Google Lunar X PRIZE

Google together with X PRIZE Foundation offer $30 million to privately funded teams that can land a spacecraft on the moon. Grand prize $20 million will be awarded to the first team that successfully land a spacecraft on the moon & capable to rove the moon surface for minimum 500 meters and send video, images and data(1GB required) back to the Earth. Second prize $5 million will be given to the next team that completed the mission. Besides, bonus prize of $5 million will be awarded to the team that can complete the additional tasks. Google Lunar X PRIZE is open to all organizations around the world, anyone can participate in this competition. This is what Google and X Prize called Moon 2.0, the second era of lunar exploration.
Check out this video!

Microsoft Tech•Ed SEA 2007 in KLCC

This year Tech•Ed SEA was mostly about Visual Studio Team System, SharePoint products and technologies, SQL Server, .NET, Silverlight, Expression Studio, WPF(Windows Presentation Foundation), WCF(Windows Communication Foundation), WWF(Windows Workflow Foundation), XNA, LINQ, System Center 2007, Office Communication Server 2007, VSTO, ASP.NET, AJAX, Open XML, Windows Live, Security, Forefront, Cardspace, Office 2007, Vista and Microsoft next trio releases - Visual Studio 2008, SQL Server 2008, Windows Server 2008 that across all the 7 tracks(WIN, DEV, EDM, OFC, ARC, SYS, WEB/UX) and 4 instructor led labs(IT Pro, DEV, .NET U, Hands on Lab).
There were also a lot of activities like Live Fest, guess my price contest, twin tower building contest, PC Games, Women In Technology, Sumorobot clinic and competition...

Some shots from the event:

Keynote session

The exhibition hall

One of the track session

Dinner served along the foyer on the first day

.Net University lab - too small...

Slides and manuals download at the Internet Cafe

One year earlier...

Collect the bot plans and build

Meet the .Net Bot after 100 minutes of hardwork

Adobe Creative Suite 3 Master Collection Free Trial DVD

I finally received the free trial DVD of Adobe CS3 Master Collection that requested about a month ago. The package is included with 3 DVDs which is Adobe CS3 Master Collection , Adobe Ultra CS3 and Adobe OnLocation CS3.















See what is inside the CS3 Master Collection disc, it is really a "master" collection!
It includes:
Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional, Adobe After Effects CS3 Professional, Adobe Contribute CS3, Adobe Dreamweaver CS3, Adobe Encore CS3, Adobe Encore CS3 Codecs, Adobe Fireworks CS3, Adobe Flash CS3 Professional, Adobe Flash Video Encoder, Adobe Illustrator CS3, Adobe InDesign CS3, Adobe Photoshop CS3 Extended, Adobe Premiere Pro CS3, Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 Functional Content, Adobe Premiere Pro CS3 Third Party Content, Adobe Soundbooth CS3, Adobe Soundbooth CS3 Codecs, Adobe Version Cue CS3 Server












- Installation













- 1GB of RAM is required for some of the applications in the collection

Full installation will consumes around 7.9GB of the harddisk space, and installation will take age to complete if full installation is performed. I think I will need some time to try out all the new products.

Windows Live Hotmail Upgrades

Microsoft is upgrading Hotmail, one of the changes is the mailbox storage, increases from 2GB to 5GB for free users.

Besides that, other upgrades are:
- upgrades in performance and quality of services
- increase the time of junk mail and deleted items stay in mailbox
- show blocked content with single click
- contacts de-duplication feature -- prevent duplicate contacts
- phishing reporting feature
- able to forward mail from Hotmail account to other accounts
- option to turn off the Today page(MSN News)
- cobranded e-mail for organizations who uses Hotmail e-mail hosting
- auto vacation replies
- right-to-left languages support
- more space with smaller header
Read full story

Microsoft upgrades on Hotmail service keep it strong in webmail competition, with storage ahead of Google Gmail(2.8GB), but Yahoo still offering the most with unlimited storage.

I have several Hotmail accounts, one of it still is MSN Hotmail, just upgraded it to Windows Live Hotmail, and it is now 5GB and implemented with the new upgrades, but my existing Windows Live Hotmail still remains at 2GB with no new features.
Anybody has see the upgrades?

Microsoft Tech•Ed SEA 2007

Microsoft Tech•Ed SEA 2007, one of the largest event in the year will be held at KL Convention Center for 4 days start from 10th to 13th September. The event is Microsoft's premier and largest annual conference in South East Asia(as stated Tech-Ed "SEA"), focuses on current and upcoming soon-to-be-released Microsoft products.

In this event, you get to learn about the latest products based on Microsoft technology in 100+ breakout sessions that based on 6 core technical tracks, and get hands-on experiences with the latest products from Microsoft and its partners. It is a good opportunity to learn from technical experts, hear from Microsoft's product team, listen to industry gurus, networking with peers, and enjoy food and drink in the event.

Check out new products like Windows Vista, the 2007 Microsoft Office System, Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, Microsoft System Center Operations Manager 2007, Windows Server code name "Longhorn", ASP.NET AJAX, Visual Studio 2008, Silverlight and more...











After "Change Your Destiny" last year,
"Prepare to make your mark" this year







Tech•Ed SEA 2007 promotions (Original price:RM1299):
-Register by 15th August save RM400 and stand a chance to attend Visual Studio Live! or Tech•Ed Europe
-Register in a group of 5 or more save RM100 for each person

The event is open to trade visitors for free on day 2 & day 3 from 2pm to 6pm.
Is there anyway to get into Tech•Ed for free? You can work as a part of the event, e.g. PC setup, event assistant, ... or become a journalist, Microsoft Student Partner, ... and ...

PIKOM PC Fair (II) 2007

It was PC Fair again in KL Convention Center. Snapped some pictures and bought nothing...
Nothing much special in this PC fair, however PC.com and HWM offered great deal, first 100 subscriptions of their magazine came with DVD burner/bluetooth headset/wireless USB adapter...(PC.com), Altec Lansing speaker(HWM), plus dice roll(HWM) and wheel of fortune(PC.com). Kingston continued their anniversary redemption(phone strap & bag), and grand prizes were iPod Video, cellphone, watch and thumbdrive. Besides, Dell's offers also not bad.


- This thing looks familiar - see PC Fair (I)


- MSI Core 2 Quad and Core 2 Extreme mainboards


- Sony spent on double-storey booth
Blue-ray, Cyber-shot, VAIO, PSP, ...


- NEC - Nice Emitting Colour


- ASUS thermal solution for processor


- Big cooler small processor


- Toshiba lovely booth


- Front colour displays of Dell new Inspiron


- PC.com filled up their booth space with a truck

Quite disappointed with this PC Fair, price high, no freebies, no attractive promotions, and less beautiful "eyecandy".
Some eyecandy :
pic1-by Fattien
pic2-by Fattien
pic3-by chowchrist
pic4