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It’s 30th January 2007, and as scheduled, Microsoft Windows Vista and Microsoft Office System 2007 has been released for sale in 70 countries. ActiveWin has comprehensive 72-pages, 200+ screen shots review of Microsoft Windows Vista Ultimate if you want to know and ins and outs of this new operating system that hundreds of millions of people (maybe including you :)) will be using for the next couple of years. There have been midnight sales in many shops around the world, and many people have been getting a new machine with Windows Vista pre-installed.

Depending on your needs, there are many editions available to you, but many of us home users will be interested only in either Windows Vista Home Premium or all-in-one expensive Windows Vista Ultimate (I’m using this one). You will not likely to get Windows Vista Business, nor can you get Windows Vista Enterprise, and unless you bought your machine back in 2002, you would like to forget about Windows Vista Home Basic as well. I would recommend Windows Vista Home Premium for many of us, it has things more than enough for home users, and get Windows Vista Ultimate if you have enough cash to splash out. CNET has the comparison on four Windows Vista editions, and it’s a useful resource to see which edition suits you best

I have been using Windows Vista since its release to businesses back in November 2006, and I’m happy to say that I would not like to go back to Windows XP ever All hardware and software, including games, that I installed have been working perfectly fine in Vista. Just a quick peep into my Programs and Features control panel, I see Adobe Reader 8, BlogJet, Flickr Uploadr, Google Earth, IE7pro, Java Runtime 6, K-Lite Mega Codec Pack, Messenger Plus Live, Microsoft Office 2007, Firefox 2, Picasa 2, Trillian, Windows Live Messenger, Windows Mobile Device Center, Winzip, and Yahoo Messenger. hooahhh… that’s a mouthful.

Windows Vista and Microsoft Office launch in New York

In Windows Vista, there’s a new tool called Reliability and Performance Monitor where you can monitor how your Windows Vista performs over time, with software installs, uninstalled, drivers update, application and system crashes, so on and so on. Like school time, clean machine started with a score index of 10. Everytime something nasty happens to your machine, the index drops. If you use your machine for one full day without any crashes, etc, the index gains slightly. After so many months of using Windows Vista, my index has been going through its ups and downs, like stock market :p to finally reach the current index of 8.43, quite a decent score From the looks of it, it has been a peaceful one week for me without any crashes. Wished my investments can also perform like that hahaha… :p All-in-all, highly recommended!!!

My Reliability Index over time, since I installed it on 18th Nov 2006 until today

For those who understand Bahasa Indonesia, read this post first, then this similar post. At work, it has been a positive start to my 2007, but off work, it has been quite the opposite. I have struggled a lot for the past few days on why, who’s fault, what should and could have been. I prayed and prayed, consulted friends, read blogs, listened to sermons, etc, and finally I think I have my answer. In short, I have not been putting God as my first and outmost priority. I have put myself, my will, my wish, what I wanted before God. I have been selfish, so selfish and so blind that I failed to see the truth. In theory, I always said that God is number one, the rest are after that, but in practice, I have finally realized that it has not been that way. Argue as much as I like, reason as much as I want, when all has dawned, the feeling of losing has sinked in, I honestly realized that I have put myself as more important than God himself. I’m sorry God, help me to change.

When I chose another meeting instead of attending prayer meeting, God has “slapped” me once again. I believe God is teaching me to obey Him to put Him first, for He said “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. (Matthew 6:33)” When God gave me the feeling of losing, pain, they all are for my own good. It hurts, but I have to learn to accept defeat this time, that I have to step back, re-prioritize my life again, before I am allowed to move forward in this aspect. For now, it seems like it’s over. Not what I wanted, but maybe what I need at the moment, because we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose (Romans 8:2 . I was deep down very low in morale, self-belief, and possibly faith, when everything in life seems like going against me, these three songs are what brought me back from the “dead”, and I firmly believe that God “sent” these songs to me that day to get His message across.

Started with encouragement song by Point of Grace, titled Jesus will still be there, the lyric started with: “Things change, plans fail, you look for love on a grander scale. Storms rise, Hopes fade, and you place your bets on another day. When the going gets tough, when the ride’s too rough, when you’re just not sure enough, Jesus will still be there.” Full lyric here.

Followed by another encouragement song Trust His Heart from Cynthia Clawson says: “All things works for our good, though sometimes we can’t see how they could. Struggle that breaks our heart in two, sometimes blind us to the truth. Our Father knows what’s best for us. His ways are not our own, so when your pathway grows dim and you just can’t see Him, remember you’re never alone. God is too wise to be mistaken, God is too good to be unkind, …“

Finally, God wants me to finally accept defeat and admit that God knows better than me through You know better than I by David Campbell. “I thought I did what’s right. I thought I had the answer. I thought I chose the surest road, but that road brought me here. So I put up a fight, and told you how to help me. Now just when I have given up, the truth is coming clear, You know better than I. You know the way. I’ve let go the need to know why, for You know better than I. If this is has been a test, I cannot see the reason, but maybe knowing I don’t know is part of getting through. I tried to do what’s best, and faith has made it easy, to see the best thing I can do is to put my trust in You.“

How amazing how three songs could bring me back from my sorrow, self-pity condition back to the real me. I thank God for it, now I know that all my effort to hush and push are in vain, now I need to learn to surrender my life in His control, because He knows what’s best, keeping faith to trust and believe that whatever happens now and in the future, I will try not to worry anymore, because all things works for our good. Now? Let it go. All I wanted will be back in time, but put God first, and the rest, in His grace, will follow when the time is right. Thanks and Glory be to God!!!

I wanted to post about my 2007 resolutions, I wanted to post about many things, but just find it hard lately to find the time to type all those thoughts into writings in my blog. It has been a very busy start to my 2007, especially this week and next week will be very packed, days and weeks, morning, afternoon, evenings, weekdays and weekends, both on and off work. Things should get better come February, I hope, *fingers crossed*

For some worth reading blog post (according to the author :p), read this blog post about happiness

Yeah yeah yeah, I know it’s late, but here are some shots from the happening around New Year 2007 for me and many groups of friends As you can see, it revolves around eating, eating, and eating :p

The dinner on 31 December was spent in Thai Express in Tiong Bahru Plaza

Followed by card games, drinks, and countdown after that (at my home)

The next morning was a lunch together church friends in Glendale Park

Some ship In Vivo City

Sometimes, it’s wrong to walk away
Though you think it’s over
Knowing, there’s so much more to say
Wishing there’s a way to I’m sorry

It’s the news of the day, and in case you are living under the rocks today, here’s iPhone from Apple, which mainly combines a phone with iPod.

Pros:
- It’s DEFINITELY a cool-looking phone.
- 3.5 inch 480×320 touchscreen display
- 4GB or 8GB of flash memory storage
- Google Maps, Safari, iTunes with CoverFlow built-in
- It’s a video iPod with the largest screen to date
- Orientation sensor that allows it to show the interface in portrait or landscape, depending on how you are holding it
- Proximity sensor. When you put the phone to your face when you’re on call, it’ll turn off the screen to save battery and “lock” the screen to prevent accidental touches
- Light sensor to auto adjust screen brightness depending on environtment ambience
- 2 megapixel camera
- Bluetooth 2.0
- WiFi
- oh yeah, it can make phone call and SMS too :p

Cons:
- Non-removable battery that lasts only 5 hours
- Non-3G phone
- Camera megapixel could have been higher. C’mon, 2MP camera-phone is so 2006
- No expandable memory, although with 4GB or 8GB, I doubt one will ever need additional memory card
- On two year contract, US$499 for 4GB and US$599 for 8GB version. Expect it to be above S$1K when it launches in Singapore in 2008. If only they managed to release this in time for Christmas 2007, it’ll probably be selling like hot cakes.

Can be pros, can be cons:
- Touch-sensitive controls, only one button for the whole phone. If it works well, it’ll be one of the best user-interface ever. If it doesn’t work well, like using my finger to smudge my screens and not getting the accuracy I want with my Windows Mobile, it’ll be a failure.
- I don’t know, but I’m feeling I’ll have to wipe my screen every now and then to remove all those fingerprints on the screen.

Amongst all the hype, this is the first phone which could make me drooling again over a new phone after my current Sony Ericsson K800i. I admit, it’s that cool Browse Apple iPhone product page to get some demos on the phone (QuickTime required)

Is it too early for me to start my Christmas 2007 wish-list now?
1. Apple iPhone

Read: Apple iPhone product page