AS a part of Tech2 my column in the Sunday Express, I sometimes try to lay my hands on the latest technology, but this time around, an old technology, that of an iPod dock, but in a new format from Denon, the S52, struck my eye. Here is my review of the Denon S52. To read it online, click here, or buy a copy of the Indian Express, this Sunday, 17th of Feb, 2008, across India.
GS
Asus has done two wonders, one launched the Eee PC and just in time brought it to India, I was thinking of laying my hands on the OLPC to really see what can be done with a stripped down machine, but it was getting impossible to get an OLPC Unit, but I know, what I have to buy now, the Asus eee PC. To read my review, click here or go buy the Print copy of the Indian Express, this Sunday, Feb 10th, 2008, India Wide.
GS
This week I try to answer a very perplexing question for all you lovers of Online Videos. This question has many answers some simple, some complicated but the one that works each time, is here. To read my article, buy the Indian Express, this Sunday 3rd Feb 2008, across India, or click here To read it online.
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Youtube has changed the way we perceive entertainment. The videos on the site are funny, intelligent and wonderful enough to share with friends. But there’s a problem: every time you want to view the videos or show them around, you need to be online. And Internet connections are neither reliable in terms of speed or uptime, nor are they cheap if you are on a pay-per-use plan. So what do you do to download the videos to your PC?
The new iPods, including the iPod Touch, can play these videos, but it’s unlikely you will buy an iPod for that reason alone. Besides, what if you want to watch a video which is not on YouTube, but on Google Video or MySpace, or any of the other video-sharing sites. If you, like me, have faced this problem, here’s a practical solution. And no, you don’t need to spend money on it. Here’s how you can download the videos:
First, you need the Firefox Web browser from Mozilla. If you don’t have it yet, this is one more reason to do so, besides the fact that it is fast and efficient to download. Just go to www.mozilla.com and download it for free. If you already have Firefox, make sure it is Version 2, or just go ahead and download the update.
Once you have the Firefox on your PC, download a tool (or an add-on) called the DownloadHelper. To do so, go to http://tinyurl.com/2zj6z5 and click on the ‘Install Now’ button. A window will pop up, warning you to install softwares that you trust. Don’t worry, there is no virus here. After installation, which should take about a minute, Firefox will have to be restarted. Do so by clicking on the Restart Firefox button.
Once the Firefox has restarted, you are more or less ready. You now need to download a player that will allow you to play the FLV files (YouTube and other flash videos). You can play them on your regular Media Player, but it will require a Codec. I suggest you use a free player like the FLV Player for which you have to open the page in http://tinyurl.com/j54bt. After downloading the player, set it up.
To get the video from YouTube, go to www.youtube.com and browse to the video you want. Once you are on the page that has the video, go to the top of the screen where you will see the three balls of DownloadHelper change from grey to some other colour (see image). Click on the down arrow next to the coloured balls, select the file and download it.
Save it on your desktop or any other folder. Remember that each video file is about 5 MB or more, so it will take time to download. Once this is done, double click on the video and it will open in the FLV player downloaded earlier.
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The Above Article appeared in the Indian Express, on Sunday, Feb 3, 2008
Update on ITR and Updates of Traceroute now show that India is back to a normalised state, but only Monday will tell when the load comes in, right now confirmation from (Our Customers) in the US and in China / Hong Kong / UK confirm that the network has become accessible back at normal speeds.
Though FLAG has not issued any advisory yesterday, but the following Graphs show a much better response time, though Packet loss is still high, and this could be higher utilisation as well as a domino affect on the old data congesting pipes.
1. Traffic Index
2. Response Time
3. Packet Loss
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It's been two days that the connectivity to India is affected. Most of the backup routes are now in place, and traffic has started moving. We are now seeing the Transit time come down to about 350 milliseconds and are still far off from the 270 that is desirable.
In the meanwhile, National News Papers (finally) have woken up to carry the story, links here
Times of India
Hindustan Times
Updates from ITR
1. Traffic Index, it is now reviving and is around 72 for VSNL Gateway at Mumbai
2. Response time is normalizing, and is now becoming faster
3. Packet loss is now reduced to Under 5%, from a peak of 10% it touched.
Update from FLAG
Further to the update below, please see the latest update.
* Currently both SMW4 & Flag cables on atlantic side are cut and hence the traffic between Mumbai & London is affected.
* Capacity in access of 10G is affected due to this outage.
* Restoration plan
IPLC Circuits - Discussions are in advance stage for restoration of these circuits towards London. Efforts are on to make this BW available ASAP. Confirmation is still awaited and exact ETR will be communicated tomorrow.
Internet BW - Additional BW of 1x STM16 for restoration of internet traffic towards pacific is in progress. This BW will help partial restoration of internet services. Due to this limited BW being made available, internet customers may still face higher latency & packet drop. Exact ETR for this BW availability is still awaited.
