Point Element

    We have been struggling with the leaking front fork seals for a while and Pratibha Motors Authorized Service Center didn't have the replacements for about a month. So I searched and found Mulraj Auto Authorized Service Center. Wife took the bike there for servicing. Next day we got the bike back. Actually previously we were looking only for seals replacement, but by the time the bike reached the service center it had covered about 3100KM, so we thought to get the 3rd servicing done.      The bill was INR 430/-. They had tightened the bike. Looking at the engine assembly it looked like it's all opened up and put together. The bike was cleaned, with grease applied to brakes etc. The leaking seals were fixed of course. The idling was tuned a bit and the scooter doesn't stop while idling. But still it idles like a haffing dog!!! I checked it out with a 5km short ride, and I could see the difference in pickup. Maybe they replaced the faulty crankshaft and flywheel. So the bi...

https://www.motorbeam.com/2017/03/bikes/hero-maestro-edge/hero-maestro-edge-recalled-silently-1-5-lakh-units-affected-scoop/ So some news about our Hero Duet. Looks like hero motocorp has fucked it up for good.  We have done about 3000 km till date. And the scooter has become kind of rubbish with leaky suspension and reduced pickup. Probably needs a service. So hearing this news I asked wife to dump it for servicing.  Let's see if the servicing guys fix this turd.  On the positive side - Hero did get some things right. Above 55kmph no vibrations. So good for highway riding. So is stability at high speeds - which may be because of the weight. But still with good suspension it gives you confidence. The light is not enough in night and needs tune-up for proper focus. But we keep on forgetting it every time we give it for servicing. Maybe I'll correct it when I start self-servicing the bike. Oil change and basic engine tune up doesn't look all that difficult.  The seating is no...

Recently I noticed my almost 5Yr old Lenovo G580 laptop which comes with a dual core 2.3GHz Pentium B930 processor, was running hotter than usual. Generally I use my laptop for internet browsing, little bit of office documents and mainly watching movies and TV Serials. So it was not as much bother, but upon looking into it - I noticed with the help of HWMonitor program, that even on idle it's running at about 60 degree celc. This is hotter than average. Two problems I could see was 1. The thermal paste has dried out and become useless, 2. The fan is not kicking in. After going through a number of articles on internet about thermal paste I decided to get the cheaper version abd try it out. Mind you the average ambient temps here are in 35 degree celc range these days, this being summer. So last week I ordered an el cheapo thermal paste for 130 INR, that about $2 - qty is 10gm. Got it yesterday. Went home and after unscrewing a dozen screws and getting nicked here and there, I manage...

My last purchase of Panasonic P75 was a bit puzzling for me when I checked out the soc name and the specs. Point was, the soc was mentioned everywhere as  MT6580. But my previously purchased phone Panasonic T44 also has the same soc. Plus the same specs, but when I used both the phones I could clearly tell which one was faster and which one was slower.  As I saw in daily use Panasonic P75 is definitely faster, smoother etc with same 1GB of RAM, with same soc clock speed of 1.3GHz. So what's wrong? Turns out the soc info for the cheaper phone was incorrect. It has MT6580m soc. This is what's a watered down version of MT6580. And so this is what's causing the difference in performance. Since from what I saw in actual usage - the mt6580 is faster so Android is smoother there as compared to mt6580m which feels only adequate.  Ciao.

One of my test servers was crashing with multiple connections. Digging in I found out that I have used same object for QTcpSocket and disconnect signal was not getting received before getting new connection. So client should send disconnect before connecting on new connection. So digging in client code, I found nothing. Okay. Documentation... Found out there's close() function in unistd.h which can be used to close a socket connection. Okay, made a call to that with socketfd, and voilla! Bug fixed! Server's safe. But going to have to add handling for rogue clients. Adios.

I wanted an entry level android for my mother. Being entry level meant about INR 4000/- of budget. That is about $60. I looked at a number of phones in budget segment, but problem being there was no main-stream brand present here. All I could find was Micromax / Zen / iBall / Intex / Xolo. No Samsung / LG / HTC / Motorola / Lenovo / Xiaomi / Oppo / Vivo etc here. I found couple of old gen ZTE's and one current gen Alcatel ( Pixi 4  - retailing for INR 5000/- ). Not interesting enough. The oddball is Panasonic which offers decent Android phones from INR 3000/-. In fact I use a Panasonic T44 these days as my main driver - bought it for INR 3200/- or about $48. It serves me well with 2500mAh battery and all needed functions. The only thing I miss is IPS LCD, but for me battery anxiety is a thing of past now. Apparently we have too many other things to be worrying about instead of cellphone battery. Haha. Anyway so for me the criteria for the purchase was set. Big battery, decent specs...