chmod777

Hope it helps, least I could do. I have learned plenty from your posts over the years, including confirmation of my tastes and biases regarding Mexican food.

Forgot to mention WIFI works fine on the Mini, and can be handy when you are out and about at a place where it's free...

I bought a Galaxy Mini a couple months ago and (mostly) have no regrets, hard to beat the price and size as you mention. It should do what you are expecting, I use my old top off 1-2 Call SIM in mine. A few thoughts:

1. Watch out for carrier versions. There is an AIS version and a Dtac/True/TOT version of the Mini, a sticker on the box identifies them. This matters for 3G more than for GPRS, but you will want 3G if it is available in your area. Not knowing this, I bought the Dtac version and didn't notice till it was too late. It works ok on AIS GPRS, and even though there is no 3G where I live, it sure would be nice to have the right version.

2. Newer phones like this can eat up your GPRS minutes in the background, so you will want to use a volume based monthly plan, not the default minute based plan. 1-2 Call has 150 MB for 150 baht per month, 1 GB for 350 baht per month, etc. detailed here:

http://www.ais.co.th...s/en/index.html

Easy to sign up for one and change it later if you need to, the 1GB might be a good one to start with and go up or down from there. These work on both GPRS and 3G.

3. My Mini was locking up in sleep mode, a shop told me that my nine year old 1-2 Call SIM should be replaced by a new copy, which Telewiz did for free. That might have been BS, since the problem did not go away completely until a new software upgrade, which is easily done for free via Samsung software on your PC.

4. The Mini works pretty well for web browsing, and you can zoom on pages fairly easily, but the screen size is on the small side. I found it a great improvement over my old phone, but there are times I wish I had a little more screen - it's a trade off. There may be Android apps available for news, email or other sites you are interested in that work better than the web browser. Some of these are pretty awesome and free.

5. You will want a google account to make best use of the phone, even if you don't use gmail.

6. The camera is not very good, and the CPU speed, memory size, etc are all on the cheesy side, but that's what you expect at the price. Everything works fine though, including GPS which is pretty sweet to have in such a small package.

If I were to do it all over again, I would take a hard look at the Samsung Galaxy Cooper. It costs almost twice as much and is a little bigger, but if I thought I could handle carrying it in my pocket (and if I could hide the receipt from my wife), the better screen, camera, CPU, etc would be nice. I would also make darn sure I bought the AIS version.

All that being said, I enjoy using the Mini and it can do a lot of cool things that I never expected (like watching live NFL football via Gamepass). I have no problem recommending it.

Photo sent to me by a friend in Wong Amat: at 4:24 PM:

Very interesting, probably a water spout.

No, I haven't rooted yet. I saw on Android forums that the mini with 2.3.4 can be rooted though.

It seems to have fixed the sleep of death, I have not had it happen again since the upgrade about ten days ago. Previously it happened at least once every three days.

Gingerbread has several other improvements too, the battery charges faster and it lasts longer. Highly recommend the upgrade, I see no reason to stay with Froyo.

FYI, and for what it's worth, the website:

http://www.gmmsport.com/howto.php

seem to show 1 Sky Grammy's plans for sports channels. This site is all in Thai, but looks like they are planning to have:

ASN

Eurosport

GMM Sport 1

Foodball Plus (Football Plus I think they mean, but Food Ball sounds like more fun)

Sports Plus

No idea when the channels beyond ASN are supposed to start, or what any of this stuff is supposed to cost yet.

FYI, Kies gave me an Android update to Gingerbread 2.3.4 for my Samsung Galaxy Mini GT-S5570B. If anyone gave up waiting for it, like I almost did, time to fire up Kies again.

I'm hoping it cures my occasional "sleep of death" problem, so far so good...

I am watching ASN right now on the new 1 Sky Grammy system, it is a little different from the ASN I am used to: defaults to Thai audio, but can be changed to English. Still has the "TEST RUN" bug in the corner.

As far as the rest of the channels on this system, I didn't see anything that much interested me, but my wife seems pleased. So, it is the same as Truevisions, where I only watched ASN, but I think my wife has more to enjoy.

It gives me great satisfaction to be finished with True, they are dead to me now.

We'll see what happens when the free period is over: if I don't like the subscription options, still have plenty of free channels for my wife, and I will watch NFL over the internet.

Then I will have the satisfaction to be finished with ASN...

Received one of these today from my thai brother in laws email address, his computer is usually packed with the latest viruses, so I did not click the link.

A google search leads to another message board thread, sounds like it is "phishing" for email passwords.

Oh yeah, did everyone notice that True's "apology" is just a boilerplate canned email, the bold text is inserted to match whatever complaint is being made?

So it is actually not an apology at all, it is yet another insult. That is why the grammar makes no sense. If anyone feels better after reading True's apology, they are missing the joke.

QUOTE:

------------

Dear Mr. FuriousAtTrue:

Please accept this letter as our formal apology for what happened on the cancellation of ASN channel.

It was not our intention to cause any interruption or inconvenience. In retrospect, we believe the situation resulted from the commercial terms for a renewal were unfortunately unable to agree. This is by no means an excuse for what happened.

Please accept our sincere apologies for the inconvenience you may have experienced in our service.

We take pride in ensuring our customer's satisfaction. Unfortunately, we did not meet your—or our own—expectations.

Should you have any further inquiry, suggestion, or comment, please do not hesitate to contact us at 02-7252525 between 8:00 am - 22:00 pm or [email protected] between 9:00 am -18:00 pm

---------------------

END QUOTE

I called the 1 Sky - Grammy number on Saturday, and received a call back yesterday evening from "Dynasat", apparently a company subcontracted to do installations. The Dynasat rep spoke English well, and said the 1 Sky receivers were not yet in hand, but should be around the 5th. She said details on pricing and channels were still not available, but ASN was certain to be available on October 8th.

Since I live upcountry, she said I could not expect installation before next week. They will have to find a local company to "sub-subcontract" to do the install at my house. I am going to give it a try, worst case I will cancel it too (True is history for me) and my wife will be satisfied with the free-to-air channels on the C band dish. I wish I could use NFL game pass, but only IPSTAR is available in my location.

Pricing I was quoted: Receiver only 1 Sky smart: 1,500 excluding delivery

5' Fixed dish and C-band LNBF with receiver 1 Sky smart without onsite service: 3,490

5' Fixed dish and C-band LNBF with receiver 1 Sky smart with one year onsite service: 4,290

Programming free through end of year, more info TBD.

FYI, here is my reply to True's first email advising I could respond with comments:

QUOTE:

-------------------------

Yes, I have a comment, in no possible way can you call this an "improvement", it is an insult. How can you be "happy" to remove the ability to watch NFL football in the middle of the season with no warning?

I am very upset, especially since your company has done exactly this same thing before, with the NFL on ESPN twelve years ago. I am amazed you have so little consideration for your viewers.

To call this an "improvement" and to be "happy" about it is infuriating! I am UNHAPPY, ANGRY, and INSULTED!

Please restore ASN channel 110 ASAP, and put "trace" in the garbage where it belongs.

----------------------------

END QUOTE

Of course, I received the same canned "apology" everyone else received. The only good part of this whole fiasco is that I will finally be done with IBC/UBC/True after almost two decades of frustration at their incompetence.

Or, get yourself a U.S. IP address and then pay $30 for a full season subscription to NFL Game Rewind...

And watch online, video on demand every and any regular season game you want, when you want.... starting no later than 24 hours after the completion of the live game.

The season subscription buys you the full 2011 regular season as well as all the regular season games from 2010 and most of the regular season games from 2009.

All commercial free and half-time reports excluded as well.

All for the less than the price of a one-month TrueVisions gold package payment.

Tall John, can you pm me with this info as well? Thanks!

Sa Kaeo...

I bought a white Prerunner 4 door "Exclusive" exactly one month ago off a dealer's lot. The saleslady said I could order a different color (Blue or Black being the other options) if I wanted with the same Exclusive trim - she did not seem to think they were in short supply. I would be surprised if you could not still get one.

The factory sticker indicates it was built in May 2007, and the window price sticker said in English: "Campaign Package", and listed in Thai what the extra money gives you: the silver wheel well and side accents, bumper, etc, and upgraded seats (leather-like instead of cloth). The interior also has some silver accents (similar to fortuner) and a leather-like steering wheel cover, unlike the standard Prerunner.

I paid the extra baht for this package mainly for the better seat coverings, but the exterior accents do look pretty good.

I thought it looked nice in white, but actually preferred waiting for blue - however my wife wanted white and TODAY! So guess who won.... no regrets though, it is a great vehicle.