Garmin ecoRoute currently not available for Asian version of Nuvi 255w

Garmin ecoRoute is a new feature for their GPS navigators which is made freely available to compatible units via the WebUpdater service.

This feature allows users to find more fuel efficient routes when navigating and even track their fuel usage. With ecoRoute, you may be able to save petrol and money by adopting smarter driving habits and finding more fuel-efficient routes.

After ecoRoute is successfully installed, a new Route Preference called "Less Fuel" will be added to the GPS unit. There will also be Fuel Report which tracks fuel usage over time, and Mileage Report which monitors mileage and fuel usage on a per-trip basis.




ecoRoute is available for US version of nuvi 255w. However, an email from Garmin Support confirmed that it is currently not available for Asian version of nuvi 255w, which includes the Sing/Mal version, Taiwan version, India version, etc.

For Asian version of Garmin GPS, currently only Nuvi 765 and Nuvi 1460 are ecoRoute supported.

Let's hope that it will eventually be made available to our Nuvi 255w in the near future.

Do not keep your money in your bank savings account

Do you know how much interest you will get if you keep your money in your bank savings account today?

Here are some of the interest information obtained from the banks' website as of September 2009:

• Public Bank Savelink - 0% for balance <= RM10,000
• Maybank Kawanku - 0% for balance <= RM10,000
• CIMB Regular Savings - 0.05% for balance <= RM25,000
• Hong Leong Savings - 0.10% for balance <= RM10,000
• RHB Passbook - 0% for balance <= RM10,000
• EON Bank Savings - 0.10% for balance <= RM5,000
• Alliance Bank Savings - 0.10% for balance <= RM5,000
• HSBC Premier or PowerVantage - 0% for balance <= RM10,000
• OCBC Premier - 0% for balance <= RM10,000
  

This indicates that you will get 0% interest or very close to that by keeping your money in your bank savings account.

Most banks also have Basic Savings Account which provides a better 0.25% interest for balance <= RM50,000. However, most of them also charge RM8 to the basic savings account annually.

If you still insist to keep your money in a savings account, perhaps you should keep in this Basic Savings Account.

So, it is wiser to keep a minimal amount of money in your savings account, just good enough for day-to-day regular spending. You should have your credit card, short term (<= 3 months) fixed deposit or volatile investment ready for emergency spending.

Then what to do with your money if not keeping in the savings account? Here are some of the better places to park your money:

• Clearing debts
• Flexible Homeloan account
• Investment
• Business
  
• Fixed deposit
• Insurance
• Precious metals/stones
• Valuable collectibles
• etc.

MalFreeMaps moving forward with improved free map

The mapper community supported Malaysia & ASEAN Free Maps Project (MalFreeMaps) releases a new version of free map covering Malaysia/Singapore/Brunei for Garmin GPS every Monday morning without failure.

Today (14 Sept 2009) they've gone to another milestone by releasing an improved version of map with a new versioning scheme, also with new coverage to Indonesia.

The new version is called MFM-Garmin 090914 with the following additional features from the previous version:

• Link to NavNet map in Kalimantan
• Coverage of Southern Thailand (coming soon)
• Optional Chinese POI
• Improved SG Postal Code & Address map with instant search result
• New POI icons
  
• New POI categories with custom icons (coming soon)
• New MFM map generator with option to generate either Full or Lite version
• Topo contours are added into Full-version map
• New multi-language installer
• No more error when uploading map through Mapsource

Click here for more information and download of the free MFM-Garmin 090914 map.

Upgraded Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop RAM to 2.5GB

I have successfully upgraded the RAM of my Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop purchased 3 years ago from the original 512MB to 2.5GB now, and have been using this new configuration for more than 2 months without any problem.

Before this, I heard about the Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop can only support up to 2GB RAM, but now I've confirmed that it can support up to 2.5GB.

The original 512MB RAM residing in Memory Slot 1 of the laptop is of DDR-2 PC2-4200 SO-DIMM running at 533Mhz bus speed. I purchased another Kingston brand 2GB RAM of DDR-2 PC2-5300 CL-5 SO-DIMM which can run at 667Mhz bus speed and slotted it into the empty Memory Slot 2.



As shown in the photo below, the RAM on the left hand side is the original 512MB, and on the right hand side is the new 2GB.



When the laptop first detected the new memory, it displayed a message stating "The amount of system memory has changed." when boot up and seems to be hang at this message. I was a bit worry then, but later found out from Internet that I just need to be patient and wait for a while. The laptop then accepted the new amount of memory and no more similar message appear during boot up therafter.

It seems that both the memory can work together well without any problem, and can even work in Dual Channel Mode. They passed all the stringent memory test in Dell's Diagnostic Utility, and have worked happily for more than 2 months now.

Although the working bus speed has to synchornized to 533Mhz even the PC2-5300 RAM is able to work on the faster 667Mhz, but the performance affected is very much neglegible.

In the BIOS, it correctly detected 512MB + 2048MB = 2560MB RAM has been installed, but it says only 2559MB is available for use. Therefore, the maximum RAM supported by Dell Inspiron 6400 laptop is 2.5GB only, and it will be a waste to install any larger amount than that.



Windows XP detects a total of 2,619,768kB (or 2558.367MB) of RAM.



Notice that I have completely switched off the Virtual Memory by setting the paging file to 0. I have been using the laptop without any Virtual Memory in Windows XP for 2 months, and it just works fine. In fact, it runs much faster than before, and there is less harddisk activity now.