Category Archives: loans

The iPhone 5 launches tomorrow in Bengaluru !

 

 

 

Apple is finally launching the iPhone 5 tomorrow in India. A mail from the imagine store specifies that they would launch the iPhone 5 tomorrow. What is already a well known fact is that the iPhone 5 replaces the earlier iPhone 4S with the pricing remaining intact at about 44,500 for the 16GB version, 52,500 for the 32GB and a whopping 59,000+ for the 64GB version.

 

At the price of the 64GB version Indians could do a lot of better things like paying 6 months of rent for a house, or buying a bike, or even buying an iMac. For the more culinary oriented guys, this money can buy you 300 costa cafe mochas, or about 600 MacD burgers.

 

While the iPhone 5 definitely has a lot going for its design and functionalities with the iOS6, it still does not justify the price being double of what other smartphones that provide same or similar features. S3, or the HTC 1x for instance.

 

Where Apple shines as compared to the others is in honoring its device warranty with mostly a replacement for devices like the iPhone or the iPad or with a definitive repair for the iMac. But these goodies too come with a cost of roughly 10%-20% of the product price in terms of a yearly Apple care cost. While this is still justified for the iMac or the Macbook Pro, it most certainly looks to be an overkill for a device such as an iPad or a phone.

 

With the leading phones by HTC, Samsung and Google at roughly half the cost, Apple’s iPhone 5 pricing seems to bring down the sheen in a highly competitive market. Add to that propreitary accessories, plus inaccessibility to the file system and not much real functionality available and the recipe isn’t even worth what you are paying for. Add to that a sloppy maps and siri functionality for India, and you would be having a dead on arrival product as compared to other phones which are live and fresh at the moment.

 

Google and Samsung are right on top of the game giving Apple a tough time in terms of pricing. While Apple still would make most of its revenues in America, Europe, and UK alone, there is a fierce couter attack on the Asian side from the Korean giants Samsung and LG. LG’s upcoming nexus 4 will be butter smooth, has had a great review on major websites, plus at half the cost and much better google integration is more than ready to trounce the iPhone hands down.

 

The latest release of Google’s voice search for Apple devices only goes to prove how important Indian english as an accent is for India specific devices. The accuracy of Google’s software is simply mindblowing and more realistic than the dreamy Siri software which is more based on retrospecting on the questions asked to it. Needless to say the gaffe on the siri and maps precision has led to Apple asking its executives handling these to depart which has also led to its share price erosion to some extent and also brings to the forefront the possible bitter politics that can rear its ugly head sooner or later.

 

There is also no conclusion on whether the carriers would be launching nano-sims across the country once the device is rolled out. Most likely they will but they remain until this day tightlipped about this possibility even many of us already know too much about the iPhone. The iOS6 itself is losing some of its sheen after the jelly bean 4.2 update as the iOS6 has no great additions than what used to already be there.

 

So given the upsides and downsides of the iPhone 5 launch, would you go ahead and buy one of these? I would love to hear from you on this! Go ahead pour your comments!

 

 

 

KHB notifies public auction of corner sites in KHB suryanagar Phase-1 on 30th of august, 2012

KHB recently put up an advertisement listing out sites for public auction in the 1st Phase. Basically all the sites are corner sites. This auction will happen at KHB office in Cauvery Bhavan on 30th of august, 2012 in the morning at 11:00.

khb

 

The following are the conditions of the auction in brief

  1. Sites are on as is where is basis
  2. People participating must inspect the properties upfront
  3. Rs.50000/- is the fee to participate in the auction and this has to be paid upfront as a deposit.
  4. This can be paid by preparing a DD in the name of Commissioner, Karnataka Housing Board, Bangalore or by cash.
  5. Those who dont win the auction, would be refunded on the spot after the auction is over
  6. Tokens would be provided to those in a queue if they arrive before auction time well in advance
  7. Tokens will be issued by 10am
  8. Those who come later than 11 will not be allowed into the auction
  9. Those who win the auction must pay 25% of the bid amount to the nominated banks within the next day banking hours close
  10. This should be accompanies with recent 2 passport size photos and address proof.
  11. Those whose names the tokens are provided on, would be the ones to whom the property would be registered and no one else.
  12. The KHB has the right to cancel this auction at anytime for any reason.

For more information the contact numbers of KHB related to this auction are:

080-2780 4400
99808 69439
94490 47084
080 – 2227 3511

Please note: this is NOT an e-auction, so you have to be physically present there.

Good luck to everyone who is attempting and it would be much appreciated if you can provide the details of the winning bid amounts against the dimensions once the auction is over for the notice of other readers and their benefit!

 

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The math of owning cars – diesel or petrol ?

There are many factors today to decide on what car to own. Compared to a few years ago, these days the fuel price of petrol has skyrocketed from about 55 bucks to a whopping 75 bucks per litre. So is it really high then or is it just a perception that owning petrol cars is now more costly? Lets do a reality check shall we?

A petrol sedan costs on the road in Bangalore, about 8.5 lacs. While a diesel version about 9.8 lacs. For about 50000km of drive irrespective of where you take it and how you finish the distance, and in how much time for calculation – we just consider the distance alone.

We further assume petrol price is 75 bucks, and the fuel economy is around 12kmpl. Similarly diesel is 46 bucks and the fuel economy is around 15kmpl (maybe more though). With this assumption, for a distance of 50000kms we need about 4167 litres of petrol and 3333 litres of diesel. The cost of this fuel is respectively Rs.312525 and Rs.153333 for 50000km of usage. Add these values to the base prices of the vehicle mentioned above and we get a cost of Rs.1112525, and Rs.1133333.

Let us take service costs for petrol to be Rs.1000 for first service, 3000 for second, 5000 for third and 7000 for fourth and 10000 for fifth. So the total here is 26000 bucks. Consider the same for diesel to be Rs.1500, 5000, 10000, 12000 and 15000 and we have a figure of 42000 bucks.

Add this again to previously computed values and we have Rs.1138525 Rs.1175333 for a petrol and diesel vehicle over about 50000km of driving.

If you were to drive about 15000km every year, you will need 3 years to manage this distance. However if you are even more conservative then perhaps 5 years to complete the same distance.

So for the first 50000km the diesel vehicle is atmost about 40000 rupees more expensive to own! Now what then differentiates the diesel from the petrol vehicle is not fuel price, service cost or features – but just the engine characteristics – not even mileage as the arithmetic is more or less close.

So tell me which one would you now consider? :-)

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The Beat Diesel Test Drive

Though this review comes after a long while, it carries with it some salient points about the Chevrolet Beat which is now in an improved version with a diesel heart and much unlike its predecessor where some key areas are concerned. It was a sweltering hot winter afternoon in Bangalore when I decided to take up the test drive for this car. Briefly I will take you over with the process so you may understand this car all the way from the dealership perspective upto the drive itself.

Dealerships

Firstly and interestingly a google search for Chevy dealers in Bangalore throws up only three results which are shown below:

Kropex India Ltd
Address:49/1 Singasandara, Hosur Main Road, Bangalore.,
Bangalore, Karnataka, 560068

Phone: 080-43574357 / 09663388830 / 9663388812
Fax: 080-43574353

Email: kropex.sales@gmidealer.com

Sundaram Motors
Address:P.B.No 5358,107, Kasturba Road, Bangalore.,
Bangalore, Karnataka, 560001

Phone: 080 – 22070709 – 13 / 22070751 – 3 / 9880631313

Email: sundaram2.sales@gmidealer.com

Trident Chevrolet
Address:No.122/1, C. Shankar Reddy Layout, Kalyan Nagar Outer Ring Road, Bangalore.,
Bangalore, Karnataka, 560043

Phone: 080- 43430500

Email: tridentban.service@gmidealer.com

Upon visiting Kasturba road for a different reason which i will come to in a different post, I found that the Sundaram GM dealership was under lock and key and they seemed to have moved elsewhere. While I did not care to check, I also knew the Outer Ring Road showroom was a mere showroom of a very small size without any servicing options. I do remember there was one on Mahadevapura Main Road leading to whitefield, but it was somehow conspiciously missing from out here in this list above !! Since the Singasandra one was near my home, I reached there after informing apriori that I would be there.

Cars in the showroom

The showroom itself is impressive with an entire range of cars put up there under the Chevry Umbrella starting from the barebones Spark upto the Fully loaded Captiva. The Sail sedan and hatch are yet to make it even to showrooms as they were just recently showcased at the auto expo in Delhi.

A friendly supervisor let me meddle with all cars including the Cruze until the test drive itself was ready. One thing that struck me immediately was that all Chevy cars were low in seating much like yours truly Honda. Somehow I think these are not suitable with back problems for easy ingress/egress. The Beat thankfully was a bit more supportive of the driver if not necessarily the passenger.

Chevy Beat

Beat Multimedia Colours mm gal 1 2011 992x325 07

(Image courtesy: www.chevrolet.co.in)

As we already know, the petrol Beat has been doing its rounds for a year or more now so many people already know the cockpit internals of the car along with a billion digital meters and displays. So its worthwhile just dwelling into the new diesel and outlining its good points and pitfalls. My test drive was about 3-4 kms which included great highway roads, congested city roads, broken gravel roads, ditches and road humps, curves and straight lines and some U-turns. This was a clear representation of what a test drive must be like. So how did the Beat Diesel perform? Read on!

Continue reading →

ICICI bank to provide social banking through Facebook in 2012

According to an email received, ICICI bank is set to usher in banking via Facebook in the year 2012. It is not exactly clear what or how they intend to do it. But for starters they are planning to include a page of their own for you to like on Facebook.

Here is an except of the plan:

As we step into 2012, we re-affirm our commitment to continue offering you superior banking services in line with our philosophy of ‘Khayaal Aapka’. We are pleased to inform you that ICICI Bank will soon be present on Facebook. The ICICI Bank page will include a one-of-its kind ‘Your Bank Account’ app through which you can access your bank account information while on Facebook. You can also choose to ‘Like’ our page and get updates on exclusive offers.

It is only known at this point that they will provide an app which will let you interact with the bank backend. But given the number of security loopholes in Facebook or any other social application/website so far, this in my opinion is only a recipe for minor disasters on average users who are already being lured by useless offers and mails.

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Swift Dzire sub 4 metre compact sedan launching for Christmas, deliveries will start in the new year

History of news flow

Autocar India, the country’s premier automotive magazine reported late April, 2011 that the new Maruti Swift Dzire would get shorter and cheaper.

It also made an audacious attempt in getting an actual picture of the compact sedan and succeeded very well. The image which it claims was taken by one of its readers (not me!) is the one you see below.

newdzire

(source: www.autocarindia.com)

 

Since this article many websites such as motoroids.com, bharatautos.com and indianautosblog.com have been citing the original article from autocar india, and bharatautos even went one step further in morphing the new swift with the old dzire to produce its own rendering of what the car would be like.

I even saw another launch photo of the dezire with a boot like the old premier padmini 118 NE, sort of ridiculous looking, the source of which I dont have (with due respects to the owner)

photo-dz

 

Well now its time to reveal some rather accurate information about the new swift dzire.

Interiors and Design

The swift dzire due to its sub 4-metre length is expected to cost lesser. For the sake of simplicity we will talk only about the high end variant the ZDi. Currently with the recent increase of prices from maruti, the on road price in Bangalore is about 8.7 lakhs. The interiors of the new compact dZire is going to be exactly similar to the existing new swift.

ScreenHunter 01 Nov

(source www.marutiswift.com)

The fabric quality is obviously better, and you can notice the marginal increase in space at the backseat. The gearshift remains same from the original swift and swift dZire. There are chrome bits near the a/c vents, and the dashboard itself and so also on the doors and window linings. As in the case of the swift, there is no 60:40 seat folding option here, but then when you have a boot already, you can just fold the seat completely and it will become better and bigger. Since the dZire will be a passenger car, Maruti might decide to make the interior seating Beige in colour which is yet to be seen. Even the beige interior looks pretty good in the swift as was in the case of the earlier dZire and finally its upto owners to have seats of their choice. Karlsson and Autoform are two good companies to opt for with respect to seating as their jobs are perfect and the styling is top notch.

ScreenHunter 02 Nov

Note that the new dZire will also sport the same stereo system as in the new swift. Its a waterfall model stereo system. I have tested this system out and it is not as good as it is in the FIGO. But that is because Ford has intelligently packaged the stereo and speakers. The speakers on the front doors have a hollow region to create an impeccable undistorted bass. In the swift though that will be sorely missed. The new dZire will not have bluetooth functionality, though it will have stereo controls on the steering and Mp3, USB ports. Which brings me to the steering itself.

The steering is an excellent creation and its electrically assisted, making it butter smooth. The churn is simply awesome when you want to use that 4.6m turning radius to turn the car into cramped places. The steering is a joy to use and is precise and accurate and smoother compared to the old swift. Do not forget to wrap it with some genuine leather and it will be the best beyond that for a car of this price range. The horn is not worth it on the stock setup and its worthwhile to install the windtone horn (skoda or polo type horn) as an after market accessory.

After having had some success with Sx4′s practical design, the new dZire will carry over the same legacy with bottle holders on all doors, and a nice retractable cup holder right next to the co-passenger A/c Vent

ScreenHunter 03 Nov

(source: Swift brochure)

 

Exteriors, and rear assembly

The only question that everyone has about the dZire is – why should a car that has been designed that everyone should hate it named as – the dZire!? It sold in thousands, but yet everyone hated it. It had a waiting period of 4-5 months, yet everyone hated it, but yet Maruti made huge sales. So will the new dZire be again the same story with respect to styling of the rear? The big-ass boot if I may call it so? The good news is NO. Observe the first picture provided by autocar and in the rear you will observe that the new car has an sX4 style tailllamp. So now the differences between the old and new dZire models will be evident if you look below.

comapre

So if I were to hammer the boot of the existing dZire a bit from the top to flatten it, and remove its taillamps to give it the sX4 style taillamps, the dZire would then be looking much more nicer and similar to the first photograph above. You get an idea dont you? The car becomes much more buyable by nature. Given that statement, the new dZire is likely to top charts in bookings by customers when it launches.

So when then will it really launch is the next question. From sources it is likely to be launched by Christmas, and also demoed at the Auto Show coming up in January next year. The training for Maruti salesmen for the new dZire is already over and the car might be expected to hit the stockyards for display and test drives by as soon as December second week.

Performance and some other differences compared to older versions

Everyone knows the power of swift family of vehicles. No one can talk a word against the world famous FIAT multijet engines which are part of many diesel cars including the current swift and the older dZire models. I have personally driven all the vehicles which have this engine and those that have other diesel engines just to find out the difference in tuning. The new Swift and dZire have some changes in tuning. In the older cars, the torque of 190Nm started appearing around 1700 rpm onwards, but in the new cars the torque now appears only at 2000rpm. In layman’s terms this means that one has to reach 2000 rpm quickly and be at that level to experience the fun side of this car. Having said that, I have driven the new swift at 10kmph speed in second gear, 20kmph at third gear, and about 30-35kmph in fourth and fifth and one of the strongest points of this engine is that it does not switch off at these speeds which gives excellent driveability. For those who have driven the old swift they will know how silent the engine was on the inside. If I were to amplify that silence and make it 10 times better by padding the right bits in and around the car interior, thats called the new swift ! The silence is overwhelmingly impressive inside the car.

The top end drive remains as good as the older versions and there is no change here barring the extra welcome silence which is appreciated. For cruising between 90 and 110 this car will be very peaceful on the inside. The new dZire also had an added armrest for the driver which was not present in the older one.

Costing and conclusions

The dZire due to its sub-4m length is bound to attract only 10-12% duty instead of the usual 22%. For an on road price of 8.7 roughly this translates to about 87,000. But due to input costs being higher, one can expect less than half that as a discount to the end buyer which means the new dZire ZDi is bound to cost about 8.3 lacs for a sub 4m sedan. For another lakh more there are bigger better sedans with fuller boot so its hard to say whether this car will find a market at that price. Given the 90bhp version of the same FIAT engine plonked into its bigger cousin the SX4, and overpriced beyond 10 lakhs for no good reason, there is a fair chance people would be better off with the 75bhp compact sedan at 8.3 lakhs rather than a bigger underpowered cousin at 10.3 lakhs.

With Airbags, ABS, a butter smooth steering and a highly damped interior, the swift dZire compact sedan will have a charm of its own. The rear styling being correct is enough reason for potential buyers to now start taking this compact sedan more seriously. With a mileage of about 15 in the city and about 18-20 kmpl on the highway this is not going to be exactly a chartbuster but reasonable enough for daily runs and nice highway trips if you are that kind.

So dealers are now discreetly accepting bookings for this new version and the older one will be phased out by mid to end december 2011. Only time will tell whether this compact sedan finally quenches the buyers dZire for the HEART CAR!

 

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7 reasons TO NOT buy or TO buy the iPhone 4S in India

So the big iPhone launch event is now over and the dust is settling down. I must say that Engadget has done a fine job of updating on the event progress while it was on. It takes a lot of effort for a tech website to be spot on with respect to the updates. Given its experience in handling past Apple launch event this was a cakewalk for Engadget this time as well. Finally Engadget also summarized the whole event in a short bulleted fashion for people who don’t have the time to read the full scoop.

iphone4s-20111005

(image courtesy : Engadget.com)

Given this introduction let us then discuss the top 7 reasons why you should NOT buy the iPhone 4S. These reasons come out of my experience with using the iPhone 3GS for a year or more. So lets head straight on then …

  2. Closed filesystem – While for a person who does not bother to look beyond his iPhone, he can live entirely only with the phone without having the need to transfer anything out of the iPhone. Unfortunately not everyone is like that so one would like to have the ability to transfer important documents, photos, and other files out of the iPhone. This need may arise since we would use the phone with the associated data service to download a lot of useful things from the net. Imagine not having the feasibility to transfer it out of the phone. You might ask me if this is totally impossible – well not exactly – you can do so if you transfer it to another iDevice only.
  3. Absence of ports – I do agree and everyone here would also tend to agree that Apple makes a wonderful set of products. But omitting things like a USB port or a mini HDMI port only means that Apple would want its ecosystem to be protected to such an extent that one has to buy an iMac or iPad to transfer data out or an Apple TV product to transfer video content to a TV. I have a boxee box, which does all that and more by connecting up to a simple WiFi network and it needless to say has a HDMI port, USB slots, SD card slots and wireless NAS accessibility via uPNP protocol. All at < 200$ (Rs.10000). In today’s world, I cannot fathom paying 650$ without any of these just for the sake of lifestyle.
  4. Camera – When Apple launched 3GS version of the iPhone they provided a meagre 3.2 megapixel camera without flash, even when other manufacturers were already on the 5MP bandwagon with dual led flashes. While daylight photos were not so bad, night shots were pathetic. I am not even still considering the time it takes to edit that photo outside of iPhone as the transfer process itself requires iTunes software on an iMac or a PC. Arguably while apple has done away with the need for a PC anymore, can you think of atleast one time where you would love editing your photos on the phone itself. Its a small screen and you will run out of patience pretty soon. You might be wondering that it still has a 1080P full HD recording ability and hence more superior than a few other phones. Well I do tend to agree, but it all boils down to the same question as earlier – how would you transfer the content out for proper processing before sharing. For novices the phone would do it all automatically by processing and uploading to a video sharing service such as youtube, but for professionals who would like to edit the video more in depth, would find it intimidating when the device does not allow certain things. Coming to apple’s claim that the camera takes pictures in 1.1 second with a 0.5 second timing after the first picture, there are many other phones which also take pictures in about two seconds or so and offer face recognition since a couple of years now and this is nothing ground breaking. If i can wait for 1 second, i can also wait for 3 seconds!
  5. Pricing and rollout countries – Pricing has always been a premium for the iPhone. It continues to be so for the iPhone 4S which will retail for $649 or a little over Rs.32.500 in India on a fully unlocked basis. If you notice carefully India is NOT one of the countries which will get the iPhone 4S on October 28th. This directly shows the step motherly attitude that Apple has towards India. It has not skimped in the same way for the iMac though so far from releasing it on time. There are a lot of factors for this attitude from Apple. In a country where 3G speeds are not as consistent as they should be and in a place where a few thousands of geeks consider that India is geeky just because they use all the tech that is available, it does not mean that there will be millions of sales of the iPhone. The real winners out of phone sales in India would be those who provide dual sim phones with music player and radio, with perhaps a memory card slot thrown in at a rock bottom price of less than 50$ (~ about Rs.2000). Given this situation, a company like Apple which is vying for market share has no business in India with its ultra high end smartphone. And they are in no mood to subsidize it either.
  6. Carrier based subsidies – Unlike in the USA, carrier based phone subsidies and exclusivity for phone launches along with subsidies is not prevalent in India. With mobile number portability in place already, there is hardly any hope for this kind of model to work in India. Without subsidies we are then only looking for a very small percentage of market penetration Apple can achieve with its smartphone.
  7. Other feature sets -
    2. Flash disk size is hardly a differentiating factor these days for phones. I would at the maximum cycle around 1000 songs in my entire phone owning history and if I have 10000 songs while its good, we are talking only of a very select subsection of smartphone owners who are bound to be such music addicts. So if I am not a music and movie addicts there is no way that I can put the iPhone’s 16GB space to have anything else practically given the limitations on what can be stored and what not.
    3. GSM/CDMA universality is again anything groundbreaking. The early advent of dual sim, triple sim, and quad sim phones with multiple combinations of GSM/CDMA are more than already enough to provide the flexibility and for Indian’s going abroad there is a rare necessity to use two SIM cards on the same phone even alternatively instead of in parallel.
    4. iOS5 with iCloud - While the iCloud (which I had written about here) is a brilliant effort by apple for descoping physical limitations of the device storage, the concept itself is nothing groundbreaking. Almost every other provider is now on the cloud. The difference might lie in the way the other providers (versus apple) that let you access the cloud. On windows, accessing apple cloud is the slowest so far compared to say even Hotmail. Amazon cloud is yet to be tested by me and how Google might fare is only a fair guess having used google for a lot of time now. The real problem with iCloud is the missing information or lack of knowledge of how to find the files stored in the cloud. While other providers just list what you have in the cloud, Apple has incorporated the cloud concept into every application. So if I want to open some content, the only way is to get into the application having the ability to open that content, and then find the stored cloud content which I have created. This approach is useless and in no way enables me to get what I need quickly. I do appreciate apple’s clutter free approach in keeping cloud content specific to the applications that can harness it, thereby classifying it properly, but what is the use if I cannot see what I have stored in entireity on the cloud (ala Kindle Fire) ? The notification bar in iOS 5 has no quick launch buttons for bluetooth, WiFi, etc even in iOS5 !!
  8. Font and screen sizes – due to the limited screen size, even tasks such as facebooking, or emailing on an iPhone is not possible for a long duration. After prolonged use of the iPhone 3GS i have already increased the font size in order to prevent permanent damage to my eyes. Kids playing games on a small screen are only inviting a disaster as far as their visual abilities are concerned. On the outset it does not look like a big issue to many, but as a user of iPhone over a year, I cannot underline the importance of doing certain things on a bigger screen device. Atleast 7 inches of screen size, and most preferably a 10″ screen. This is the most ideal for heavy multitasking even if its just gaming or browsing or reading. This is perhaps where the kindle screen is a better alternative with e-ink technology compared to a retina display which is dazzling rather than practical to the already strained eye.

So if the Apple iPhone launch was all about brickbats, are there no boquets then? Your guess is as good as mine. Apple is a company which stresses on innovation. And when the give a feature they will implement it in a way incomparable to other mobile manufacturers. The TOP 7 reasons why you MUST go for an iPhone would be:

  2. Siri voice recognition – Here is an app which recognizes what you need and contextually remembers and answers all your related questions. Going all the way upto taking the stress out of you to do mundane tasks such as sending messages, shuffling music, etc. But the big question here is whether it will understand Indian English accent? That is yet to be proven and only time will tell.
  3. iTunes match - it is not clear how well this service will function yet. This seems to be a nice feature, but not compelling enough for an iphone buyer in India even if he is a music addict.
  4. the A5 chip – Apple’s processors are always a judicious choice and if you have seen the way an iPad 2 behavious with respect to screen renderings for graphical applications or games, then its not hard to imagine how blazing fast the iPhone 4S would be in the same aspects.
  5. Airplay mirroring - agree that this is a seamless feature, but it also requires equipment on the other end to support this kind of handover of content like a TV taking over from iPhone or gaming on the TV from an iPhone. We are still talking about a good six months before someone makes this possible. For those devices that already have airplay enabled, they will profit from this feature immediately
  6. Battery life - For those who own current generation apple devices they will already know the state of their battery prowess. Start with 100% at morning coffee, and you are < 10% before an evening coffee, leave alone dinner. Apple seems to have understood this and have high claims on battery life. This simply means the new iPhone would very well extend into day two of battery being in good shape kicking out those silly Mophie and other juice products into the bin sooner than later.
  7. Lifestyle device category - I cannot stress on this aspect any further than I always have. Apple makes lifestyle products. One that suits all age groups. So if I can do something on my iPhone, my kid can find something else worth doing for his age, and my aged parents can marvel and photo album swipes for their age and understanding. This is where Apple really shines and one device can keep all ages happy.
  8. App store - Apple we know pioneered the concept of app store and today they have anywhere more than 1,50,000 apps. This pretty much means you have an app that will help you brush your teeth and an app that will potty train your kids and an app which will monitor vital health signs of a sick aged person at your house if necessary. Extending the app store to iMac, iPad and the iPhone apple has ensured that they are on top of the money minting pie for a long time to come. Anybody else who makes mobile devices now has to have a store even it means aping apple and even if it means they have only two apps – facebook and twitter. For me honestly about ten apps should suffice. But it is really the needs and wants of 5% of the worldwide mobile phone market who own this phone that really matters. And the apple app store is pretty much geared to cater to this growing need in style.

So here were my 7 top reasons you should and should not go for the iPhone, now the call is yours. Tell me if you will or wont go for the iPhone 4S by answering the poll below!

BDA launches yet another mega E-auction

The Bangalore Development Authority launched yet another mega e-auction today covering both prominent areas in the IT belt as well as areas in South Bengaluru such as BSK Vth stage.

eauction

 

In the last few e-auctions, people have had some issues with registering for the auction. One day before the auction, people could not register for the auction since the registration link was taken away hours before the auction started. While one can expect that e-auctions would not load the server as in the case of say a railway ticketing system, still BDA needs to iron out a few nitty gritties to make this system more reliable and foolproof.

Now there could always be scenarios where they jack up the price by themselves and in the heat of the moment the participants dont notice it when the auction is going on.

Further BDA’s website was not renewed by them which shows how callous the government department can be at times. Somehow they have found a way to get their website back. But even then, their certificates are not trusted by a browser like Chrome that displays this message.

ScreenHunter 01 Sep

 

With all these drawbacks, this page will show the current auctions going on.

What is important to note is that the minimum bid amount by which an increase can take place is Rs.100/sqauaremeter. Some important information about this event is specified below:

ScreenHunter 02 Sep

 

So if you are participating in the auction for a slice of the Bangalore real estate pie, Good Luck!

 

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Ezone goes into online sales mode

This had to happen someday. Kishore Biyani’s E-Zone was on an expansion spree with many outlets in Bengaluru. The Rajajinagar one was the biggest of all and the Future Group started gobbling up many more properties to open an e-zone everywhere. But what he did not anticipate is the performance of other small time players with the weapon they had against him –  ONLINE SHOPPING!

It is important to understand that when you open an physical store, it is going to cost you money. From the rentals to the employment you need to generate to keep the store going, and the miscellaneous bells and whistles like the parking space the footing of electricity bills and generator fuel and what not. Not to forget to mention the traffic jams generated due to your store, the physical store route is always the least profitable. When it came to electronic gadgets, distributors caught on to the fancy of opening their own stores a-la-ebay.

The small time players dealt everything online and slowly grew big. This included sites like the erstwhile fabmall.com which got taken over by indiaplaza.in, flipkart.com which is waiting on a potential acquisition from a bigger player like Amazon in the USA, and infibeam.com –  another suitor. Now we are not even still talking about online retailers like lootspot.com, letsbuy.com, naaptol.com, theitdepot.com and the likes who can collectively kill E-zone’s entire marketing strategy in one flat year sending it into a loss making enterprise.

Kishore Biyani being an intelligent guy has understood this issue well and has decided to offer e-zone on a platter –  so that young online shoppers who do not have the time and convenience can pick up the items they need online from the same huge store across the street. What matters then are the logistics of how to overthrow established players like flipkart.com in the longer run. E-zone’s strategy for sales has always been linking non moving products bundled into some ridiculously highly priced ‘offers’ which people with common sense can easily grasp and stay away from this store. Their products except the MRP’d ones, have always been on the costlier side of things. Given that they are entering online and the fact that Amazon is going to set up shop in India, this kind of selling strategy might fool a few people but not all those who have time and energy to search out a best deal among participating sites. Amazon can with one sweep of their hand kill E-zone’s forward thinking moves with their established presence and product lines.

Better late than never is always appreciated but unless E-zone tries to price its products competitively online owing to the fact that the factors mentioned in para number two are not there anymore as a liability, this is going to be turning out into yet another dormant online shopping portal. We have see this happening with other portals before, and E-zone is not special to get itself out of this mess. Only time will then tell whether this venture is a success or not.

 

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KHB Suryanagar allotments phase 2 now announced

 

The government of karnataka has today announced the second phase of KHB Suryanagar site allotments. The advertisement is specifically for LIG and MIG houses of 550 square feet and 600 square feet respectively. These translate to roughly 30×40 and 30×50 homes. The number of LIG houses is 110 and the number of MIG houses is 68 that are still available. The payment terms are Rs. 4lacs for the LIG and 4.75 lacs for the MIG. The total value of LIG homes is Rs.16 lacs, and the MIG is Rs. 19 lacs.

The following will be the conditions of the scheme:

  1. The application process is now open
  2. Applications which are not filled properly will be summarily disqualified without assigning reasons
  3. The rules of allotment will be as per stipulated standards of the housing board
  4. If you are from specific castes like SC/ST a certificate from tashildar is required to be provided along with the application
  5. If you are from the army or other forces a certificate from the same office would have to be enclosed with the application
  6. If you are a government employee a letter from the office you work from has to be enclosed with the application
  7. If you are a handicapped person you must enclose a certificate stating your handicap from a registered government practitioner (doctor)
  8. All senior citizens have to attach a copy of their age proof or birth certificate along with application
  9. Every applicant have to provide an affidavit stating how many other properties in the state they have purchased amongst their immediate family members (if any)
  10. The last date for submitting duly filled in applications is 8th of August, 2011 at the designated bank branches
    1. Axis bank Jayanagar
    2. State bank of mysore, CBAB complex caveri bhavan
    3. Corporation Bank, SC road,
    4. Union bank of india, Navrang Circle
  11. For those who have already applied, they need to deposit the difference of initial deposit directly in the name of Commissioner, Karnataka Housing Board, Bangalore using a challan in any of the bank branches mentioned above. All prior applicants must also mention all their personal details along with previous application number, in a slip attached with the challan compulsorily. If any of the details are not mentioned, then those applications cannot be processed due to lack of information
  12. All applicants must pay the intial deposit and the fee for application in one single DD in the name of Commissioner, Karnataka Housing Board, Bangalore. Those not providing initial amount would not be considered for allotment
  13. All allotments are using lottery basis. For those unallotted members, their money (excluding fee) would be reimbursed with interest
  14. Each allottee has to pay the rest of the amount in 4 equal installments. For those who fail to pay the 4 installments as per stipulated time their allotments would be rejected summarily without assigning any reasons.
  15. Only after all successful allotees have paid their full amounts will the house absolute sale deed be executed in their name
  16. For more information you can contact the department coordinator at Suryanagar project division, Suryanagar during office hours or by telephone on 080-27803076
  17. You can also contact Chandranayak or Rajanna at 1st Floor, Cauvery Bhavan, KG Road, Bangalore during office hours or by telephone on 080-22273511-16

NOTE: For all queries on this topic, please discuss on www.khbsuryanagar.com