Artistic Controls Blog

In my last blog “Will Fibre Optics Coming to Home” I was wondering will the fibre optics infrastructure will be available to our Malaysian home. As we know fibre optics has been use widely in the backbone cable infrastructure and some business application but has not been available to home use. Finally the wait is over as we will be able to install new fibre optic link in our home as an option packages offered by Telekom Malaysia in the new Unifi packages launched last Wednesday.

Our normal telephone jack and computer network uses copper cabling to transfer data via electrical pulses. Copper cabling has been a standard for data transmission for many years. The maximum speed is up to 100Mbps.

What is Fibre Optic Cable?
Fibre Optic Cable is long thin strands of very pure glass or plastic about the diameter of a human hair. They are arranged in bundles called optical cables and used to transmit light signals for communications over long distances. It uses light pulses to transmit data and not electrical pulses. Light in a fiber optic cable travels through it by constantly bouncing off the cladding. The speed of transmission can be up to 1000Mbps or 1Gbps.

The advantage of using Fibre Optics is less expensive in cost in long run and able to enjoy 20 times faster in Internet browsing and able to watch high definition data live download without interruption.  The ability to transmit voice, data and video (IPTV and Video-On-Demand)  in the same cable infrastructure is the future for home technology.

In Malaysia there are currently only two internet service providers that offer the fibre optics broadband packages. Time dotCom offered Time Fibre Broadband a 10Mbps packages launched early this year and Telekom Malaysia with the Unify Fibre Optics Broadband packages offer up to 20Mbps packages launched last Wednesday.

I will definitely upgrade to fibre optics broadband packages once it is available in Puchong.

Related topics:
Will Fibre Optics coming to home
Telekom Malaysia Launched UniFi High Speed Broadband

The traditional light bulb will no longer be available by January 2014. Bulbs like incandescent light bulbs are considered less energy efficient and will be obsolete in usage by then.

It will be fully replace by compact fluorescent lamps, fluorescent tube and LED lights. This was announced by Power, Green and Water Minister. He said by using more energy efficient bulbs will help reduce energy usage in the country by 1,074 gigawatts a year. The phasing out will be implemented in two phases. The first phase from January to December next year would involve stopping all production , import and sales of 100 watt or higher capacity bulbs.

The second phase from January 2012 till end of 2013 will see an end to the production, import and sales of all other light bulbs. By the LED bulbs will come in heavily as the alternative to incandescent bulbs. A 60W LED bulbs emits the same amount of light as a 250W convention light bulb.

Advantage of using Compact Fluorescent Lamp

• Efficient lamps – about 4 times more efficient than Incandescent lamp
• Long Life about 8,000 – 15,000 hours. Incandescent lamp is about 500 hours

Disadvantage of using Compact Fluorescent Lamp

• More expensive to buy
• Can not be dimmed
• Can not be used in very low temperature or very high temperatures (> 60 C)

By Admin

The lighting bills for your outdoor house need not to be high. But trying to save electricity apart switching when not in used is not that difficult. Here are some tips :

1) Install motion-activated sensor lights that turn on when there is movement in the area as to regular outfoor floodlights that are constantly switching on and consuming your electricity.

2) Consider using low voltage lights or even solar lights to provide outdorr accent lighting.

3) Energy saving bulbs are plenty selling in the store and consider buying them will help the bills a bit.

4) LED outdoor lighting is an alternative choice to provide accent lighting around your house.

5) Modern solar lights stay lit for hours and since they have no wires connected them, they are adpatable for your landscape.

By Admin

One of my business friends complains about the manner and the language the youngster use now a day. And I tend to agreed with him after he relates what happened to me. He received a few rude applications after he advertised the job vacancy in jobstreet. One of the applicants really triggers his frustration.

This is what he received.

He has no choice but to reply in this way.

I must say that in general the younger generation is different from the time when internet age is still an infant. Fifteen years ago when web site and internet is just for the small group of people, most of us graduate know or has been taught the proper way to apply for a job vacancy. At that time it was through by writing a proper application letter. A proper application letter will tell the different either we are in the successful list or they will throw away the letter.

In this world where the internet, facebook, twitters and sms is worldwide we tend to forget the proper manner and language in everyday basic business use.

It does not help when the government changes the method of teaching or simplify the education to allow more passes in the exam. This does not bring well education to the majority of the students.

No wander my friend is not happy with the current education.

Most of the houses or offices will have at least one jack for telephone line and one jack for network line.  How about having one more jack in the house for fibre optics cable to hook up to high speed broadband. Fibre optics has been widely used in industrial and AV system for faster signal loss free data transmission. If this technology is installed in every house you can plug in to watch high definition movie or do life-like video conference instead of just voice.

While the existing wall jacks will remain in place the new fibre optic link will open up a world of offerings via new high speed broadband. Each fibre optics cable no thicker than a piece of thread has the capacity to deliver services such as phone calls, high-definition TV programme and internet access.

So far for the high-definition TV programme only Astro Malaysia has launched the new Sattelite Transmission B yond offering pay services to watch HD content.

Fibre optic cable which uses light signals to transmit data can transfer up to 1000Mbps (1Gbps) whereas copper cable which uses electrical pulses to transmit data can transfer maximun up to 100Mbps. Currently TM Streamyx using copper telephone line offer up to 4Mbps packages.

Whether it can be implemented in Malaysia is remain unknown but Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan has started installing fibre optics in the housing area.

The 5 club operators in Jalan P. Ramlee are allow to have their live bands back again this week end by the local authority. The Beach Club, Thai Club, Aloha, Peppy Garden and Rum Jungle will have their live music back provided they do not play their music too loud.

Earlier on the 1st January 2010 the local authority decided to revoke their entertainment licenses on New Year’s Day after numerous warnings by the DBKL last year to lower the volume of the music. This is because the resident staying around the area complaining about the loud music.

Quiet night at the Beach Club - No Live Bands

During this time there were no live bands play in this area and you can only listen to piped in music when you step inside. Too quiet for Jalan P Ramlee and the scene were rather dead and hollow.  Jalan P. Ramlee is known for its vibrant music and nightlife with an average 5000 visitors mostly foreigners thronging the clubs during the weekends.

“Club owners must make an effort to tone down the volume and ensure the noise threshold is maintained at 65 decibels (dB) or less during the evening and at 55 dB during the day” said the authority. The permitted level for Jalan P. Ramlee is 60 decibels.

I wonder how they are going to measure the sound pressure level (SPL). Is it just outside the club or along the Jalan P Ramlee. Since the club is the open air concept they have to really tone down the loudness inside the club to 65 – 68db in order to have 65 db on the outside.

The last time I was there last year in one of the clubs I think the average sound pressure level (SPLs) inside the club was around 95 dB to 110 dB. To have 65 dB is like walking in a department stores or talking in a noisy office environments. I am not sure this time. I will check out the clubs in one of this day.

Unless they install soundproof devices inside the club to absorb the loudness they cannot really increase the music level.

According to Ronnie Chong who owns Poppy, Beach Club and Rum Jungle said he was happy with decision and would stick to the rules. We as light and sound company and the sound industry in general were happy with this decision also. Let the music play on.

Dec/Jan issues Systems Integration Asia Magazine

The new issue of System Integration Magazine December/January issue has arrive to my office last 2 weeks. I have no time to flip through untill now. Finally today some how I find some time to start reading it. And I like it. As a system integration company it will be good to update ourselves regular on the latest installation articles that happen is our region.

You should by visiting Systems Integration Asia Website for more details.

Firework in KLCC 2010

Happy New Year 2010.

The year 2010 has come with high hope and anticipation from the people all around the world. They usher the year with cheers and fireworks and looking forward for a better year ahead.

Year 2009 has passed and as I looked back to the last year and ask myself what have I done for myself and the company.  Did I do enough? Or have I been wasting time unnecessarily. The answer I think was the year 2009 was a tough year and even though we have achieved many things in sales and projects but I didn’t do enough.

We have done a numbers of good light and sound projects like Ummo building in Pekan, DCA new building in Sepang, UPM new building in Serdang, UiTM Shah Alam and many smaller and preferred installation around Selangor and Kuala Lumpur and Malaysia is general. We set up a showroom for light and sound in Puchong, upgrade a few sales marketing and the website and secured a few projects for 2010.

Looking back the efforts that we put in just to achieve these result is too much. We have to spend many resources and it does not justify the outcome and we still have inefficient working method where we spend many hours just to get one task done. Spend more than 10 man hours just to get a simple sales proposal done is no good. Some time our technical team have to go to the site a few times just to solve a few problem. The reason given was not enough information given, parts is not enough and need to come to buy, contractor pull the wrong cable or worst still waiting for other people to come.

Of course some factor is due to external environment and we have no control in it. The efficient level of the local contractor is still on the average as there is no qualify people to do a certain job. The consultant and the project manager some time play a pushing game and we as the contractor have to undertake most of the blames in order to get moving.

Competition is still very stiff in the light and sound contracting work. Other supplier is trying to undercut or to bypass us by quoting directly to the client. We specify their product in and we hope with this effort we have the chance of winning the project. But these supplier quote directly to the client in order to earn higher profit.

Another external factor where we feel is not right is the contractor did not pay us promptly when work has been completed and done. The common answer is that they have not received payment from the owner and they expect us to wait. Even though they receive the payment but they delay paying us.

If we follow the same method of working attitude and business method for this year then they will definitely see the same result as last year and there will no improvement. I must do things differently this year in order to see a better result at the end of 2010.

This is what I will do for year 2010.

1)    To spend less hour in getting work done by improving the system around the office.

2)    To train more in house technician and technical team so that they can do faster installation and solve problem easily. This can only be done by sending them to more product training.

3)    Get more main products ourselves by becoming the distributor rather than just another product dealer.  This means increase our in house marketing and sales. We don’t want to rely so much on the third party product.

4)    Organized and update the sales and marketing catalogue/material in the server and get more drawing updated for quick proposal.

5)    Invest on the presentation software like the 3-D visualization. Your client will be impress with the presentation.

6)    On the personal matter I will spend less hours working especially in front of my computer and spend more time to myself and with family and friends. Will I achieve it? Let us see.

7)    Lastly, I will blog more.

That’s it. This will be my New Year resolution and do the things differently in this more challenging year 2010. What about you? Have you done enough last year and what about this year?

By Michael Liew

Merry Christmas And Happy New Year

We at Artistic Controls would like to wish all our customers and friends and business partners a Merry Christmas And Happy New Year.

Though we like to go for a long holiday like our friends in the UK but we will be back to work on 28th December.

Happy Holidays from the Artistic team.

Budget 2010

Datuk Seri Mohd Najib Tun Razak the prime minister of Malaysia on yesterday Friday tabled the 2010 Budget totaling RM191.5 billion and which has a three-pronged strategy to drive the nation towards a high-income economy; ensuring holistic and sustainable development; and focusing on the well-being of the people.

Najib said that to drive the country towards a high-income economy, the government would encourage increased private investment, provide a business-friendly environment and implement privatization initiatives.

The prime minister said RM20.3 billion is allocated to the social sector encompassing education and training, health, welfare, housing and community development, RM3.7 billion is for the development of the security sector, RM1.8 billion for general administration and RM2 billion for contingencies.

To me I wanted to see if the budget has some benefit for the business point of view. I read through 49 pages of the text and here are some points I pick up that could benefit my company business and light and sound industry in general.

1.    Among projects to be implemented in 2010 include the development of an Integrated Immigration, Customs and Quarantine Complex (CIQ) in Bukit Kayu Hitam, construction of 6 UiTM campuses and the development of MATRADE Centre.
-    This is interesting as new UiTM campuses will require proper light and sound system.

2.    To strengthen ICT, the Government will expedite the implementation of High Speed Broadband (HSBB) at a total cost of RM11.3 billion, of which RM2.4 billion is from the Government and RM8.9 billion from Telekom Malaysia. Initially, broadband services with the speed of 10 mega bytes per second (Mbps) will be provided in selected areas in Kuala Lumpur and Selangor by en-March 2010. Subsequently, these services will be extended to other areas nationwide between 2010 and 2012.
-    I am looking forward for a better broadband services cause the Malaysia broadband is really 2 – 3 times below par compare the Singapore and other neighboring country.

3.    To further enhance broadband penetration, the Government proposes that individual taxpayers be given tax relief on broadband subscription fee up to RM500 a year from 2010 to 2012.
-    At least some discount given – not bad…

4.    For the education sector, the government will allocate RM19 billion, RM2.8 billion for student assistance and scholarship programme, RM1.6 billion for the construction of 80 new schools as well as 1,100 additional blocks and 347 school replacement projects.
-    News school means new business opportunity for audio visual system.

The rest of the budget is mostly for the growth of the economy in general and to drive the nation forward. I am quite happy with this year budget and hopefully next year could be better.