Singapore has a rather high mobile phone penetration rate of 137.4% as of Dec 2009.  Of course, this is nothing compared to places such as the UAE, which stands at 193.5 percent, followed by Saudi Arabia with a rate of 165.5 percent.  Well, I was reminded of the statistics again a couple of weeks ago, and so I decided on impulse to do a count of the number of smartphones lying around in my house and realized… that I beat the national average by a wide margin.

I decided to do a roll call and assembled the smartphones for a family portrait.  From left (Top row): HTC Tilt2, BlackBerry Curve. (Bottom row): BlackBerry Bold 9000, Apple iPhone 3GS, Prototype Samsung Galaxy S, Samsung Wave S8500.

Absent with apologies: My wife’s BlackBerry Bold 9000 and Nokia E65, as well as an iMate Ultimate which I gave away last month.

Final tally of the mobile phone penetration in my house at the time the photo was taken: 400%.

Anyway, the prototype Samsung Galaxy S has since been returned to Samsung Singapore; though an iPad Wi-Fi + 3G has since been added to the lineup…

Interesting Note: With the exception on the BlackBerry Bold and BlackBerry Curve, all the phones in the photo runs on different operating systems (BlackBerry OS, Android, Apple iOS, Samsung’s Bada, Microsoft’s Windows Mobile)

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1. My workstation

If you’ve ever wondered how my workstation looks like, above is a photo  of my desktop taken a few months ago.  As you can see, I am a firm believer on how a multi-monitor setup can increase productivity; you can read Increase Your Productivity with an Additional Monitor for more about what I have to say on this topic. And yes, Bill Gates is also known to use three monitors.

There are other hardware that makes up my workstation, though not everything can be seen here – I’ve listed them below instead.

• 2x Samsung P2350 – 23″ LCD monitors @ 1920 x 1080 resolution
• Samsung 223BW 22″ LCD monitor @ 1680 x 1050 resolution
• Ergotron LX Dual side-by-side arm (Review)
• Ergotron LX Desk Mount LCD arm
• Matrox TripleHead2Go Digital operating in dual output configuration (Review)
• Apple Wireless Keyboard (3 battery version) (Review)
• Microsoft Wireless Mobile Mouse 4000 (BlueTrack sensor, nano transceiver) (Mention)
• DisplayLink USB to DVI adapter
• Andrea NC-181 Headset with Noise-canceling Microphone
• Logitech USB 2.0 Hub (with AC adapter)

And anchoring the entire workstation would be my (almost) two-years-old Sony Z series VGN-Z16GN which is 13.1″ @ 1600 x 900 resolution that has been revved up with a Samsung PB22-J MLC 128GB solid state drive (SSD). (Review)  Sony Singapore declined to assist or offer advice on swapping out the pre-installed 4,200 rpm HDD, I did it myself. (Upgrading the HDD involves dismantling part of the laptop)

Check out the harrowing installation process with photos here.

Moving on, the network side of things are powered by the following hardware:

• Linksys WRT310N (802.11 b/g/n in 2.4GHz or 5.0GHz, 5-port gigabit Ethernet ports)
• Linksys WRE54G Wireless-G Range Expander (Review)
• Samsung SCX-4623F Multifunctional Printer (Print, Scan, Copy, Fax)
• IOGEAR USB 2.0 Multi-Function Print and Storage Server (Review)
• Synology DS210+ NAS Server (Mention, Pending Review)
• Peplink Balance 380 multi-WAN router (Mention, Pending Review)
• Huawei UMTS Femtocell Access Point (Mention, Not working for me; be returning soon)

At the moment, my Internet service is a 30Mbps cable broadband (2Mbps up) with 6Mbps ADSL (512Kbps up) load-balanced via the Peplink Balance 380. Algorithm used is weighted balance for HTTP (10/3 in favor of cable), persistence for HTTPS and priority to cable for all other traffic.

Finally, for music:

• BlackBerry Bluetooth Music Gateway
• 2x Yamaha HS50M Powered Monitor Speakers

I’ll try to keep this page up-to-date.

Related posts:

1. Increasing the range of my wireless Microsoft Mobile Mouse 4000

I was sent a review unit of the LOK-IT Secure Flash Drive recently, which I wrote about on my SMB blog at ITBusinessEdge.com.  I consider the use of Secure Flash Drives like the LOK-IT or IronKey to be mandatory for all documents and files that are transported via portable storage.

After all, flash drives get stolen, or lost due to carelessness all the time; most of us won’t want strangers or people with potentially malicious intentions looking through our budget spreadsheets or even photos from our last holiday.

I won’t be elaborating more on its functionality here, since I’ve already written about what I like and don’t like of the LOK-IT secure flash drive here. Where the LOK-IT is concerned, there are two versions of the drive, one with a built-in 5-key PIN-pad and a slightly more expensive unit with a 10-key PIN-pad.

However, there don’t seem many photos of the LOK-IT on the web so far, perhaps due to its relatively recent arrival. To help users along, I’ve posted a few photos of the LOK-IT below, as well as a short video clip of me performing unlock of the device.

No related posts.

Just came back from a trip from the office of Fusion Garage, the Singapore company that created the JooJoo tablet.  I spent some time using the device (It’s exactly the same as the one demo’ed in December 2009) and also spoke to founder and CEO Mr. Chandrasekar Rathakrishnan about the JooJoo.

Now that we are nearer its launch, I was able to confirm some key information (Production has started) pertaining to the final hardware (USB port stays).  I also quizzed Chandra on his take about the Apple iPad, and if Fusion Garage will be modifying its pricing (no)  in the wake of its unveiling.

I’ll post the rest of the details shortly in the full write-up.

Update: Write-up is now live on Ars Technica.  JooJoo maker: iPad won’t crowd us out of tablet space

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1. Fusion Garage JooJoo tablet versus the Apple iPad
2. JooJoo Internet tablet now shipping

Last week, the tech world waited with bated breath as the Apple iPad tablet was finally unveiled at a media event put together just for this purpose.  By now, you have probably committed its hardware specifications to heart; such is the sheer volume of related news reports.  As @Alvin_Yap tweeted, “Wonders why there are is little tech news these 2 days. Oh! Cos all talking bout iPad”

Watching anxiously from the sidelines are the folks from Fusion Garage, though for very different reasons.  A Singapore company, Fusion Garage has demonstrated a touch screen tablet called the JooJoo just two months ago in December 2009.  Built from the ground up as a tablet for browsing the Web, the JooJoo bears striking resemblance to the iPad.

With the same price point as an entry-level iPad however, a collision with juggernaut Apple appears inevitable.  Indeed, the ability for the JooJoo to generate sales could well be severely impaired to crippled, given that the iPad has far more capabilities.

And this is on top of legal troubles from a botched partnership with Michael Arrington of TechCrunch.  (As I write this, I received an e-mail from Fusion Garage that the company has filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit) On whether approaching TechCrunch in the first place was a mistake though, a VC friend of mine noted: “It’s better than no publicity at all.”

For today however, the more pertinent question is actually: Will the JooJoo be dead on arrival?

I’ll have the chance to speak with Fusion Garage founder and company CEO Chandrasekar Rathakrishnan tomorrow about the JooJoo, courtesy of an interview opportunity that was scheduled earlier.  I’m excited to see the completed software on the JooJoo, which Gizmodo says was only 75 percent complete in December.

More importantly, it’ll be a week since the iPad was announced, and it would be a fantastic opportunity to hear what Fusion Garage has planned to compete with the iPad.

More pictures below

Related posts:

1. JooJoo is in production and will ship by end-Feb
2. JooJoo Internet tablet now shipping