I was going to buy an SSD to resurrect my old MacBook, then I ended up buying a new MacBook Pro with crappy 5400 rpm standard drive. FYI, I’m using Seagate Momentus XT 500GB on my old MacBook, it’s a hybrid disk with 4GB MLC SSD for read cache. So, yes, I’m desperate like an old man when using my brand new MBP with standard disk.

SSD is a new kid on the block, so popular, blazingly fast with super limited lifespan. A friend of mine bought a 240GB OCZ Vertex 2 to use with his core i5 MBP, 2 months later (now…) ended up with 20-30MB/s for write speed. Although, it’s still fast on reading, but it was able to write average 250MB/s during the first month! So, I decided won’t go with that direction, and writing this blog right now.

The Good

1. Blazingly fast, nothing can beat this badass in term of writing and reading speed!
2. Fast drive means faster boot time, snappier launch time and less umbrella (on Mac)
3. Much much much less power! I believe Greenpeace will be happy to recommend SSD over mechanical drive!
4. Less power means less heat! Good thing if you’re going to use it with core i7 MBP (it’s already hot from the factory, Intel, do something about it!)
5. Better shock resistant. No moving parts means you can drop the drive without hurting it too much (if you dare to drop your $450 drive!)
6. No mechanical components, mostly silicons, no platter(s) means lighter!

The Bad

SSD is a new kid on the block, just passing it’s ‘toddler’ period and now SSD is on elementary school session. So, yes, it comes with consequences, this is what you’ll barely found at hardware review sites. They simply pretend to not talk about it.

1. Your $450 SSD always come with very short lifespan compared to standard HDD
2. If you choose wrong, you’ll ended up with super un-reliable SSD, data gets corrupted most of the time or even lost!
3. Came with tons of flavors and jargons! From Intel, Samsung, Toshiba, Indilinx, SandForce, SLC, MLC, Enterprise Grade MLC, IOPS and so on… Confuse? Me too… DO YOUR HOMEWORK BEFORE BUY!
4. Most benchmarks are synthetic, and done within hours, not days or months, so you can’t rely on benchmark!
5. In the end, current SSD will ended up as coffee coaster within 2-3 years (depend on your workload).
6. Controller has a very important role in SSD, so, firmware update can brings significant improvement or worse.

Operating System 101

1. Your OS, modern one (Windows XP is not qualified!), does make changes to at least 5K files every time you use it from boot to shutdown (not boot then shutdown)
2. Open 50 pages of websites everyday means at least 10K files has been changed by your OS
3. Write, compile and modify codes everyday means at least 100K files will affected!
4. Listening iTunes does adding more files to change.
5. Downloading 1MB of file doesn’t means you only affect 1MB of your HDD, it’s more than you can imagine!

How To Perform REAL Benchmark on SSD ?

USE IT EVERYDAY AND YOU’LL KNOW WHEN YOUR PRECIOUS SSD WILL DEAD!

REAL WORLD Requirements

1. Heavy I/O operations, I compile codes most of the time, not to mentions download and mail activities.
2. Size DOES matter for me! I love to shoot raw with my DSLR and I love to keep the original and I shoots a lot. It’s useless to use 40GB SSD as boot drive! Your apps will launch faster, but not your data! Opening 500MB of Final Cut Studio project from secondary mechanical drive still be ages to wait!
3. Journalize file system is IMPORTANT for me! I’m not gonna sacrifice my Time Machine and Spotlight feature just for the sake of faster drive! DO NOT sacrifice convenience over small portion of performance! Overall performance is the best!
4. I use Mac, so, idle Garbage Collection feature is important since Mac doesn’t support TRIM and WON’T supporting it not even on Lion Beta! So, I’m not gonna wait for Apple implementing TRIM to migrate to SSD (it would be endless).
5. With heavy workload (let say 20-30GB data changes everyday), you’ll definitely wants your precious SSD to live longer (2-3 years) as a FULL FEATURED HDD not a READ-ONLY HDD!

How To Choose The Right SSD ?

1. Controller is important! Make sure you can easily update the firmware!
2. Warranty is everything! Your drive can ended up as a coaster if the support is bad!
3. FAST != RELIABLE! SandForce based SSD is FAST, however, from my friends experiences, Intel outperform SF-1200 after a month!
4. DO NOT LOOK AT BENCHMARK RESULT! Fast is important, but useless if you can only enjoy it in less than 6 months!
5. Wait for your friend tried SSD, even recommend different controller for each of your friends and see how long those drives ended up to become read-only mode! Cruel, but you certainly don’t want to spent $500 on a crappy SSD.
6. Specs at the label can only be achieved under a very long list of impossible requirements in the real world usage. So, DON’T TRUST IT!
7. You SHOULD NOT choose the wrong path by agreeing to perform low-level format for your SSD every 2 months and so. If you decided to go that direction, then something is wrong with your head! Computer is our slave, not us become a slave of our computer just for the sake of temporary speed performance!

Recommended SSD

Here are list of recommended SSD with its lifespan based on real world experiences. Note, all based on heavy workload that my friends did everyday with their SSD, it can vary for different situations, but you get the picture. I’m gonna say BRO for Before Read Only, where Before Read Only mode means you still can write to your SSD but slower than standard 7200rpm drive can do (means below 30MB/s). All happened in Indonesia, so, warranty maybe different for your country.

1. OCZ Vertex 2 Pro 240GB, lifespan = 2-3 months BRO (OCZ refused to replace the drive with read-only mode)
2. Corsair Force 240GB, lifespan = 4-6 months BRO (Corsair replaced the drive within 2-3 weeks of RMA)
3. Crucial RealSSD 256GB, lifespan = 2 weeks BRO, 3 weeks RO (Crucial won’t replaced the drive with reason user failure, so it’s ended up as a glass coaster at my friend apartment)
4. Intel X-25M G2 160GB, lifespan = >6 months, so far so good.
5. Samsung 470 Series 256GB, lifespan = almost 2 months right now and everything is good (twice faster than Intel X-25M G2)
6. Toshiba 500GB (bought from Apple Store, it’s actually 480GB), lifespan = almost a year and everything is okay, not fast, but it works (warranty only 1 year by default)
7. Patriot Inferno 200GB, lifespan = >4 months, still works, but write speed down to 100MB/s in average, read speed still around 170MB/s
8. OWC Mercury Extreme Pro 480GB, lifespan = almost 4 months now and it still on its first time condition (means perfect)

From that experience, I decided to removed my optical drive on my brand new MBP to go with double drive. I can’t afford $1000 for 500GB SSD, so I decided to buy 256GB Samsung 470 Series through my friend in New York (Samsung has officially inform me that the drive won’t be available outside US). I’m using OWC Data Doubler for my SSD bracket, and keeping my Seagate Momentus XT as reference-data-only storage. Momentus XT has low power compared to other 7200rpm notebook HDD, so in total with my SSD, it has the same power requirements with standard 7200rpm 7200.4 Seagate HDD. You can get the OWC Data Doubler here.

That’s all folks, decide for yourself which one is suit you the best! Once you’re in, you’ll never want to go back to old mechanical drive! Because it’s fast and everything you want for your laptop!

So, yes, I agree with Steve Jobs saying 7″ tablet will be Dead On Arrival.

So, what I’m doing here is based on my daily conversation when I’m talking with those kind of developer regarding what you should ask to them during interview session for hiring a web developer or even Java developer or anything related to web development either enterprise or not.

Question #1

When you enter http://www.wikipedia.com in your web browser, what happened in the back [internet network] so you can view Wikipedia home page?

Smart keywords: HTTP Request & HTTP Response

Average keywords: client, server, web server

Un-necessary keywords: router, IP table with all of inhuman words

Question #2

Is DOCTYPE that important in a HTML page?

Smart answer: YES

Idiotic answer: NO or for some case, YES

Question #3

To send a request, we usually use HTML form, is there any different (programmatically) between Form and Multipart Form?

Smart keywords: Request boundary, ability to send binary data and request parameters

Average answer: Multipart form support file upload, standard form no

Idiotic answer: Both has same functionality or worst, what is Multipart part form? Can you give mean example? (Seriously? You wanna hire this guy?)

Question #4

Which one is the best, XML, JSON or …[what]?

Smart answer: If data structure is complex or data has custom object(s), then XML is good, if it’s simple then JSON is more efficient

Average answer: Depends on client side, JSON is for Javascript, XML for web services

Idiotic answer: What is JSON? or Is JSON part of JQuery? or XML is for Java Beans

Question #5

Talking about web service, which one do you preferred, ReST or SOAP?

Smart answer: SOAP for legacy system, ReST is simpler and more efficient

Average answer: SOAP if you need authentication, ReST if no authentication required (Dude, Google dude! The world is changing!)

Idiotic answer: What is ReST? or What is SOAP? or I got no idea about any of those! or Hmmm, depends on what framework you use! (Seriously, no modern web framework that doesn’t support ReST or SOAP, you’re really need to get out from your cave and see the world! What? Are you an Amish?)

Final Question

What do you think about using open source libraries on your project? Don’t you think it felt cheap that’ll make you less developer?

Smart answer: NO, my life is better and it make me feel joyful to finish the work faster and have time to enjoy a cup of coffee at Starbucks every afternoon! (Hire this guy! You want it! Seriously!)

Average answer: Yeah, for some module, I preferred to code by myself since I love sitting in my desk and coding. Or, Yeah, I simply don’t trust other developer’s work, while I still have time for it, I preferred to do it by myself. (Yeah… Enjoy your overtime bonus if you get any…)

Idiotic answer: Yes, the best way to do the work is by bare hand code! (Enjoy your slow death until your blood sucked till die! And don’t complaint when you’re there!)

Ok, are any of those questions hard? If you think so, then something’s not right with your life! I suggest you change your direction before it’s too late! Seriously!

If most of your interviewees (or employees) answer with average answer, then your company is average or you’re really a cheapskate to hire average developers just because you don’t want to pay better salary! Worst, if your company full with developers with idiotic answer, seriously, change before it’s too late! Your company is not going anywhere good! The world is changing, client will demand better quality per time than just good relationship or nepotism!

Sorry being sarcastic on this, I just can’t justify people who under-estimated a freelancer just because they have “senior” or “specialist” title on their business card while inside they’re just nothing than a bad song in a bumpy road!

Have you ever think about why dumb-ass  people really interested with latest gadgets? Or you simply just can’t justify why most of gadgets freak got no idea about their gadgets? Or you think that those people shouldn’t using any of those gadgets because you think they’re too dumb to use it?

Well, I’m not an expert on this, I’m just another tech guy who live from making mobile application, but I do have some thoughts that maybe can clear your mind…

Think Different, Think From Other Side!

Let’s examine about iPad, this is an interesting topic!

• Do you think it’s a smart device?
• Do you think it’s useful for user?
• Do you think it’s revolutioner?
• Do you think it’s a future?
• Do you think Apple’s market for iPad is right?

Well, as a tech guy, here are my thoughts:

• Yes, it’s smart, but not the smartest in the market.
• NO, it’s not that useful for user, even I think this device is useless, I can’t even find any good reason why I should use an iPad beside for development and to become looks cool when demonstrate my apps or writing notes in a meeting.
• Yes, it’s a revolutioner device in hardware perception, but not in software, it’s nothing than an iPhone in a big screen. Ooo, wait the minute, it’s not built to make phone calls.
• Yes, anything that came out from Apple’s lab will hit the market along with it’s predecessor or duplicate products.
• Hmm, hard question, Apple is definitely chasing home user or ‘ordinary’ user (well, based on their campaigns). However, I don’t find anything useful from iPad to use at home, even worst, it’s just gonna make me working with multiple devices just to do a thing. And proprietary book format? Com’on, who gonna buy an e-book which can only be read using iPad or iPhone???

Before you start typing in your browser’s address bar to access another site, WAIT! That’s my thoughts as a tech guy! Not from ‘ordinary’ user perspective. Here is the fact:

No matter how agree you are with me, no matter how you hate those dumb ass who thought iPad is cool, trust me, Apple WON’T LISTEN TO YOU!

WHY ???

Because 97% Gadget’s market, NOT ONLY Apple (BlackBerry, Android, etc) are people who DOESN’T understand about technology (or at least just the skin, not deep) and THEY want to simplify all their works even if they need to live with only ONE device, or put their entire life to ONE VENDOR!

So, think different, think from other side!

If you’re Steve Jobs who signed billions of dollar for R&D and then 3% of your market saying that you should change this, that, over here, over there… While 97% of your market likes it and won’t even think twice to buy it? Billions dollar question is:

WILL YOU LISTEN TO THEM?

I believe you’ll do the same with Steve Jobs, because all of those money your company had spent needs to be back! Fresh on cash preferably… While if you trying to listen to the 3%, there is a chance you’ll hit 100% market trust, but there are also a chance where your company will went to bankruptcy within a month.

My point is, put your sarcasm in the right place, rather than hating the vendor or even worst, hating their most users? You better compromise and start to deal with your 97% market wisely. For example, iPad apps has been downloaded more than 4 billions times while Apple only able to sold iPad for around 350K units within 20 days! That’s YOUR OPPORTUNITY! And guess what? Those dumb-ass, stupid users are people who will buy those apps without even think!

I just don’t like sarcasm in the wrong place… You can’t just keep hating this hating that… While if you’re on the other side, you won’t make any differences… So, what’s the point?!

Have you ever search for things you want to buy in Google then all results in the first page are linking to eBay but you don’t have enough courage to buy it from eBay?

Well, if that’s the case, maybe this is what you want to read.

1. Get Yourself A PayPal Account

First thing you need to have is PayPal account! Well, it’s not a must, however if you want a secure transaction, then you wanna consider a PayPal account.

eBay recommend all transactions payment to be done through PayPal, this is the only way you can get eBay Buyer Protection Plan when something’s not right happened.

In order to be able to use your PayPal account for transaction (not just on eBay), you have to verify your billing source(s) (credit card, bank account, etc) and verify your billing address. To verify your billing source, use Get Verified link on your PayPal home page, PayPal will charge your credit card (for credit card) with small amount of money. Later on, you need to enter verification code that PayPal sent it via billing statement, after that, PayPal will return your money.

After your billing source is verified, you need to verify your billing address (later this will be your primary shipping address on eBay) by sending/uploading identity card copy with same address with your billing source billing address (e.g driving license or passport). This process won’t take long, I only need 2 hours to verified my billing address by uploading my passport scanned file.

You can have more than 1 address in your PayPal account and you probably want to verify all of it. However, most eBay seller only need you to become PayPal verified, most of them will ship your item even to non verified PayPal address if you have at least one verified address (you can’t use PayPal for transaction if you don’t have one).

2. My eBay Page

My eBay page is your starting point to see and manage all your transactions, account information and resolution centre access.

Considering you haven’t connect your PayPal account with your eBay, go to your My eBay page, it’s on the Account tab, on the left menu, you can click on PayPal Account menu. Follow eBay instructions from here, you should not have any problem with this step.

You can customize your account information (this is important if you’re a seller) and you can also personalized how eBay should display your My eBay page to meet your satisfaction. Nothing’s fancy here, you should be able to handle it by yourself.

By default eBay will redirect you to closest eBay site with your country, for example, since there is no ebay.co.id or Indonesia, so if you create eBay account from Indonesia IP address, eBay will set your default eBay site to ebay.com.sg which is Singapore. It’s a big problem if you don’t mind to buy items from US or Europe, because eBay won’t show any items listed outside of Singapore not even Hongkong! So, you better always use ebay.com as your primary eBay site.

3. Advanced Search

To start your shopping spree, it’s a lot easier to know what you want before browse to eBay directory. Even if you spend 1 full month, eBay items are simply too much. So, use Advanced Search function!

Things you probably want to set before searching are:

• Location section, set item availability to your country, so it won’t show any items that unable to ship to your country
• Buying Format (Auction Only or include eBay Store), if you’re a ‘bid addict’ then you probably won’t care with eBay store (It can be useful if you want to check retail price on eBay)
• Categories, if you’re not sure, you can leave it to all categories then you can sort it out later after results displayed (it provide more specific categories)

About the keyword, eBay has auto-complete function show you most popular search on eBay. However, you probably want to be more specific with your keyword to filter search results. For example, if you want to search Tumi Alpha travel bag, instead of entering Tumi, you better enter Tumi Alpha Wheeled.

By default, search results will be sorted by how close item’s name with your keyword.

4. Always Read Item Description Before Bid

Always read item description carefully!!! Don’t just see the low price then you place your bid!

For example, a seller can use a MacBook Pro box as  item’s picture, and say MacBook Pro Original Packaging or Apple MacBook Pro 17″ along with it’s specification BUT smaller font below said THIS AUCTION IS FOR APPLE MACBOOK PRO 17″ ORIGINAL PACKAGING.

So, if you decided to buy it for $999 and all you get is just a box, seriously, you can’t blame the seller, it’s your fault not them!

Good seller (experienced) usually has a clear item description, along with real picture and mention about shipping regulation, handling fee, tax fee, payment rules, custom clearance, etc.

So, for your peace of mind, ALWAYS READ ITEM DESCRIPTION BEFORE BID!

5. Know Your Seller

To know about your seller, see their feedback rate and how much feedback they got (means how much transaction they did). You can also read their profiles if you really want to know that deep.

There are Trusted Seller, Power Seller and No Title seller, which one you should trust?

I’m gonna say get your brain think in a positive way! You can trust all kind of seller AS LONG AS THEIR FEEDBACK RATE IS GOOD! eBay seller really depend on buyer’s feedback, here is an illustration:

A buyer didn’t get their item as expected due to damage during shipment, and buyer didn’t ask for insurance to press lower shipping cost. Buyer then give negative feedback to seller which give bad impression for the rest of the world to this seller.

So, in that case, you probably still want to buy from this seller. Just make sure you read their negative feedbacks (if there are any) before you judge the seller.

How about low feedback seller? I never bought anything from 0 feedback seller, seriously, this seller can just open new eBay account, sell items and gone with the wind after they took all money from their PayPal account. So, NO, I’m not recommending this kind of seller!

However, if the seller has low feedback with 100% rate, I’m gonna say YES, you should consider to buy from them. Beside, most of this kind of seller will give you good deal, and if it’s an auction, not many people will block your way to win that item.

6. Communication

Use Ask a Question menu to ask seller any of your doubts or just to ask more information (specially regarding shipping cost). Good seller will always respond your message, before you judge, you should also consider time difference between your country and seller’s country. It will take some time to get an answer.

Even after transaction, I found a great seller which always ask me wether my item has arrived or not and sometime they want to make sure everything is okay. So, any doubts? Ask them before you judge!

7. Shipping Issues

There are several things you need to know regarding shipment.

Shipping Cost

Depend on courier, price is quite vary. Here are some references for shipping to Indonesia (per 1 Kg or small to medium package):

• USPS ($1.95 – $14.50), higher cost provide limited tracking system, 8-14 days to Jakarta
• UPS United States ($9.99 – $34.99), with limited or full tracking system, 4-10 days to Jakarta
• EMS Hongkong/China ($4.95 – $14.50), always have limited tracking system, 4 days sharp to Jakarta sometimes 3 days
• Hongkong, China, Japan Mail Service ($1.50 – $3.99), no tracking available, maximum 10 days to Jakarta, mostly arrived within a week (from Japan only took 3 days to arrive with $1.50 shipping cost)
• Deutsche Post (€2.99 – €12.00), no tracking available, arrived to Jakarta within 4 – 10 days
• DHL (€4.00 – €18.00), with tracking system, arrived within 3 days
• SingPost (S$1 – S$4.99), higher cost has limited tracking system, arrived within 3-4 days

Handling Cost

Handling cost is quite vary and usually already covered on shipping cost. Depend on how big the package will be, it’s definitely will affect both handling fee and shipping cost. Read you seller shipping regulation to get more information about this fee.

Tax Fee

Be aware of seller country/state law. Some states like California has a regulation to make you pay 3%-15% tax fee for any transaction happened in California. So, you better check with your seller about this.

Customs

ALWAYS REMEMBER THAT SHIPPING COST NEVER INCLUDE CUSTOM FEE!

It’s totally your responsibility. Every countries has their own law about this. For example, Indonesia has a regulation with import like this:

Duty Tax = Item Cost – $50

The funny thing is, Item Cost always include shipping cost if shipped using third party courier like DHL, UPS, EMS but not counted if you’re using Mail Service. You can avoid this duty tax by ask the seller to send it as gift or put lower value, however, if something bad is happened, you should take it on your own risk. Usually US seller will marked it as gift or merchandise if it’s under $100.

Be careful with handling charge that may apply if your item is shipped using courier service and marked greater than your country tolerance value (Indonesia is $50). They will charge you with re-packaging cost caused by Custom office (they will open your package if it’s >$50 and just leave it to courier to re-package). Seriously, this handling fee will be quite messy. You can avoid this by using Mail Service instead of courier service and EMS or anything with Post or Mail Service name on the end of it’s name.

8. Pay Your Bill

After you won your item, or bought it with Buy It Now, DO NOT PAY ANYTHING YET!

Wait for eBay invoice come to your email. If you’re buying multiple items from same seller and the seller can give you combined shipping, you better give the seller some time to send you combined items invoice.

Pay it using PayPal with your desired shipping address checked on your PayPal account during payment.

Always pay your bill before the deadline gave by your seller expired, otherwise you’ll get negative feedback.

9. Feedback is Everything

As a buyer, you’ll get feedback from seller usually after you finish the payment. In some cases, seller will restrict their bid to buyer with minimum number of feedbacks. In this case, you either can ask the seller to allow you to place bid, or simply move on to other item.

Seller can only leave positive feedback to buyer. However, if you don’t finish your payment in certain amount of time that the seller want (usually displayed along with item description), they can bring you to resolution centre and leave you a negative feedback. So, be careful with this issue.

When your item has arrived and everything is like you wanted, then you can leave feedback to your seller. When you do this, please make you keep these things as your consideration:

• There area many things that could caused delayed during shipment. From busy season (Christmast, New Year Eve), shipping type and your country/state custom office.
• Always expect item based on it’s description, don’t get over expectation
• Handling (how good the seller pack your item)
• Shipping cost (how reasonable the cost, refer to courier original price)
• Communication (how good your seller respond your questions)

10. Bidding Tips

Skip this part if you’re not a real eBayer who only interested with Buy It Now.

To win a bid there are several tips I can give based on my experiences on eBay.

• Always use Watch This Item for every interesting items you found
• Do regular search for same items with at least 12 hours difference, new bids usually posted within 12 hours interval, and some bid probably only available for short period of time (could be hours)
• Be Patient, don’t get rush, if it’s too expensive, don’t buy it, other cheaper items is being posted while you’re outbid!
• Be a last minute bidder! For this, seriously, you need a tool, wether it’s a desktop widget or iPhone Push Notification (this one is the best)
• Most people won’t interested to bid an item with no one placed  bid on it, so, watch the item, then be a last minute bidder
• Use automatic bidding feature from eBay. If an item bid is started on $10 and you place $20, eBay will automatically set your maximum bid $20 and place your bid by $0.5 increment from last bid on that item, so your current bid will be $10.50. If someone place a bid below $15, eBay will automatically place new bid for you $15.50, so you’re still the winner at that moment.
• Some eBay store will open their items for bid as part of their marketing campaign. Use this moment, save the seller that you think give you satisfaction and re-visit from time to time.
• Seller with lower feedback (but with good score e.g 100% or 99.1%) usually has lower price than eBay store or power seller, grab this opportunity.
• Seller with low feedback score (e.g 98% or 95%) usually will try to increase their service by open some good items for bid, not much people will choose this seller, which means your chance to win this bid is higher than usual.

Ok folks, that’s all I have for you about eBay, the rest is up to you, HAPPY BIDDING!