I went to Sarit Center First then checked out some of the machines they had, I wasn’t impressed.

They were relatively expensive and at that time I saw no use of a duo 2 core with 2GB RAM, 320 GB HDD.

I went over to Avenue Electronics after passing through BestSell in Kimathi Street.

I’d been to Best Sell before and I kept wondering what will come of it this time.

I remember correctly and I was very specific about what I wanted, the Acer Travel Mate I saw some time before where the price was very sufficient to call it a good deal… But the Travel Mate was sold out, which was the case even in other places like Parklands Road.

After looking through the stock available something strack me as off when the sales executive pointed me to a Dell Inspiron n5010. Electric Blue with a gun metal finish, smooth and I had seen this before.

Charles Kanyis[1] computer had the same exact design, except the lid was black.

The laptop brought back sooo many memories of my times with Charles and his laptop… which got stolen. I fell in love with the laptop on day one and at the time we bought it, it was pretty damn expensive considering even when Wezesha had cut off 9,600 form the marked price. I didn’t even look at the Blue machine. knowing all to well the expenses that were levied on Charles the last time, only for the expensive piece of hardware to disappear into the night.

To my luck though, the laptop was of lower specs. They are the following.

• Intel Pentium Duo Core 2.16GHz
• 2GB RAM
• The ussual stuff which I still do not give two f_cks about.

The machine is definately what one could call “eye candly”. The blue hue just jumps and grips the imagination of what this computer could be capable of.

Like many geeks would notice Duo Core is a far cry from the current Intel Brands and to say the honest truth I didn’t notice this little detail till I was on the bus home. Come on I thought all computers were Duo 2 Core models already! But I brushed off that stumble by convincing myself that there is no python code I have ever  have written that can even max 1/1000th of the computers Processor. Maybe the thought of not being able to play MW3 will haunt me for a while, though still I think I made the decsion to forfiete Gaming when I chose Ubuntu Linux as my primary OS.

I’ll have to use my bro’s comp to play COD or any game for that matter which is current and on the bleeding edge of modern computing technology. This wouldn’t be so bad. Gaming is best done in the dead of night like I currently do, therefor no plans have been interaptted because of this little debacle.

"Do my shoes match my car or should I get a new car." 

The Blue Laptop also goes astonishing well with something else, the alien blue hue that engulfs Ubuntu Ultimate Edition 2.8!

Now I get the big gist that mac people feel when they use an operating system that matches there hardware.

The Blue Theme just makes the whole computing experience blend together so well. From hardware to software, all I can see is one big block of blue and slight shades of black and silver. This is too cool.

I’m not going to go overboard praising Ubuntu Ultimate Edition, despite it’s obvious eye candy… I have been using Windows 7 for quite a while now and I had already started getting accustomed to the look and feel of it. Not to mention the workflow that comes with it. The last time I used ubuntu was way back when, never on my own machine like I have now. And that was I learning experience that I wouldn’t care to forget.

Before Distros like Fedora, Ultimate Edition and SlackWare came along it was a near immpossible feat to use the operating system without a good and proper internet connection. I think this is still the case because I got a complementary Ubuntu 9.10 distro CD to kick start my use of the computer, lucky enough it had Windows 7 starter installed and I did exactly what I would have done…

Using Windows I burned a copy of Ubuntu and wiped the hard drive clean. FULL ON LINUX BABY.

After typing the word baby I’ve realised that I have not given the new member of my family of tech gadgets a name. Think I’ll name it Deep Blue, after the first computer to beat a chess grand master at chess.

This should sort of reflect what I’d like the machine to be for. I want it to be the first at achiving something that not many or any computer has ever achieved. This is ussualy up to the user and the programmer considering that computers are only tools. So the proper phrase here would be: I want to do something that has never been done before, using my new computer. Hence Deep Blue comes in just fine.

All I have to do now is get it to an internet connection and give it the updates that it so rightfully needs. Think I’ll do that at the iHub.

Finally I get to take a computer to the iHub, things are deffinately looking up.

This month we’re going to continue with our bi-monthly meet ups as we already made a conanical rule during some of our previous meetings. Like always this event is open to public and everyone is envited to bring a friend to the gathering.

Ubuntu Hour 2012 starts at 2nd February at the iHub. Check the mailing list at https://lists.ubuntu.com/mailman/admindb/ubuntu-ke and be sure to sign up to the list if you want future updates on the up comming events.

ION, This is a personal blog, well the last time I checked anyway….. And just to share some bit of what I’ve been up to this couple of weeks (relating to technology of course) I’m getting a new laptop~!

This has to be one of those special things that happen to a geek that most treasure and awe so much throught their lives, hence I can’t afford to mess this up (litterally – I can’t). Yep, you read it right – I didn’t have a laptop before this. I like many other Kenyans some of whom lie under the bunner of “techies” don’t have laptops, and also some like me are just coming around to buying them. Boy oh boy am I exited ! The obvious thing that I started with was not exactly going around window shopping as some of my fellow students once did during the Wezesha initiative, no I took my time  to actually consult the greate Oracles of the web, also known as Google.com and the merchant directory also known as dealfish.co.ke. And I’ve come up with some good reviews of what I went through during both experiences – Google and dealfish are  smart tools, but they didn’t beat the old fashioned Glass on noes approach .

So here it goes. The three contenders are dealfish.com, google trader aaaaand, last but not least, that dead tree the sales clearks hand you over the counter – the price list. The scorse are somewhat not very surprising I might add.

A search on both web based platforms for the machine of my desire pulled up hugely none varing results. Dealfish although proving to be the more informed of the two, though still google trader was very resoursefull to say the least. There was definately redununcy in terms of result, at least on mobile, but this didn’t affect most of my searches. eg A search for a Dell inspiron (my favourite brand due to their numerous opensourse deals with Ubuntu; would return StarCom Ltd (opposite Hilton Hotel) as one of the main sellers.

At the rate dealfish is updating with new content and in some cases widely varing prices, I’m guessing a smaller supplier can overtake Starcom and take the prime spot in my search results. I was heavily realing on the mobile site so forgive me if I’m a bit inaccurate about that.

After searching around the web I must have missed the point of actually going old school and shopping (hopping) around form store to store checking out prices. The best offer I got according to my budget at that time was the Acer Brand. TheAcer TravelMate 5735.  Acer can be quite competitive in prices. This version was a Core i3, 2GB DDR3 RAM….. etc.  And sort of looks like this.

The store attendants were pleasantly surprised at my demands — A machine with Linux NOT Windows. Something they clearly did not hear often.

Hopefully I’ll be able to pick up a few valuable lessons from this purchase, and a good computer as well.

Linux lovers and part of the Ubuntu Kenya community.

#ubuntu hour with @bernardowuor @BMutunga @Freya_nee @masumanx @HarisonWamani @Kirembu @Zacckos and more - KE Team wiki.ubuntu.com/KenyanTeam - next one Wed, Oct 19, 2011

Some of the guys who got to meet up for the event.
Photo curtecy of @grantbow on Flickr

It’s here!!! Just a few more hours left to the official opening of BarCamp Nairobi. Check out the official page where the following announcement has been shamelessly copy pasted from. [deleted]. Hope to see you there.

Announcing BarCamp Nairobi 2011

Here is a snipet of how the event was proposed and organized, courtecy of the iHub Blog

“The Ubuntu Hour was proposed by Director at Partimus and Technologist in Residence at Dreamfish Grant Bowmanand made possible with the help of the iHub staff, iHub Member and Dreamfish Member Bernard Owuor and iHub Member, Dreamfish founder and CEO Tiffany von Emmel.”

The meeting started at  a subtle key with the usual introductions and we  got to know more about each other. To set the ball rolling Mr Bowman gave us a sneak peak into the upcoming Ubuntu 11.10! For those who are familiar with the naming system of each realse would know that it is scheduled to appear for download later this month, hence 11.10. That wasn’t the only jaw dropper, as if our appetite for more wasn’t whet enough, the 11.10 (Oneiric Ocelot) was customized to run on an intel in-development tablet computer. Review on the machine I’ll spare for later but to make this feat more cognisious…. The original os of the tablet was Intel’s MeeGo(which intel claims to still support)

Other gadgets we got to tinker with were a small conspicuously green laptop running puppy linux. The puppy is a light weight linux distro which I’ve gathered could run on the obscurely low RAM that migh prove a challenge to most other Operating System types and flavors.

The next thing was to discus the various aspects of Ubuntu that we loved and others that we as a community weren’t yet satisfied in. matters like the better browser between Mozilla and Chrome both  appeared to gain an equal fellowship form our gathering . In case anyone wanted to use either of the two feel free to drop your view of the ongoing (and seemingly  never ending) browser wars. Note IE is not included.

The next thing was the use of  Ubuntu as an entertainment platform. Most users preffer a touch and go approach to this inconvinencing the Ubuntu flavor when it gets to gaining miles in this field. Most users prefer an experience that did not require leagal knowledge as to why they cannot play mp3 files off the gate. Entertainment was a key feature in current Ubuntu realeses but older distro users are advised to go to http://ubuntustudio.com for a full collection of media codecs and plugings.

Another issue raised was how to increase the user base of the operating system. Various arguments were discussed that clearly sold the os as the best option even and mostly as an academic alternative to various properatery solusions that tend to be more expensive. In the enterprise computing field Ubuntu and Linux servers dominate a majority share of this market even in Kenya. This was a selling point that could encourage new users to pick up use of the operating system. With conanical also providing enterpresise solutions.

Use of the operating system in the various of the Ubuntu group was also a favourable sign. With most admitting that Ubuntu is great for development work, with tools such as gimp, scribble and Libra Office supplementing the various Windows based options such as Adobe PhotoShop, Illustrator and Microsoft Office. This tools are yet to fully compete with the widely used and acclaimed proprietary options but could suffice for most cased.

The Ubuntu Hour turned to a two hour event this was a bit overboard on time management but still most who attended admitted it was well worth it.

Those who made it were. @bernardowuor,@BMutunga ,@Freya_nee,@grantbow ,@HarisonWamani,@Kirembu ,@Zacckos, @ondije_ondije  and more @iHub

Next meetup will be on 19-10-2011.