Info and forum posts by 'umern'

RE: £3 E-Voucher @ HMV

Any one had their voucher yet?

Applied last week - still no sign of it.

RE: Used BMW 5 or BMW 3 - any advice from someone who has owned both

jrinns,
Does your mate find the 530d is good for chucking round corners etc - despite the size?

Used BMW 5 or BMW 3 - any advice from someone who has owned both

Hope you guys can help me decide here - hoping someone here has owned both...

Planning to buy a used BMW for around £5k-£7k which will probably be get me a 5-6 yr old high mileage BMW 3 or 5 series.

Current shortlist is the following:
318i, 320d or 520i or 530d

Also unsure if I want a manual or automatic - been driving automatics for the past few years as the missus only drives autos and we have been sharing the car.

Main priority is a fun drive (for saloon standards) - not so bother about speed - but more about handling and cornering type fun.
Reasons for interest in the 5 series is all the hype you hear about it being the best saloon etc. Also, the extra boot space my come in handy on the occasional trip up north.
In my mind the 3 series definitely sounds like it will be more fun to drive than the 5 - anyone care to comment on this?

Also, has anyone got experience of both the 318i and the 320d - which one did you prefer?

Look forward to the opinions!!

RE: Ramadan - Muslim laws

Some more answers - I am practising muslim who isnt that strict but has some good friends/relatives who are strict and pretty well informed:

2. Do women and from what age need to cover their faces and by how much.
Covering faces is optional - covering hair is supposed to mandatory from puberty.

3. Are you allowed to drink or smoke or do drugs. Is it different for men/women.
Same rule for men/women - drinking is not allowed. The understanding is there is good and bad to alcohol but the bad outweighs the good. Nowadays more and more jurist state that smoking is not allowed as it is proven to cause harm. Self harm is not permitted in Islam.

4. Are you allowed to go to night clubs. Is it different for men/women.
Pretty sure nightclubs are not acceptable as alcohol is served and men and women mix freely. I have been to a wedding of some very strict arab friends and the men and women were strictly seperate. According to my missus the women were quite fashionably dressed under their shrouds and were bopping away to some serious upbeat music. I was in the male section and even the men got in on the traditional arab dancing act - but accompanied by just two drums.

5. Can men have 4 wives or more.
You have to absolutely treat each one equally with regards time and materials (dont have to love each one equally cos that would be impossible) - max of 4 wives.

6. Do you beleive in reincarnation.
NOPE

7. In your holy book, does it state anywhere that it is ok to hurt or kill other people or is this a misinterpretation.
Misinterpretation where people just qoute one sentence and leave out the sentences before and after it and ignore the context. I beleive the bit that gets qouted is `Slay them where ever you may find them`. The sentences concerned were revealed when Islam was still a fledgling religion based in just one small area and was under attack from neighbouring areas. It clearly defines `them` as `those who attack you`. It also states in the next sentence `if they stop fighting you must also desist`. The bit about `where ever you may find them` is actually giving the muslims permission to fight even in the holy city of Makka - if they get attacked. The muslims wanted to make a pilgrimage to Makka but were worried about being attacked and not being able to fight back because of the respect for that area.
As far as killing innocents generally - it is strictly forbidden - even to the point that during times of war you are not allowed to kill cattle or burn down crops of the enemy. Quote:
`…if any one slew a person -.... - it would be as if he slew the whole people`

8. Are you allowed blood transfusion.
Blood transfusion is fine. Organ donation has been debated a lot and most modern jurist say it is permissible with certain conditions attached e.g. age and state of mind of donor. Pretty certain there is NO condition attached about only going to a muslim etc.

9. By not following any laws, are you still a Muslim or would you need to ask for forgiveness. i.e. your temporarily not a Muslim.
By commiting sin you do not leave the fold of Islam. However, if you stop beleiving in God etc then you would leave Islam as the whole point is that you beleive in the one God and the Prophet etc.

I am sure others may have different views but.....

This item was edited on Tuesday, 26th September 2006, 13:26

Whats a reasonable amount of time to wait for a DVD recorder repair

Handed my Panasonic DVD recorder in for repair at Richer sounds on 12th August but still not got it back - nor can I get any idea of when the repair will be done - despite many phone calls to the store.

What do people think is a reasonable time to wait before I start making a fuss? Is there any consumer rights / legal guidelines on how long a repair should take?

Getting a bit impatient here as there is some new series I want to record and I dont have a DVD player so cant even watch any DVDs. Yes I know I could buy a standalone player but dont have the space for it.

RE: Can Anybody Recommend Laptopsdirect.co.uk?

Only used Savastore once (just a few months ago) - had serious problems with their Courier Amtrak - spent 3 days at home waiting despite paying extra for next day delivery. Tried to hassle Savastore during these 3 days and no joy whatsoever.

Tried to get a refund from Savastore for the delivery charge - tooks several emails to get a response and even then they only refunded the next day surcharge - not the full delivery charge - which is what I would have expected as compensation for the inconvenience caused to me. I am sure they could have refused to pay Amtrak for the crap service.

On the subject of Laptopsdirect.co.uk - they are owned by CET Ltd and I ordered a Loox N500 GPS PDA from them a few months back for an absolute bargain £189. I picked the cheaper 4 working days delivery option and it arrived within 2 days.

RE: praise for dabs direct

Did a bit of an impulse buy on a laptop that was on sale at Dabs over 10 days ago.

Then had 2nd thoughts the day it arrived so tried to do a return under the Distance Selling Regulations using their online system. But the system would not let me raise a return request and instead it logged a support request for me. I received an automated email confirming the support request immediately but now has been 10 days and still no response to my support request.

Have decided in the meantime to keep the laptop anyway and sell my old one - but Dabs dont know that and they still havent responded!!

RE: Adobe Premiere Elements 2 and Photoshop Elements 4 £39.99 in Staples

Ok this is the link mentioned on the pack:
http://www.adobe.com/special/rebate.html#q3

Does not seem to mention having to own a competitive or previous version to qualify for the rebate.

and cheers to pavslovspooch for spotting the typo - have corrected it

This item was edited on Sunday, 23rd April 2006, 17:49

RE: DVD-r to DVD-r/w

Check out the following guide on how to merge two titles onto one disc using DVD Shrink.
Might not be exactly what you are after but might help:

http://www.doom9.org/index.html?/mpg/dvdshrink31-main.htm

RE: Any cheap Region 1 UMD suppliers?

I am also in a similar situation and after a fair bit of research on various forums I dont think the Devhook allows you to run other regiond movies.
As far I can tell there is no way of doing multiregion on a PSP at this moment. I would be happy to corrected :)

Gripshift for PSP only £9.99 at Toys R Us instore

Gripshift for PSP only £9.99 at Toys R Us

Was at my local store (Ilford) and they quite a few in stock.

Seems like a fairly reasonable game - well worth £10

Also had Mercury for £15

RE: Spooks - complaints to BBC

Neiliboy - are you a hindu or shikh / Indian / Pakistani?
I have family in India who have also suffered at the hands of Hindus so please dont start that India Pakistan, Hindu / Muslim rubbish. People got killed and suffered on both sides during the formation of Pakistan / India and continue to suffer.

Christian and Jews lived in Iraq alongside Muslims and werent any worse off than the Muslims. Tariq Aziz is a Christian. There are Jews and Christians living perfectly happily in Turkey and they have done so for hundreds of years under Ottoman rule etc There are Christians in Iran living without any fear. Islam teaches tolerance of other religions especially Christianity but it does not teach turning the other cheek.

In Palestine Muslims and Christian Palestinians fight together against the Israeli army. The Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade is not an Islamic group, it is a secular one whose leadership is mainly Christian!

Yes in some African countries there is violence between Christians and Muslims but that is usually down to some asshole politician inciting hatred to win a few votes - just like in India and Pakistan where Hindus attack Muslims and Muslims attack Hindus etc.

Politicians will always use Religion to gain support. But it makes great material for Racist / Islamaphobes etc to use blast religions with.

RE: Spooks - complaints to BBC

Complete load of Right wing OR misinformed bollocks talked here.
As a moderate muslim I can assure you that the programme was bollocks.
Muslims (such as myself) do own ITV Digital boxes and so many of us did watch the programme when it was previewed on BBC 3. The complaints were to try and stop it being shown on BBC 1 a few days later.
I can assure you that 99.9% of the mosques in the country are run by old fart trustees that would throw out any one remotely inciting any kind of violence. They are more interested in how much money was raised to make the mosque bigger or to build a mosque back home in India, Pakistan etc.That is why extremist groups such as the one run by Omar al Bakri `Khilafah` are banned from every single mosque that I know off.

Finsbury mosque was an exception becuase there somehow Hamza managed to kick the trustees out and takeover the running of the mosque. This has not happened anywhere else in the UK.
Talking of Finsbury mosque I dont recall any suicide bomb jackets being found when they raided the place. I do remember an electric stun gun being found on the person of on of the guys sleeping there.
WOW. Electric stun gun - WMD! Superb terrorist weapon!! Wey hey! I think the average drug dealer has more dangerous weapons.
How many of the arrested people were charged with Terrorist offences? ZERO!

Some of the people commenting here and the BBC say that the programme did no harm -
So why does Stantz beleive that the everyone who complained is either a msyoginist or an extremist.
I wonder how many other people who watched that programme also walked away thinking that all these mosques are full of people who openly despise this country?
Why is is that two muslim girls wearing a Hijab (of their own will and choice) were attacked on a Bus in Birmingham and references were made to Spooks?
Why is it that racist graffiti was sprayed on a Birmingham mosque - inciting violence on all the `suicide bombers inside the mosque`?

Maybe the muslim community did overreact but that is because we felt we were being unfairly protrayed as murdering nutters.

And yes Muslims do write to the BBC and complain - it is usually about the coverage of the Israeli Palestiniain conflict. About why arab lives are valued less than Israeli lives e.g. the killing of two Israeli soldiers is put before the killing of 5 Palestiniain women and children. About how illegal assasinations by the Israeli army are reffered to as targeted killings when usually a number of civilians are also killed. It is that kind of thing most muslims complain about. I beleive the complaints most Muslims makes are about ones that show the hypocrisy of the perceived media support of Zionism - a clearly racist ideology.

Most Muslims have got nothing against British or American people. What they are saddened or frustrated by is the hypocrisy of it all.

To all you War Mongers on this website - WHERE ARE THE WMDS? WHERE ARE THE TERRORIST LINKS? WHERE IS THE PROOF BEHIND THE BS CLAIMS YOU USED TO JUSTIFY THE KILLING OF IRAQI MUSLIMS?

I know many people on this site were against the war on Iraq and I am glad that not everyone thinks all muslims are terrorists. Because that is how I feel sometimes - that people see me as a Muslim and wonder or beleive that I am probably a west hater and have hidden terrorist urges or something. In actual fact I am too busy earning a buck to spend of western goods such as DVDs etc.

I think the other thing that people like Stantz should know is that many women wear the Hijab of their own free will and choice. There is a powerfull resurgence of Islamic values all over the world. I went to Istanbul on Holiday and was suprised to see so many young girls wearing Hijab. We chatted so some of them and they were wearing them of their own free will. Turkey is a secular state with a very anti Islamic administration and army. Students had actually been beaten by police during protests about the right to wear hijab or have a beard on Uni campus etc.

I wont be responding to any comments because I have tried in the past and the Islamaphobes on this site came out with allsort of BS and half truths to try and paint an even worse picture of Islam.

If Islam is so bad then why are so many White, educated people converting to islam in this country? And only a small percentage are because they are marrying a Muslim.
A visit to any Muslim matrimonial website will see loads of ads from White Muslims men and women who have already converted looking for a muslim partner.

You may feel it is msyoginistic for a women to cover her hair or her body. Muslims feel it is msyoginistic for a woman to have to reveal her naked flesh in order to sell a product. How many adverts are there out there now that dont use nudity or sex to sell something? It is a diffrence of opinion - doesnt mean your opinion is the right one.

Besides I am still wondering what the point of this thread was. How dare those silly Muslims complain about a programme on BBC? They should just be glad we let them live in this country and shut up?

This item was edited on Monday, 16th June 2003, 12:34

RE: Customs Limit for Gift

can anyone else confirm the £36 limit?
Also, does anyone know how the duty is calculated?

Customs Limit for Gift

I know the limit for normal Imports is £18 but is there a higher limit for items marked Gift?

I am tempted by the amazing Sopranos deal at EzyDVD but dont want to get stung by customs.

Also, If I were to get stung does anyone how the duty is calculated?

Thanks.

RE: First time Home cinema buyer - Advice needed Package or separates???

Agree with everything RichardH says.

I have an older Cyberhome M512 and the Novatech Speaker setup and for £200 it sounds great. I have plugged the TV into the speakers as well for the Stereo effect when watching normal TV or Video but off course this wont be true Pro Logic surround.

If you do watch a fair bit of TV/Video and need the Pro Logic badly then you will have to spend at least £300. Buy any decent £100 DVD player and spend £200 on the VideoLogic Digitheatre decoder and speaker kit. I understand that his has both Dolby Digital 5.1 and Pro Logic decoding on board.

The Videologic Digitheatre is at www.qed-uk.com for £200. Most places are still asking £250 minimum for it. check out www.videologic.com - they have a link to a number of reviews on the Digitheatre page.

RE: Budget 5.1 system for Samsung 511

I have ordered a VideoLogic Digitheatre silver from www.qed-uk.com for 200quid
It has had some good reviews from both PC and DVD websites etc.

It has a remote control, Dolby Digital and ProLogic decoder etc and looks quite good.
Do a search on www.google.co.uk and you will see some reviews.
OR goto www.videologic.com and from the product information page you can read some reviews.

This item was edited on Wednesday, 3rd April 2002, 20:22

Grundig 6 speaker set from Index/ Acoustic Solution set from Argos - any good?

Index are doing the following for 139 quid.
GRUNDIG HOME THEATRE KIT
5 surround sound speakers. Active sub-woofer. Remote control. 15 watts RMS per channel. 6 channels of sound fed through 6 speakers including a sub-woofer for extra bass.

Does anyone have any experience of this - is it real 5.1 setup or is it some emulation stuff?
Cant find anything on the Grundig website.

Also, Argos have a Acoustic Solutions DS333 6 speaker setup for 99 quid. Is this any good?

This item was edited on Tuesday, 2nd April 2002, 21:06

RE: Ebuyer advice

Ordered eight times over a 12 month period. Only one problem ever - wrong heatsink sent. This was sorted the next after a 15 minute phone call - told me to keep the wrong one and sent me the right one which arrived 2 days later.
The free 3 day delivery (orders over 100GBP) has on most occasions arrived the next day.
I once placed an order for the goods to be sent to the office. This was around 11/9 and security decided that they would not accept any parcels - so I Faxed ebuyer and even tho the parcel had left the warehouse they were able to reroute the parcel to my home address. Impressive stuff!

6 months free mobile line rental.

www.dialaphone.co.uk are doing the 6 months free line rental again.
The following details copied from an email I just got.
Cant be bothered removing the uppercase - sorry!

Offer ends 31st March -
£11.99 LINE RENTAL plus £2 itemised billing= ONLY £13.99 PER MONTH
2p PER MIN for off-peak calls
6 MONTHS LINE RENTAL FREE
50 TEXT MESSAGES EVERY MONTH
600 MINS off peak calls per month
4 MOBILE COVERS
CONNECTION worth £35
PORTABLE HANDS-FREE KIT & IN CAR ADAPTOR
3 MONTHS INSURANCE worth £14.97
FREE CARRY OVER MINUTES
FREE NEXT DAY DELIVERY
14 DAY PEACE OF MIND GUARANTEE

RE: Scart Switch - stop crosstalk?

Cheer pete.

Was in a rush so bought similar item from Index. Works fine except...
The Scart output lead is like 10cm long! Have to leave it dangling from the TV - not a good idea. It will be going back and will try one of the others which requires your own output Scart cable.

RE: Philips 32PW6006C Widescreen for £499!!

Or if you dont need the cabinet and cannot fit the Telly in your car to bring it home Tradex...

Unbeatable.co.uk are doing it for £474+Delivery = £502.46 without a cabinet.

http://www.unbeatable.co.uk/product_main.asp?sku=314327&shopid=SHOPBJECAFBCDDKDFV6767HCHF6660EXPT3536

This item was edited on Thursday, 14th March 2002, 12:49

RE: Whats the minimum spec req to run Windows XP ??

Prodcu*t F**ktivation!

I have 2 licensed copies of XP Pro.

I recently installed Wireless networking on my Desktop (and choose that moment to add a Firewire card and remove my normal Ethernet card.

Had to reactivate! Phoned the automated line and the numbers it gave did not work. Had to hold for the human operator.
He was a pain in the ass, I must have let it slip that I have two licences and he kept asking why I had 2!
I had to then repeat over and over what I had changed in the machine, why I had changed, what make and model everything was - inquisition or what.
Finally got the reactivation code, but now I am dreading my next PC upgrade.

Auction: Planet of the Apes 2001 2 Disc DVD R2 SEALED

[+P]£11.00[-P][+D]06-Mar-02 07:44:33 GMT[-D][+I]1521486418[-I]The 2001 blockbuster with Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth, Helena Bonham Carter and Michael Clarke Duncan.2 Disc Special Edition, SEALED and UNOPENED.

Shipping £1.50 for Recorded Delivery

Payment by NoChex or cheque/postal order

I bought two copies from the WHSmith 2 for £25 deal. Happy to sell at my cost price - unless Ebay nuts bid too much!

RE: no more dvds on pcworld website

I ordered Mummy Returns and Bridget jones at around 10:00am yesterday.
I told a friend and he ordered Mummy Returns around 10:30.

My order was cancelled and yet his has been accepted and confirmed i.e. two emails and credit card charged!

RIP OFF!!

THOMSON 32WR25UG *VIRT.DOLBY* SILVER - Any good?

Is anyone familiar with this model?
Is is any good?
I am not expecting stunning - just competent.

RE: Half price printer from Toys R Us web site

If you are doing mainly Black and White printing and using more than three carts a year consider getting yourself a Laser.

I did just that last week after putting it off for months (and two Black ink carts later).

http://www.dabs.com/zgjfc £116 inc VAT and free delivery. Comes with one starter toner - good for 1000 pages and a FREE second Full toner good for 2500-3500 pages. Excellent print quality, sharp text and very dark even in Toner Saver mode. Toners are around £43 - twice the cost of a black ink cartidge but a damn site more number of printed pages.

RE: Adsl Price drop

Eclipse Home500Lite product £22.75+VAT (£26.73inc VAT).

Griffin Home £22.50+VAT

Pipex £23.44 inc VAT for the Xtreme Solo product.

Freedom-2-Surf (setup: £59.99+vat) Home 500 (residential) £19.15/mo

BTopenworld have announced that a price cut will happen for existing customers.

Centrica/OneTel £25.53+vat for their home and business "plug & play" package.

Power Internet Ltd. long term contract packages. Details £20 incl. VAT on 24 month contract - Setup Charge £45+VAT

See http://www.adslguide.org.uk for full details.

With people like Eclipse doing one month contracts you dont need to wait - just pay a bit extra for one month.

Go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on.

I made the move back in December - cant beleive I used to surf at 56k once. I have a Wireless network setup as well which means I leave a Laptop switched on in the living room which I can just pick up and check email etc as and when I feel like it.
Excellent stuff.

Converting Digital photos to VCD/SVCD

Apologies if this is old hat...

I bought a Digital camera last year and have taken hundreds of photos. I certainly cant afford to print them all out, so I have been looking for an easy way for the missus to view them (without using the PC).
I found the following tip on a website somewhere a while ago and tried it out last night - works fairly well.

1. Use Nero 5
2. Choose "New Video CD or SVCD"
3. Drag all your JPG files over into the CD window
4. Choose `Select All`
5. Click `Properties`
6. Put a time delay in (5-10 seconds usually is OK)
7. Hit `Write`
8. Stick the CD into your VCD compatible DVD player and you get a slideshow. You can use the chapter jump buttons to override the time delay.

The colours were a bit washed out under the Scart connection but looked much better with the SVHS output selected - I have an el cheapo CyberHome 512. Good for Family shots, obviously not as good for scenic shots etc.

I hope all the jammy bargain Kodak owners out there find this usefull.

If you are an XP user the following tip might be of some use. If you have taken a number of Portrait photographs (ie holding the camera sideways)- they are awkard to view on a PC and the following tip saves opening and rotating each one individually in a photo editor.
1. In the XP Explorer, tag the folder containing your photos as a Picture folder so you can see a thumbnail of each photo.
2.Select all your Portrait shots and then right mouse click.
3.Use the Rotate Clockwise/counter clockwise option to convert them all in one go.

This item was edited on Thursday, 14th February 2002, 10:33

RE: Selling or exchanging used DVDs

Also check out http://uk.auctions.yahoo.com

Dont know if DVDs sell on there as well as ebay but the great thing is that at present it is totally FREE - yes no listing fees and no sell fees either!

I have sold a few things on there - low value such as a DVD, PC Game, PC card and high value such as a Mobile Phone and Wireless Networking kit etc - so there are definitely decent buyers on Yahoo!