Dhaam Dhoom Movie review

Watched Dhaam Dhoom over the weekend.

With due tributes to the Director of the film, Jeeva (who passed away last year during the film shoot) I have to say, the film is a big disappointment. But for a couple of songs, there isn’t much to look for in the movie. None of the characters stand out or remain in your mind as they just come and go just to fill the reel. I don’t know if the film came out the way Jeeva expected it to in the end, but I am caught classifying the movie. Was that supposed to be Romantic Thriller ? Sorry..

Kangana is just for the songs. Jayam Ravi is pinned as a Doctor just to save himself from the bullet wounds in the middle of the film (it looks like). The Russian mafia look a joke. Jayaram didn’t make the “Thriller” Villain.

Those two words that unfold the thriller -

Shukriya, Dhanyavad..
Thats what I wanna say for reading my rant thus far.

Its GPhone day today

In a few hours from now, Google and T-Mobile will be teaming up to announce the first Google phone (shortly called the G-Phone) to the world. The device is from HTC named HTC Dream powered by Google’s new mobile platform – Android. Though the build up to the event has not been as extravagant as the iPhone, there has been enough buzz and speculations leading up to the event.

Things are only looking good for Android with Chrome, Gears etc. to match the Web experience delivered by Mobile safari of iPhone. The fact that it is an open platform means that third parties can build apps for the phone right away (they already are, I believe) as against getting approval/distribution through Apple and Apple only in the case of iPhone. Though the third party apps are strictly controlled by Apple, developers are lured and get eventually get benefited by the fact that they can earn for their work (for instance, a Steve Demeter has made $250,000 in just a couple of month by distributing his app @ $5 per installation). Not sure what such motivation awaits the G-Phone developers.

As far as the cost is concerned, the G-Phone is also expected to be priced at $199 (same as iPhone 3G) with exclusive  carrier contract (with T-Mobile).

Its going to be iPhone Vs gPhone Vs Blackberry by and large (if M$ sleeps with WinMob for long).. interesting times ahead..

A Trip to my native..

Last weekend, I took a much needed break from the regular work/sleep routine by making a visit to our home town – Mayiladuthurai. It was  a last minute decision to attend the Kumbabishegam (well, what would you call that in English.. hmm.. may be Temple Warming/renovation ceremony) of the temple that is considered to be the place of worship of our Grandfather (and his forefathers). The temple named Panangudi Mariamman Koil is located in Nalladai Village which is about 20 Kilometers from Mayiladuthurai town. My Grandfather hails from a remote village named Koththangudi which is about a Kilometer from the temple.

The best thing about the tour was that the entire generation (even the future one – my 6 month old) of the family got together and had good time apart from taking the blessings of the God.  Once the Kumbabishegam was done, we went to Kothangudi (first time in my life) wanting to catch a sight of the Agraharam and the temples in and around it. Unbelievable to imagine that my forefathers lived there. Infact, a lot of people have migrated to the towns and metros (including ours ).

This site is supposed to be the place where my forefathers lived (there was a house then). Nothing left now, not even the ownership of the land. Infact, out of the 6 odd houses in the Agraharam, just one or two are occupied by Brahmins. The place though is well surrounded by Farm lands and Ponds with more dogs than Human beings (based on what I saw on that day).

And here is our Family in front of the Shiva temple in Kothangudi. We rejoiced worshiping the God by performing the Poojas, Harathi, Naivedhyam etc. ourselves. This was the highlighted of our tour for me. A very brief but satisfying tour overall..

Way to go Hotmail !

I had my first email ID created by one of my friends in Hotmail back during 98-99 time frame. Though it was the first, preferences changed over the next few months. Usa.net, Lycos and Yahoo came into picture and I found my love for all of them.

Emergence of GMail had the other services wanting not just in terms of space but the usability and speed too. After switching to GMail, every other mail service was pushed behind in terms of usage, hotmail probably taking the last seat. I used to wonder even an year back as to how Hotmail is even surviving, given its sluggish and unresponsive user interface in this GMail era. The only reason I check Hotmail today is because I had subscribed to my school egroups using this ID then and I couldn’t get it changed by the moderator (Manda Mahesh are you listening).. ?

That said, it has actually been good to access Hotmail since the last couple of Months. The UI seemed to be highly responsive and the storage space too has increased. I have not used the Calendar and other stuff but the email interface has definitely gotten better. Come to think of it, it has taken an unrealistic time for Microsoft to react to the GMail onslaught. Anyways, better late than Never.

So, way to go Hotmail …

Google Chrome – First impressions

Google Chrome is clean, sleek and quick. The new Javascript engine hasn’t disappointed the web surfers. Given that this is all in the first version, you can only expect it to get better. If there is onething that has left me wanting, it is a MAC version. Now that I alternate between Mac and Windows on a daily basis, I feel the need all the more. While it should just be a matter of time, I hope the wait will be minimal.

From a web developer’s perspective, while I see it as a big win for HTML/Javascript as against Flash or Silverlight, it leaves us with one more browser to contend with. The fact that Chrome is built over Webkit (the same rendering engine used by Apple Safari browser), is definitely a good news as when you support one, the other gets supports automatically (OK, at least to a greater extent from the rendering perspective).

Another important convenience is that the Chrome comes with Gears, pre-installed. This facilitates Web Apps from Zoho and Google  itself to work Offline.

What Next ?

The next big thing to watch our for is the Android version of Chrome. Will it match the iPhone safari ? Will it surpass its performance ? The wait will only be till this month end I guess when T-Mobile will release HTC dream with Android powering it.

Overall its a great step forward from Google in its campaign towards Cloud computing and its Web apps/services. More later..

What it took to buy a new Panasonic SDR-H40 camcorder

For the last couple of weeks, my free time has been quite hectic. Have been spending time doing a lot of research and analysis on the various Camcorders around. The first assignment was to narrow down on the camcorder type – Mini DV, DVD, Hard Disk or Flash Memory types. It was tough. What better resource can you get than today’s Internet. First level investigations revealed that the Quality of video from Mini DV to be better than DVD or HDD based ones where the data gets compressed and stored. But then, Mini DV is waning and I had to find space to carry and store the tapes apart from the recurring costs. DVD seemed to be the best bet given the budget I had (in fact I had to stretch for that too). Then again, the carrying, storing part was there with the recurring costs. I wasn’t comfortable with a mere 30 or 60 minute storage that you can get with a DVD. I wanted to go with the HDD ones but the only thing that was stopping me was the budget.

The SR45 was the least priced in the pack of HDD camcorders from Sony in India costing about Rs.25K. That was way out of my budget (which is around 15K). The DVD ones were costing about Rs.20K. I also checked out the SDR-H40 model in the Panasonic showroom in chennai but again, the cost was out my range (Rs.30K). As with everyone, I was caught between the price and convenience (features).

This was when I heard that one of my colleagues was on a Trip in the US and will be returning back over a week’s time. Not wasting any time, I checked the US websites of Sony and Panasonic for the price of all the above said models. Sony SR45 was costing $450 and Panasonic SDR-H40 was costing $350 (yes, just $350 which translates to around Rs.17K). Decision was made. At least on the day when I saw the prices. After my colleague accepted to buy and get the camcorder for me, I started my comparative analysis. Amazon, CNet and few other sites offered User reviews and Expert reviews. That’s when I stumbled upon the new JVC Everio GZ-MG330 and it got added to the probables list. The user rating for this model was better than either Sony or Panasonic models mentioned above. It was also priced at $350. It was not tough to omit Sony from the race due to the $100 difference in price. The war then was between Panasonic SDR-H40 and JVC MG330. Panasonic won the contest for better features and the service options back here in India.

My friends did suggest The Flip, but that wasn’t going to suit my requirements. And the Panasonic model itself had the option of SD card recording. So, didn’t have to look at the pure Flash memory based camcorders. Another reason to overlook Flash memory based camcorders was that the Optical zoom was quite less (at least in the price range I was looking at)

Key features of the Panasonic SDR-H40 camcorder :
1. Hard Disk Camcorder with 40 GB storage
2. SD card provision for additional storage
3. 42X optical zoom
4. Optical Image stabilization

Overall, it has been a very pleasant experience scouting for the camcorder that best suited me and I hope I won’t be let down by Panasonic. I’ll post a review of my experience with the camcorder over time. For now, I am powering it up to get going !

The Expressive Genius in Shri Kundrakkudi Vaidhyanathan

The passing away of Shri Kundrakkudi Vaidhyanathan did cast a gloom this morning when I read the newspapers. In my school age, his facial gestures brought more fun than music to me. But ever since I grew, I watched him with awe for his musical intellect and his unmatched control over the instrument (Violin). I have never seen him miss out the Thyagaraja Aaradhana festival in Thriuvaiyar (from whatever I saw) year after year. His gestures never fail to convey the subtlest of the pitch changes in his renditions. And we’ll definitely miss him for the early morning Raaga in Televisions on Festive occasions !

May his soul rest in peace !

Mac Book Pro experience

Got a new Mac Book pro at my work place about a fortnight back. Should say, the overall experience till date has been awesome. The Pro book is reasonably power packed, running an Intel processor @ 2.4 GHz wtih 2GB of RAM. The system also boasts a 256 MB NVIDIA graphics card supporting a max resolution of 1440*900. Other prime features of the notebook includes a LED backlit keypad and the Firewire ports.

There were a few things that I didn’t quite like as well. The first and foremost is the number of USB ports – Just 2 of them. Having used Dell at work and at home, I am very used to most of the ports/slots (mainly ethernet and power) at the rear side of the laptops. The Mac Book Pro however is very different in that all the ports/slots are on either side of the notebook. I personally found it clumsy and inconvenient with this arrangement.

The biggest setback for me which I am trying to overcome till date however is the keys and its layout. No Home, End, Insert, Delete, Page Up and Page Down keys – this has crippled my navigation a lot. The re-arranged CTRL, ALT and APPLE keys also add to my typing woes. That said, the keypad has a great touch. It feel really good to type with it. And here are other things that could have been better with this notebook given its price (costed over a Lakh Indian Rupees):

1. The Battery life is around 2:30 Hrs which definitely can be improved (my Dell D610 used to do more than that)
2. The following portions of the notebook heats up a lot on continuous usage – The place between the keypad the laptop edge (where we rest our palm) and more importantly, the portion near the Function keys at the top.

I found the following pre-packaged software very useful with the Mac – The Dictionary and the Stickies app ( there surely should be much more but haven’t explored a lot as yet).

Will post more as I get used to this sleek notebook.