The Best Way to Save Money

I did not noticed that for the past 2 weeks, I have been buying things like crazy. I have never realized that I am not saving any money at all and so I have been thinking what is the best solution to save money while not depriving myself from spending a lot of money. See the shopping bags I collected on my China made Tulip Chair.

I thought it is not wise to keep on buying electronic gadgets since these gadgets are just not so useful for me except the latest DSLR Cameras but then it is just too expensive for me so for now, I will still be so happy with my Olympus T-100. The advantage of buying useful electronic gadgets such as laptops, dslr's, video camera and cellphones is you get to use them so that you can become more productive and be more entertained but these electronic gadgets can be easily be outdated in just a few months and worse it depreciate very rapidly.

The second option which I think is also not a good idea based on my experience is buying cool furnitures. While there so many good looking pieces of furnitures which are designed to make home living more comfortable, it too are depreciates very rapidly just my China made Tulip chair which I bought 4 months ago from SM Homeworld. I did not know that it was made in China, not until the saleslady told where it came from just after I paid for it. I bought it because it is so good-looking but after a few days of using it, I felt that sitting on my old monobloc chair is more comfortable than sitting on my tulip chair. And worse, the chair earned its irrepairable crack even though I hardly use it. So I told myself, goodbye to my Php3600 which I could consider not well spent.

Then the 3rd option is buying jewelries and this seem to be the best option. Gold and Diamonds are as good as cash in the bank. It never depreciates and never lose its quality. In fact, it even gets more expensive every year. But to buy the real gold and diamonds, you should consider the reputation of the seller, you must be familiar with the current market value and trends. The best part is the buying experience. It really is fun and exciting. To check how much the real cost of the jewelry, say for example a 4 gms Italian 18k gold necklace,  a jewelry shop in Cubao, would normally sell it for Php2500/gram. The reason why they sell it for Php2500/gram is the storage fee(it is understandable they, the store owners, will not be able to sell it immediately so this is an added cost), the quality and labor cost in the creation of the jewelry itself, and lastly, the store owner needs to make some profit from selling the product. So, check the actual market trading value of gold which is currently at Php1850/gram. Multiply the Php1850/gram amount by 18/24(18 is the gold purity of the jewelry), which results to Php1387.5/gram. So, upon buying the jewelry, you already lost Php1112.5/gram assuming that you plan to sell the jewelry as scrap gold or in other words, you are selling the jewelry without taking into consideration the cost of assembling the jewelry, its sentimental value and age, 

then you will need to keep it for at least 10 years before you can recover the cost if there will be no financial crisis, prices of gold will increase constantly at 5% to 10% annually. But if you have bought it 5 years ago, the price of gold has increased by 125% because 3 years ago, there was the US financial crisis. It is not advisable to sell jewelries as scrap gold, because obviously, you loose lots of money. If you plan to sell the jewelry, look for jewelry shops that buys second hand jewelries, these shops usually buys jewelries much higher than scrap gold prices.

There is another way to save money from gold. I found a product in Amazon that can be cheaper than buying a gold jewelry. The gold bar is 24k and upon buying the gold, you will only lost at least $10/gram which means its only Php430.00 at the current exchange rate. The product link is as follows:

In today's High Tech Gadgets, Automatic Watches still rules

Automatic Watches or popularly known as Mechanical Watches still remains the favorite of most people in spite of the latest innovations in electronics technology. I am still one of those people because I know that mechanical watches performs so much better and last much longer than the modern electronic watches not to mention the fact that automatic watches is considered as fine works of arts and assembled by hands of great craftsmen.


In today's technology, everyone can have watches that can do almost just about anything, there are electronic watches with camera, colored lcd screen, can monitor your blood pressure, can locate your locations, store appointments, watch television programs, store important documents, used as cell phones, tells where you are with gps technology and many many more. But still some people choose automatic watches.

The only reason behind this is that people value fine workmanship, the elegance and sophistication. But in my case, I have chosen an automatic watch because it already meets my requirements, I do not need all those fancy features since my lifestyle is very simple and I am not constantly on the move. And the Orient EEM78002WB is just perfect for me.

Robotic Bird will be a cool gadget!

A robotic bird has recently been invented by German company FESTO. This robot flaps its wings to enable it to fly just like seagulls. It is very energy efficient and very cool. I came to know about while feeding my Munias and watching Net25's Convergence. What a coincidence, I got 2 munia's as pets and FESTO released their robotic bird at almost the same time.

According to FESTO officials, the SmartBird is an ultralight but powerful flight model with excellent aerodynamic qualities and extreme agility. With SmartBird, FESTO has succeeded in deciphering the flight of birds - one of the oldest dreams of mankind.

The robotic bird can take off and fly and glide more efficiently that cannot be achieved by other flying machines. Speaking of efficiency and safety, can it be envisioned to replaced commercial airlines? My guess is absolutely never! It could become a good hobby though.

My New Pets: A pair of Munias

While on my home, my usual stop-over is in Sandigan Bayan along Commonwealth Avenue in Quezon City. This place has become a talipapa or Farmer's Wet Market with lots of people converging to sell and buy cheap farmer's produce that are anything under the sun, from cheap t shirts, newly harvested hybrid corns, peanuts cooked food and lots of street foods you could imagine.

I normally don't go out to check any of these items because of the sun's heat until I spotted a woman selling cheap bird pets so I thought I'd check it out. I was surprise how cheap the birds were so without hesitation, I immediately bought a pair of Munias(Lonchura leucogastra). According to the seller, these birds are caught in the rice fields of Nueva Ecija province. I had no idea what kind of bird they were at first and I thought they would die anyway because during my childhood days, I also try to catch similar birds and would really want to keep them as pets but they always die the next day no matter how I try to feed them. They just wont eat anything until they die of hunger.

It has been 3 days after I bought my pair of tiny Munias and still, they are alive and very healthy and playful but they don't chirp. They only chirp when their water is empty. They must have gotten used to the conditions they were into, living in a small cage with plenty of food and water. Maybe after the next 30 days, the female will start to lay eggs and their family will start to grow and I will be needing people to adopt them or maybe I should keep them or set them free. But in the meantime, I will keep them as pets and will serve as my warning gadget.

Just an update:
As of April 17,2011, the 5th day anniversary of my 2 lovely Munias, they are as playful as ever and they are now constantly chirping while playing. A remarkable change it is not like the last 4 days when they are so afraid to chirp. This could only mean that they must have become very familiar with their environment.

CD-R King Megabeat Sound Bar Speaker is really worth it!

I had been enjoying watching my favorite movies from my 32LD330 LCD TV via my Qube M1 netbook. I am so fascinated by the 720p resolution and it is so clear that it makes me really keep on watching it over and over despite the fact that the sound output is mono. And so I thought I really need a good speaker similar to what I saw in a popular appliance store in Ali Mall, a speaker soundbar. A speaker soundbar is basically a speaker with built-in amplier and gives 3D Surround Sound which is just as good a home theater offers.

I scouted around Araneta Center this morning searching for an affordable but high quality speaker sound bar and well, who else would have it but no other than CD-R King and they call it the Megabeat Sound Bar Speaker.

I am so glad that I bought it because it really meets my expectations. 3D Surround Sound is just what I needed and thats what it gives me aside from the not so loud sound that will not definitely annoy nor disturb my neighbors. The other thing I like about sound bar speakers is that they come in a very nice package and compliments my current hifi setup. It just looks like a dvd player. The one thing that disappoints me is that the 32LD330 is not capable of outputting its sound to an external speaker which can be inconvenient whenever I would want to quickly shift to watch TV shows. But that's just fine, I can live with it.

LG 32LD330 is worth it!

Watching movies on a big screen tv is never the same with the LG 32LD330. It has been almost 3 months after I bought this outrageously large HDTV and so far, each time I turn it on to watch GMA's telenovelas, I could not help but stay in front of it until wee hours in the morning. Watching all sort of tv programs, and 720p DVD movies is really the best thing that can happen to a man's life.

 

This tv is very much responsible why my electricity bill shoot up to more than $30 in the past 3 months well because as I have mentioned earlier, it stays open for almost 12 hours straight daily. But that $30 is nothing if I had always gone out to the malls just to eat lunch and access the internet and play DOTA. Thanks to this lg lcd tv, I was able to save more than $2000 if I did spent my time at the malls.

I wonder if it could have been bigger? Something like an lg 42 lcd tv? Maybe it could have been so much better, but for now, I am still so happy this lg lcd tv.

X-Fi Technology a Creative Labs's Standard Audio Technology

X-Fi Technology is the latest audio standard created by Creative Labs, a Singapore based Technology company and a leading brand in audio technology. X-Fi Technolgy makes your games, music and movies way better. X-Fi technology breathes life into songs. It restores detail and expands your audio to surround sound

This technology is behind the best selling Creative Labs HS-1200 Digital Wireless Gaming Headset. Creative Labs has found a better solution in converting analog audio into digital format and enhance it further before it transforms it back to its original analog format without losing any of the original data giving the audio quality far more superior as compared to other traditional digital to analog and vice versa conversion technology today. The process which is proprietary to Creative Labs is dependent on their in house designed audio processor on X-Fi which is by far the most powerful at its time of release, offering an extremely robust sample rate conversion engine in addition to enhanced internal sound channel routing options and greater 3D audio enhancement capabilities.

This technology according to its designers and creators which composed mainly of the very best Engineers and Scientists, has become much closer to isolating every musical instrument and human voices in the audio. This is what every sound engineers are dreaming of and Creative Labs has moved closer to making this dream almost a reality. If you can just imagine a device that can isolate every piece of instrument in a symphony orchestra? The sound would be as close to listening to them live.

X-Fi Technology has really taken listening experience to the highest level with its superior sound quality output. And the proof of this is the best selling HS-1200 Digital Wireless Gaming Headset which really enjoys rave reviews from its buyers worldwide. This should make Creative Labs a leader in sound technology because they use the best technology and algorithm to produce the X-FI.