Upcountry

Regarding the 400k for two months requirement. It seems to me that the spirit of this requirement is that we should keep this amount in an account at all times (for emergencies, I suppose).

I'd like to find out unequivocally if anyone has gotten into trouble for going below this amount AFTER the extension renewal was accepted (with bank letter for 2 months balance) but before the final stamp was issued.

It's been an expensive year for me, so I'd really like to dip into this money now that I've we've submitted my papers for marriage visa renewal. In previous years, I've waited 30 more days for the stamp before accessing the money for any reason.

I wonder if there is any check made by Thai authorities on the account during the consideration period, even though the requirements only call for the money to be documented for at least 60 days prior to renewal application. No one has posted about such a calamity, so I would guess it's not an issue.

Just want see if there is any reason to be paranoid about this.

I actually called the Imm. Bureau directly today and they told me that the bank letter could be done today for Tuesday.

Of course, the local office might feel differently.

Anyone know about the official bank statement date, relative to the date of visa renewal?

I'd like to get my statement today, a Friday, and go the the immigration bureau on Tuesday next week.

Hopefully that's okay, or does the statement have to be the same day or the day before?

G'day,

My wine bottle vacuum pump has failed me, and I need to get a new one. But in my Thai town they don't know about such things. Not even at the CW mall.

I've looked up a few wine sellers that mail purchases to customer (one will only do so to Bangkok and suburbs) but I don't know if they'd have what I need.

I decided to start this thread to see if anyone can recommend a store that sells a good quality vacuum sealer, and is willing to send it to me after a cash transfer payment.

Thanks!

Yeah, I read about the Vernal Equinox but only AJE was showing bad distortion for the last few weeks.

I had to have the cable guys come to my house of other reasons today, and when I showed them AJE's troubles, the communicated with the home office.

This evening for the first time the picture has been back to normal.

Now I know that I can't just call and try to explain the problem over the phone. I have to have people come to the house and witness the problem for themselves.

It was bad this morning before they came, but now it seems fixed. Glad that's over.

Thanks, folks, for confirming that AJE is fine for you. So it must my cable company and something they need to fix.

Do you get Al Jazeera English via your satellite or cable TV service?

if so, what is the sound and picture quality like for you?

For the last few weeks my signal for this channel has gotten so bad that it almost unwatchable, especially in the early evening. The sound clicks and drops in volume in response to glitches, and the picture jumps and freezes. The nearby channels (BBC, etc., for me, are fine).

I called my cable company last week, and they asked me to wait till the 22nd, when some new thing was supposed to arrive - satellite receiver or something like that - which would solve the problem. But nothing has changed.

I called the other day to report that I still had a problem and the said "tomorrow". Tomorrow came, no change.

At this point, I wonder if the problem is with my cable company or something "upstream" that they can't control. They don't have good enough English at the company to explain properly.

So, if you can share what your experience is with AJ English, it will help me find out if it is just my cable company or a bigger problem.

Thanks.

I've got a good chair with a pneumatic gas cylinder that is wearing out.

It's good news that we can actually buy replacements for these things instead of having to replace the entire chair.

I can by one online and import it,

(example, http://www.echairparts.com/servlet/the-Pneumatic-Gas-Cylinders/Categories)

but I'd like to find a seller in Thailand if I can.

Anybody know one?

Crown had a certain taste to it, so I'd like to find something similar. ;-) Not too harsh.

The Crown label said: "Specal blended spirit" "Blended with finest imported malt whiskey".

I just talked to Red Bull headquarters, as well as I could with language difficulties, to find out why I can't buy Crown 99 anymore.

As far as I could tell, the Crown 99 blend is no longer being produced.

I prefer to drink whiskey (or whisky blends) plain or with juice, rather than with soda, which is harder to find these days (as well).

I've tried some other types, but I find them too harsh. Any suggestions for an alternative? I don't want to pay the higher price for imports right now.

Maybe the Crown and the soda that Red Bull makes are just temporarily unavailable due to flood damage, but my local Lotus store people also talk like Crown is gone for good.

Well, it's been almost a year since I posted my question here. Thank you, Saraquin, for trying to help.

I finally found the answer, thanks to a friend who saw it in a local store:

GM2848 DIGITAL TV CONVERTER

http://www.alibaba.com/productshowimg/sg102236875-102521811-0/GM2848_DIGITAL_TV_CONVERTER.html

You can see a picture of it via the link above.

It takes in the coax output of my RF box (extension from True Visions box), and outputs RCA. The tuner works just like a TV, etc. It does an auto search to find all channels. In my case, if found the UHF frequency for True Visions.

So, now I have separate inputs for cable and True.

Program guide? What program guide?

In the past, UBC/Truevision had a decent set of HTML pages with program listings for the month ahead. I.E., as of today (March 1), you could see all of April. This also used to be true for HBO/CM and Star.

But these days the movie channel web pages have shifted into glitzy nonsense what does away with useful schedule info (at least in a form I can easily use for what's on a few weeks ahead).

And True forces us to use a Flash program that is tricky to use and gives strange results sometimes. Worse, we can't copy the results. I found a program that can convert bitmap to text, but that is a cumbersome step to have to take.

I've complained and begged them to provide another way to get the schedule info on-line. But so far, nothing has changed. They don't seem to understand or agree that there is a problem.

So, I'm wondering if anyone else agrees with me. Have you complained? I think if enough people did, they might do something. I suggested a button that would export search results to a window for copying, a downloadable file, or even an an email. With Flash that's not so easy, I suppose, but there has to be a way.

On a recent trip to Bangkok I saw a LA32C530F1R Samsung TV with BBC from the local cable/satellite service. 4:3 format.

It impressed me because of the way it handled 4:3 in a mode that fills the wide screen. Basically, the majority of the screen is not distorted. Only the outer edges are stretched to fill the screen. This is nice, because it means I don't have to letter box the standard format, avoiding burn-in, and I don't have to put up with fat faces, etc. I found the manual on-line, but there is no mention of this feature.

Currently I use a standard CRT with UBC/Cable and a DVR. The TV is dying, so I'm looking for an LCD 40" to enjoy downloaded movies, etc., while still watching my regular TV programs and movies.

Now this issue seems like the elephant in the room to me (how to view an old common format on a new display), but there seems to be very little support or understanding of this. Very few folks here are even discussing it.

I did a search on the Internet, and instead of finding info about the Samsung, I found the following about LG:

http://www.exposeknowledge.com/reviews/5258-lg-w1943c-185-lcd-monitor-3-year-warranty.aspx

Wide(ARC) Function

Enjoy original 4:3 images with LG Wide Monitor!

With 4:3 in Wide(ARC) Function, No more distorted image!

Now, that's what I want to see in the Samsung!

I've looked at downloaded PDF manuals, but I can't see how to make this feature work on any LG or Samsung TV. Based on other features, I'd like to get one of these Samsungs:

LA40C530

LA40C550J1R

But the folks at the stores have little clue of what I'm trying to do with 4:3.

Does anyone here in the Thai-visa (TV -ha ha) community understand my problem? Can you recommend a good LCD choice?

I'm thinking about just fixing my old CRT at this point and waiting till Thailand is more wide screen-ready.

I've been reading more about the 4k sector issue with EARS. WD may be ahead of the curve in dealing with usable space and error checking, assuming that W7 will take over the world soon.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/2888

This means that XP users have to adjust a jumper or use an emulation utility to adapt 512B sectors to 4k. This seems to result in a performance hit.

This makes me start to think harder about moving to W7. I've only got one W7 system right now. I could try to put it on my older systems when I have time (driver issues).

Or, I could format for XP now and reformat later when I'm ready. Getting a 512B sector 2TB drive might not be very future-conscious.

Oh well, transition time.

Thanks for the www.invadeit.co.th suggestion, Crossy. They don't have the Seagate I'm looking for, but it's good to find another source just the same.

About noise, I suppose it depends on the ears and environment, as well as usage (writing vs reading).

-UC

I live far outside Bangkok, and the only 2TB drive I can find is Western Digital's WD20EARS.

According to my research, this drive cannot be used with XP without a special format utility by WD, thanks to a new sector size. Some say it is noisy too.

I've read good things about Seagate's ST32000542AS drive (5900 rpm), and also the Samsung F4 2tb drive (fast).

Seagate builds drives in Thailand, so I think it is just provincial thinking and economics that leads my local retailers to stock only the WD drive.

So I welcome feedback from anyone who uses these drives, to help me decide if I'm still on the right track (trying to get the Seagate and Samsung drives).

If so, can you suggest a reputable retailer in Bangkok who will allow me to order it and have it shipped to me. Too bad that tohome.com and shop4thai do not sell the drives I want either.

Thanks.

kudroz,

I noticed that you saw a timeout between 10.121.... and mx-11.

Here's my traceroute to www.google.co.th. Notice the long timeouts between 10.121.65.210 and mx-ll-58.147.1-205.static.tttmaxnet.com.

I counted about 30 seconds as I watched it go, several times. I wonder if you and others have seen something similar. I did this test just after 3BB came down my street with new cable to upgrade speed capability. Theoretically, 2mb is now 3mb for the default Premier package, not that we see anything close to that.

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 27 ms 26 ms 414 ms 10.121.165.202

3 28 ms 27 ms 27 ms 10.121.65.210

4 * * * Request timed out.

5 * * * Request timed out.

6 34 ms 33 ms 34 ms mx-ll-58.147.1-205.static.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.1.205]

7 * * * Request timed out.

8 33 ms 33 ms 33 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-90.static.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.90]

9 33 ms 33 ms 33 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-66.static.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.66]

0 33 ms 33 ms 33 ms 218.100.47.246

1 33 ms 33 ms 33 ms 218.100.47.22

2 56 ms 64 ms 56 ms 72.14.217.193

3 57 ms 58 ms 58 ms 209.85.242.238

4 57 ms 58 ms 57 ms 209.85.242.236

5 133 ms 64 ms 80 ms 209.85.242.242

6 133 ms 134 ms 132 ms 209.85.254.155

7 219 ms 219 ms 217 ms 209.85.249.36

8 226 ms 224 ms 223 ms 216.239.43.228

9 227 ms 222 ms 226 ms 64.233.174.99

0 243 ms 220 ms 230 ms 216.239.46.6

1 221 ms 222 ms 222 ms pz-in-f147.1e100.net [74.125.127.147]

I'm looking for a COAX to RCA converter that does something like what a VCR would do - take COAX input and output RCA to the TV. Any advice on where to find this in Bangkok would be appreciated (phone number? ). I'm also in the market for an old VCR with a Thai UHF compatible tuner as an alternative to this. It doesn't have to have a timer or channel changer, just COAX/UHF input and RCA output.

Since I live in the provinces, trekking down to "Red Town" to scour Phantip, etc., is not practical right now.

I use a coax/RF device from UBC to connect to my 2nd TV. One remote "rules them all", and this works for me. Cheaper too.

I also have cable service. In the main TV room, the UBC box connects to my DVR via RCA, the cable connects via coax. All is fine.

But in my 2nd TV room, I am forced to use a T coax connector to input both services into the coax input of my DVR. This means a degraded picture for both UBC and cable. My old VCR has a coax input and RCA outputs, but for some reason the non-Thai specific tuner can't find the UBC signal.

So, your help would be appreciated. Hope someone can help!

The dnsadvantage IP's are working for me. Thanks to webfact for that suggestion.

1 1 ms <1 ms 1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 13 ms 12 ms 12 ms 124.157.233.1

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * * * Request timed out.

5 * * * Request timed out.

6 17 ms 17 ms 17 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-90.static.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.90]

...

1 <1 ms <1 ms <1 ms 192.168.1.1

2 11 ms 11 ms 10 ms 58.147.41.1

3 * * * Request timed out.

4 * * * Request timed out.

5 15 ms 15 ms 15 ms mx-ll-58.147.0-209.static.tttmaxnet.com [58.147.0.209]

I've had similar problems in the last few days (maybe week or so). Good to know I'm not alone. Today, the last few hours, have been particularly bad. Can't check email or anything.

I think there may be an international gateway problem, since local sties work okay, but some overseas sites are harder or impossible to reach.

I changed modems and saw the same problem, so it is not hardware, stopped bittorrent activity, as well, and that is not the problem.

I mentioned this in another thread, but just in case, I want to say here that I was very disappointed by my experience with Kuhn Pawdee of Mr. Balance (top floor of Phantip).

He charged an obscene amount of money just to make my turntables look pretty (which I did not ask for), swapped out the new belts I had already installed, and tried to con me into thinking there is nothing wrong with my tables, or that I need to just accept the speed issues I'm trying to fix. Clearly he was not interested in having his tech really try to fix them for me.

I feel cheated and I'll never do business with him again. I would be worried about the quality of some of the equipment he sells, and would not expect his warranty to be worth anything. I've dealt with crooks like this in the US. Too bad the used audio business is polluted with this kind of 'businessman'.

-UC

Whatever you do, I have to say that you should avoid Mr. Balance in Phantip.

I got a bum-steer to this weirdo recently, and got stuck with a huge bill and nothing but BS when I tried to set things right.

Someone else I talked to had a similar experience with this twerp, so it is not just me.

-UC

Found this from the Rega site:

http://www.rega.co.uk/index2.htm

Got an email response from the contact there.

So, Thailand may have a Rega dealer now, after all. I still wonder if buying in Singapore might be cheaper, despite travel expenses, than buying in BKK with taxes, etc.

-UC

http://www.lpgear.com/Merchant2/merchant.m...egory_Code=TURN

I had to share this with you all. It's sounds too good to be true, because I thought I read about problems hooking up a Grado to Rega arms. But read this:

Listening Experience

We were anxious to try the Rega P3-24 turntable. It was very easy to set-up and align. We installed a Grado Gold phono cartridge because we have been delighted with its sheer musicality. Grado cartridges are said to usually hum with Regas. That is not true with the Rega P3-24. There was no humming whatsover from the new high performance motor.

The Rega P3-24 turntable and Grado Gold phono catridge turned out to be an exquisite match. The sound was liquid, detailed and colorful. It was painted on a wide soundfield of solid black canvas with detail that could be discerned about 2-3 feet inside. We could not stop listening to records, both old and new. It was an enchanting musical experience.

The Rega P3-24 turntable is a keeper!

Who could ask for a more positive declaration? That's my cartridge they're talking about.

Now, I would like to try a Rega.

UC

I'm thinking about taking my old turntables, that did not get fixed by Mr. Balance's technician on the 5th floor of Phantip, to a repair technician at "SRI Audio".

The reason is, KS World, which used to be a local Thorens dealer, recommended a technician named Nikorn. When my wife called him, she found out he works at a store called SRI Audio, or something like that, on Phatanakarn Rd. I can't find anything about this store on the web.

He said he wants 2200 Baht just to look at and adjust settings on one turntable, so his prices seem to be part of a "Bangkok audio cartel", similar the cab mafia around Baiyoke Tower.

Having been ripped of by Mr. Balance, I am nervous about trusting my machines to this man, even though he has one Thorens in the shop and was recommended by KS World.

So, I hope someone can share their experience with this repair man and shop.

Thanks!

UC

Thanks for all your feedback and offers to help, Richard.

Only one of my tables as a really bad pulley. The other one is okay, if maybe a little worn. However, but have the same problem(s) with speed.

1. Pitch control pot changes translate into too much of a speed change. Not sure how else to describe that. It used to be easier to fine-tune the speed. The technician who cleaned them may not have known how to calibrate it correctly. Sadly, Mr. Balance's technician didn't touch them, as far as I can tell, and Mr. Balance himself refuses to acknowledge the problem.

2. Since I can't set the speed, I can't be sure, but it seems like the speed drift is still there. I'm sure it is, because I have no evidence that anything was really done to them. I'm sure the speed change is more than spec, visually noticeable in the built-in strobe.

I read that the Linn has an outboard power supply that can be used to control the speed, but that this brand has a certain sound characteristic, coloring the music.

I also read that it might be tricky getting the Rega arm to work with the Grado.

I have an old Thorens arm (original for the table) and an SME arm (classic option for the table). I got the 2nd table (with bent pulley) as part of the deal when I bought the SME on eBay.

-UC