briley

Yes, 7-11 to the rescue. Now a happy daughter and an un-happy father.

Can't win them all!

Sharktooth - I like it, but where do you get the rolling baccy????????

Dislike smoking but my daughter is here.

Can you get tobacco for making cigarettes or what brand is menthol and who sells them?

Tesco Lotus were not much help ........................

From my experience last February you can renew a few months before it expires or up to one year after. Since it expires on your birthday and will be renewed until your birthday doing it one day late gives you 6 years.

Yes, you need a certificate of residence - there are rules about what visa you must have, others will be along to explain that.

One of the middle East airline, Qatar I think, give you the option to upgrade your ticket during the booking procedure.

Those rates are cheaper than Chiang Mai.

As an interesting comment if you live in a condo you pay commercial rates for water at the rate of the whole building. So in Chiang Mai that is 29.75 B per cu metre plus VAT assuming a normal sized Condo.

If you were a private house and could then have your own metre it would be under 10 Baht pre cu metre.

How long is too long for the pipes from the inside to the outside unit?

Or how short should they be before you have to take them into account in deciding on how many BTU you need?

I have in the past used a gizmo that monitored electricity usage of anything I plugged in.

My fridges (2) are both reasonably sized and cost about 350 Baht each for a month's electricity. My amazement is the water cooler (definitely a mini fridge) cost around 325 Baht a month to run, almost the same as a full size fridge.

So I would suggest that your big fridge will cost little more to run than a small one.

And the price you quote is good. I have bought both my fridges at "50% off" and not regretted it.

If I had the choice now I would have gone for one, double sized, fridge for saving on electricity. After all 350 Baht a month is around 4,000 Baht a year or 40,000 Baht over the lifetime of the fridge. Much more than the purchase price.

In Thailand I've done exchanges, you give in your old hard drive and a bit later get a replacement. (In Chiang Mai)

In the UK you have an option to give a credit card number and they will send you a replacement and a box to return the old drive - you have one month to return or else they charge you for the new drive. Useful if you want to try and get data off the old drive.

Once got a bigger drive back but normally I get the same model, reconditioned, back.

If you install in a 'wrong' language you can later download the language pack and change the language - then copy language setting to the other users and the start-up. Changes most of the language things but there are still things that do not change. Normally programs, drivers etc that were installed during set up. This can be irritating or a major problem.

No, integrated sound card in the motherboard. Got a USB plug in, suppose it is a sound card, works fine for 99 Baht. Not complaining.

manarak - agreed:

"As a last suggestion for OP, doing anything on a computer at room temperatures of 30 degrees up is just torture. What about an aircon?"

I was sweating like a pig by the time I had finished. But I do not like aircon - just a personal choice. A shower and a swim afterwards and I was (almost) human again. Oh yes, the computer is quite happy, if I could get the sound to work.

OK, went out and bought a hyper 212X from Cooler master. Choice of 9cm or 12cm fan. I went for the 12 cm as recommended above at 1290 Baht.

Rather a pig to fit, had to take the motherboard out to fit a plate underneath and it is big. I thought the fan would sit above the mother board parallel to it but no, it stands up 12 cm. So it doesn't allow the cover to be fitted by a mere smidgen. But that can be sorted out.

Boy is it quiet - totally. Probably could have got away with the 9cm fan at under 1,000 Baht but no complaints.

Temperature is wandering just a few degrees above the room temperature - 38-40C. Who could ask for more?

One problem, the sound card is also totally silent. Windows says it is fine and everything produces pretty bounding lights but nothing comes out. Hope I didn't break something on the motherboard.

Thanks for all the comments.

Interesting set of observations.

I have a new motherboard this year so it does control the fan - no noise problems when the ambient temperature is in the 20C range, but I do not run A/C so the current room temperature is 31C and will get a bit warmer this afternoon. It is actually the change in fan speed that is most irritating, silent to noise to silent to noise.

The case is old. I've just tried changing one of the fans so it blows into the case - the second fan blows out and see if I do end up with a wind tunnel. Does sound a little better after just a minute or two.

I am going to get a bigger fan for the CPU - it is only about 70mm so a bigger fan can shift the same amount of air for less noise (hopefully).

Don't know why but the Core Temp software refuses to install. However I do have other CPU temp software and was interested in a comment that the temperature reported by the CPU core is rather inaccurate, especially as it is not reported in temperature but just as a number that has to be converted to a temperature.

--Change in the fan direction seems to have helped - still sounds quieter. Fingers crossed.

Thanks for the comments,

I tried having the case open, no difference. Mind I have 3 fans on the case (all silent) but the room itself is rather warm 33C at the moment.

I never mind a silly question if it solves my problem, yes it is in the correct socket so the motherboard can control the speed.

Looked at Jedicool - some interesting coolers, but which one works well and quietly? Any specific recomendation?

I will go down and look at the coolers and go for a larger radius fan - also see fans which have bigger blades, I assume they are better as well?

I have an AMD socket AM3+ processor (FX 8350) and am using the supplied heat sink. The noise is OK under normal running conditions but when the CPU temperature creeps up the fan does get annoying with a whining noise. Things are getting worse as the room temperature creeps up to the 40C mark.

I do not intend to spend some 5,000 Baht on those super water cooling heat sinks but see a number of replacement fan / heat sinks around the 500 Baht mark.

Anyone any experience of these - are they any better, ie quieter?

I agree with KittenKong but would add that the committee does have overriding power over the JP.

As committee you can call an EGM and sack the JP.

The committee (IMHO generally the chairman) should work with the JP to manage the building. Yes the JP is the boss person but you can get rid of the JP with the owners approval. The committee should have a check on the finances in that any cheque should be signed by the JP and a committee member. But the committee can change the signatories to make it JP only or committee only. Darn stupid thing to do but then committees can and do do stupid things (and then normally complain!)

Back to the OP - yes the committee chooses the chairman by majority vote. The person with the highest vote in the AGM might not be the best to be chairman.

Whether to have the JP at the committee meeting is up to the committee. The law does not require them to be present. With a good committee / JP relationship it makes sense for them to be there to give input into any discussion. It could be different with a JP-developer, in my case the last time I saw the developer was 12 years ago!

I was surprised to see the OP refer to the JP's lawyers being present. Two questions, why are they there and who pays the lawyers fees?

Look at Booking dot com - I've just booked a room plus breakfast and travel both ways from the airport for just over 1000 Baht, mind I did go for the delux room.

You do need a letter from the British embassy at least in CNX immigration - I got mine on the spot in Chiang Mai consulate and, for once, it was free.

Back to normal? The last parcel sent Friday 19th Feb arrived Wednesday 24th Feb. Not sure they can keep that up!

Mommysboy - don't defend the UK PO. My grandson went to collect his monthly parcel since he was out when the post man called. They won't give it to him until he produces ID. <deleted>, he is 6 years old and the address label even has his picture on it. I am not happy.

I can confirm that for a fixed deposit account with Bangkok bank if, at the end of the term, you do nothing they automatically open another fixed deposit with the same account number and the same bank book.

Don't know how they choose the length of the new fix - I had an 11 month fix, the first change they put it in a 3 months fix, the second time into a 4 month fix. You can not do anything about it using internet banking, seems you have to go into the branch.

Chiang Mai accepted my account even though the fixed term had ended in the middle of the 3 months and automatically moved to a new fixed term (but same book and same number).

But the comment above about interest rates - which bank gives the best rate on fixed deposits these days?

Same for me, my monthly parcels sent mid January arrived yesterday. Packaging a bit damaged.

Squirrels. I've often seen them removing the dead body. PEA did start putting protectors over the terminals and that made a difference near me but somehow they still manage to electrocute themselves.

Gonzo - Sorry they took so long to fix in your case, maybe nobody informed them?

Usually takes 20-30 minutes for PEA to fix, they are rather used to it!