EDIT: P16,000 for the ASUS eee

Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at November 30th, 2007

* There has been a price drop in the ASUS eee. It now costs P16,000.00.

Hello ASUS eee. You’re finally here in the Philippines. Your proud owner allowed me to fiddle around with your real estate for the better part of the evening and here are some of the notes I took down:

• P17,000.00 flat for the mini laptop. The eee runs on a 533MHz processor with 4GB of hard disk space and 512MB of RAM. If you add P1,200.00, you get the RAM bumped up to 1GB
• Available colors are in white, black, pink and light blue
• Mouse buttons are a bit hard to press and the mouse pad is a little small
• Ultra light and ultra small

The best thing about the eee is that it doesn’t feel cheap for P17,000.00. The elegant exterior reminds me of my black MacBook and it comes packed with everything that makes a laptop a great blogging machine. For less than P20,000.00 you get a portable computer with a mic, webcam (with recording capability), WiFi, three USB ports and a SD/MMC card reader. It comes built in with Google Docs, Open Office, Mozilla Firefox 2 and a bunch of other open source applications like the game Mr. Potato Head.
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Diving at Paradise Island, Davao City

Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at October 29th, 2007

Diving. Unlike basketball, football, volleyball and badminton, where winning is defined by the number of points your team scores by the end of the game, the objective of diving is different: don’t die.

We went diving over the weekend at the Paradise Island, a good 15 minute drive from Davao City, and though it may not be the best diving spot in Davao, it was still an experience. I’m hooked. We weren’t too adventurous as 20 feet deep was the most we went. I think Anton Sheker is planning a dive soon. Stay tuned.

More photos after the jump.
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Ingress at the Mindanao Blogger Summit

Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at October 27th, 2007

Spent the night at the NCCC mall for the ingress of the Mindanao Bloggers Summit. The evening was summarized by a lot of eating, Nintendo DS and moving stuff around.

Big day tomorrow!

Four Tips to Buying a Gadget Bag

Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at October 3rd, 2007

As a general rule, buy a bag that’s 10% the cost of what’s inside
Have you ever wondered how much a bag should cost? Well, take the total cost of the gear you plan to put inside and get 10% of that. The formula works for most (read: not all!) cases: my Crumpler Whickey and Cox costs close to P10,000.00 and holds about P100,000 worth of gadgets including my MacBook and camera. A hefty bag price should only mean that your gear fits comfortably inside, likewise both your hands are still free.

In the case of laptop sleeves, a good sleeve should not cost you more than P2,000.00 or $40.00. In fact, one of the best laptop sleeves ever invented retails for only P1,500.00: this is the Zero Shock Laptop Sleeve. You can literally drop a bowling ball on top of the memory foam and your notebook will still function afterwards. *
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Malaysia, Truly Asia: KLCC Aquaria!

Posted by Jayvee Fernandez at September 5th, 2007

Click on the photo for bigger version

The KLCC Aquaria
Price: 38 RM for tourists
Feeding time: Mondays, Wednesdays, Saturdays 3:00 PM

This was a lucky long shot – to come during feeding time! If you plan to drop by the Aquaria, it would be best to go on a weekday (Monday or Wednesday) at around 2:00 PM so that by the time you reach the sharks, you’ll be treated to a feeding frenzy.

Correct me if I’m wrong but I did hear some rumors that back in the Philippines, plans to construct a “Sea World” type of attraction is currently in the works. The site will be located in the reclamation area and funded by a European company.

Click on the link to view more of my photos of the KLCC Aquaria.