally moved in to the new place, and unlike my previous place where it was semi furnished, this one is in the "unfurnished, but with appliances" category. So, apart from a mostly empty room (I got a table and sofa from the previous tenant), I have a stove, fridge and washing machine at my disposal. There is no dryer, so I still need to get a drying rack.

Also, there is no internet >.> It takes over two weeks for the provider I signed up with to get it setup, so I'm typing this over my phone's 3g connection.

One thing I'm really liking about Montreal is the water. It tastes rather good out of the tap, and there doesn't seem to be limescale at all in my toilet.

Power also seems to be an issue in this building. The lights flicker and dim when appliances start up, so I will also need to get a line conditioner for my electronics to deal with the brownouts.

Finally, I still need to get a bed, and found a nice single futon base on craigslist, but I seem to have difficult arranging a time with the current owner. Once that is in the flat, I can get a mattress of sorts, and I think I'm good to go.

Ok, so I still want a piano....

Weekend Move: Fail

So, yesterday I moved most of my belongings into my new place, and decided to call it a day as it was rather late and most of the places I wanted to buy stuff at were closed, so, Sunday then.

Sadly, alot more shops were not even open over the weekend, so decided to just make the best of the day and visit what shops that were open. I decided to head over to Canadian Tire to check out what kind of household stuff they had there, and stopped by the Jean Talon Market as well as Italmelodie, a music shop, on the way there.

Jean Talon seems like a great place... if I could cook :P

Definitely will pick up a cook book to explore shortly, but considering I don't even have a mattress or even a pillow in my new apartment.... :P

 The F1 races are on in Montreal this weekend, and most of St Laurent is just blocked off for partying and this stretch near Little Italy had a whole stretch of cars being displayed.

 Got a few beautiful mustangs out there, didn't shoot those though.

 Dynamic range of the phone cameras are sadly lacking...

Arrived at Canadian Tire but didn't see much I wanted, so headed off downtown to get some crockery for the kitchen. Probably need to head out and lunch time to buy a saucepan and kettle and I should be sorted for that aspect of the house.

Irish Sessions in Montreal

Was going through some of my older youtube videos and got reminded about the number of Irish whistles I brought along with me :P Promptly googled and found this hit, Siamsa (Irish for "pleasant music diversion, according to the site!)

Looks like something to add to my to do list :3

Unity + Playmaker

I got Playmaker months ago, but finally found time to figure out how it works. I think it's great, decreases the time required to prototype stuff. Looking forward to using it.

And.... seems like there are street pianos in Montreal :3 Can't wait to get my paws on this beauty tomorrow after work :3

Korg AW2+ Quick Review

Got a Korg AW2+ tuner today, an upgrade from my really old Casio. The casio is great for wind instruments, but it takes awhile to lock on a pitch, and does not work well with strings. Hence, the AW2+. There is an AW2 model available, but that is for instruments with concert tuning only. The AW2+ has additional settings for transposing instruments, perfect for sax, french horns etc.

It can pick up the tuning using either the piezo pickup or mic, has several back lighting options, as well as a feature for changing the reference A frequency. A bit pricey ($32!), but I believe it will be a good long term investment. My other Korg metronome is still kicking butt.

Here's a random underexposed photo of the sky:

Nexus 4 and Unity 3d

So, this weekend I picked up a micro sim -> mini sim adaptor in the hopes that I could use my Xperia Ray here in Canada. Initially, it worked and seems to be fine, but after I could not access any data related options (google maps!), I did some reading and found out about data bands vs voice bands.

Evidently, the phone does not support the data bands here in Canada, but voice is fine. So, boo. The Xperia Ray felt so good in my pocket, i.e. can't really feel it. I was also looking forward to not charging my mobile every 4 days or so. I've found that disabling every friggin' thing on the Nexus 4 really improves its battery life but I digress.

Being rather free tonight, I decided to try out Unity3D with the Nexus 4. I had some minor hurdles, which was mainly not knowing where to find the USB Debug Mode on the phone. Evidently, it is hidden away, and googling will get you the answers.

Things proceeded quite smoothly after getting debug mode enabled, and I had no issues running a test apk on the phone. I must say, the display is simply glorious, the Unity logo, as well as my test cube and sphere were very nice and sharp.

I think I will definitely look around for a smaller sized, less power sucking android phone shortly, and leave the Nexus 4 for fun with unity, or when I have a need for high powered google maps usage again.

Speaking of Android.... my Kindle Fire has developed some kind of illness... it runs excruciatingly slow, and it seems like I'm not the only one experiencing this issue >.>

I have no idea what could have caused it, as I do not install "apps" and only download into it the music I buy off amazon. Grrr..... when I get more settled in I'll look into doing a reset to see if it helps. And also, figure out what to do with a UK Kindle in Canada....

Xprotolab Portable Oscilloscope

Had this appear today! Woo! At the moment, I don't have my belongings with me so not much things I can do with it. Here's a few things I could comment about it. The build quality is very good, and the buttons are very responsive to input.

And it is tiny.

The included protective case fits all the cables perfectly.

Here's all the stuff inside the case. I actually forgot to take out the 3.5mm -> BNC connector, so it's not in the photo :-/

Random glamour shot :P Shoulda taken the screen protector off.

Given that I have no signals to test against, it was very nice that the two analog inputs have a loopback to the signal generator. Here, we have a beaaaautiful 1khz sin wave being displayed.

The interface in generally seems quite intuitive, though I had to spend a quick moment going through the manual to figure out how to change the time (horizontal) scale. The manual has a flowchart of how the various functions work, that was a massive help. Hopefully life will settle down to routine in the next month or so.

So many idea, only one wolf.

#filing this under arduino since this is going to be for use with the arduino.

Saturday stuff.

So, continuing from this morning's post, I headed over to HSBC to ask about their cards. Evidently it is only useful for withdrawals at atms and for interac..... ok, I'll need to figure that out.

Explored a bit more of the underground city, all the way up to Guy Concordia Metro. Found a games workshop here, woo!

Which is pretty awesome as they've got a new Space Wolves book out, which I didn't want to buy in Singapore. Also checked out some jeans, Old Navy's range started from just a touch under 20, and levi's were a touch under 100. Not bad.

After that, went over to check out another apartment. Hopefully I can get it, but there are at least 6 other people who want to rent that place, whilst I was there, with probably after me. Sigh. Decided to have a late lunch at A&W (again!).

I love the fries they got, skin on chips in a cute little basket :D

Soooooo need to find a place fast >.>

Grah, what is this card?!

Due to some snafus, I got my bank card about a week in after I landed in Montreal. Supposed to have got it in Singapore. Whatever.

But I've never really had to use the bank card until Thursday evening when I attempted to buy a Metro ticket. And got refused. I was like... ok, perhaps I got the pin incorrect. After checking, I went to an atm (the atm I visited charged a $2 transaction fee... culture shock, yes!) and it worked fine.

Trying again at the Metro ticketing station, no go. I also tried at one of the Metro supermarkets, no go there as well :-/

From the signs on the Metro vending machine, the debit cards accepted there appear to have the visa symbols, whereas mine does not (HSBC canada). Annoying, but not the end of the world. New country, new things to adapt to.

Still hunting for a place, it's like places that appear on craigslist/kijiji dissapear almost as fast as they are posted, and only the really high end expensive and lower priced student lodging is available. Doesn't help that all I want is just a studio or at max, a 1 bed place. Couples have it easier, as there are much more 2 bedroom (and larger) apartments around.

Going to hsbc right now to check about this card I have, then hopefully those emails I've sent out for places to visit will be replied and I can check out a few more places today. GAH!

Oh, here's a piano re-used as some sort of horticulture experiment.

Blargh: Random posting.

So, things have been going swimmingly, in general. One little hitch was my apartment. I had an agreement with the tenants to pay the rent when I got my keys (which was supposed to be today...). However, on Thursday evening, I received a text that because I didn't put a deposit, the apartment will now not be rented out. I was like... what?! This wasn't our agreement at all!

So, I'm back in the house hunting mode again. Sigh. Will probably be heading out shortly to troll the neighborhoods on foot. Oh, here's a random ice cream shoppe photo.

Also have been using the Nexus 4 for the past two weeks, and I have a love-hate relationship with it. First, the screen is awesome. The response of the phone is also amazing. Battery life is poor, but with my usage needs, it is actually not too bad. I'd say with my needs, I'd easily go 3-4 days between charges - unlike my 2g iphone which gets over a week!

Now what I really do not like is actually the size of the phone. When making phone calls, I really need two hands to use it. I can't for example whilst making a call, use just my right hand to hit the icon that brings up the numeric touchpad. I mean sure, I could, but it makes the phone really wobbly.

Also, whilst in the phone mode, attempting to switch between the phone, call log and contacts is simply not possible with my genetic makeup. Ok, so I can reach the call log button with a little stretch but the phone button (located at the very very top left of the screen)? Not with my hand.

Once life settles down a bit more, I'm probably going to just sell the Nexus 4. Picking up my Xperia Ray, it just fits so well in one hand. It also helps that I prefer the Xperia Ray's camera. Will miss the Nexus 4's photosphere though. Maybe there is an iphone sized android 4 phone out there, I dunno. Or I could do what some of my photographer friends do. Buy an iphone.

EDIT: One other niggle that bothers me, the on/off switch is located by the right side of the Nexus 4. So when pressing it, I tend to have to press against the left side of the phone, which, so conveniently, the volume buttons are at. Causing the volume controls to appear onscreen. Consider this against the Xperia and iphone 2g which have it on the top, and friction from the phone being held on both sides is enough to support the button pressing.

Montreal: Jours Six

Didn't do much today... stressing out about the apartment. Did go out to check out other parts of the Plateau though, and went to Schwartz's for lunch. It's the most famous smoked meat place in Montreal. But first, random street art:

 Schwartz's was very packed when I arrived, I think this was close to 4pm.

 They got a few options for the meat, lean, medium and fat.

Pretty tasty! Will be trying to visit another place for Poutine tomorrow.

Montreal: Cinq jours

Again, another day of nothing. Wanted to go out, but I had to wait for some kinda apartment inspection, so occupied myself doing french language tutorials. After, I went out to old montreal.First stop was at the Notre-Dame Basilica.

I must say I do enjoy the Nexus 4's photo sphere camera. Yet, the more I use this phone, the more shortcomings of the camera application surfaces, like the lack of an option to be quiet when taking photos. Anyways, you can tell I'm not a fan of new tech (at times). Passing on from the Basilica, I headed down to the Old Port.

And there was this beautiful sight of the 1976 Olympic Village.

Towards the end of the port were an interesting music instrument made from an abandoned grain silo, aptly named the Silophone. Tried it, didn't seem to work.

After this, I was feeling hungry, so went off to Chinatown to get some bread. But it was very packed, nixed that. Went to get food at the food courts, but didn't know what to eat. Decided to just head to the grocery store and nom on stuff I got there.

Montreal: Day Quatre

So, nothing much on today, decided to explore the area around Chinatown a bit more.

Waaay more packed over the weekend.

Got a new camera app for the phone, "camzoom fx". I'm in two minds over it. I don't see an exposure compensation control........ the borders and fx are really fun though.

Found one of the bigger chinese supermarkets.

Some of my personal staples aren't as cheap as I thought.

There was a protest against Employment Insurance going on. Decided to pop into a shopping centre to avoid the crowds.

There are lots of food courts (what are they called here?) underground, easily rivaling Singapore.

Had poutine for lunch again. I was recommended to visit LaBanquise. Probably tomorrow :3

Here's a photo of Play Des Arts Metro.

Decided to head home then. Need to catch up on my french studies!