DEAR GOOGLE SPIDERS PLEASE CRAWL THIS

It’s been about almost 2 years, since I first picked up web development. I remember a real long time ago, the first exposure I had to web development, was hearing about CMS and Drupal from my mentor, Uncle Yong. And back then never would I have dreamed of doing what I am currently doing. XODUS Creations is something I would honestly call, a decent portfolio site by my standards. I won’t say it’s the best, and there is still tons to work on, but I think I’m finally going somewhere with XODUS Creations, in fact I already have a freelance web projects on hand.

Acknowledgement

1) My Family

For always being so supportive of whatever I am doing related to the web, and letting me pursue my own path. Without your support, everything above is never possible.

2) Sylvia

For being so nurturing towards my web development interest. I remember back when I started footballmanagerguru.com and I was not ranking 2nd on Google, in fact I was ranking many pages far away from the 1st page. Sylvia would check my rankings every single day, and tell me how many positions I’ve moved up or down. She even added footballmanagerguru.com to her Google reader, even though she knew nothing about football manager at all. She did it so, she could nag me to update whenever I dropped the ball, and I couldn’t have done it without her. Till date, footballmanagerguru still ranks 2nd on google for the term “Football manager blog”. Thanks Hun, for always being there.

3) Uncle Yong

My mentor, and a great selfless teacher. Thanks for growing my interest regarding SEO and the web in general, I really could not have came so far without you. Thanks for not only imparting your wisdom regarding SEO, and also about life in general. Without you, I wouldn’t never have came across the word CMS, and I will have always thought WordPress is a blogging tool and nothing more. It’s been amazing working on the same project with you.

There is only so much I can say with words, but thanks for being the biggest inspiration to me to take the bold step of stepping into web development.

4) Shifu (aka Weijie)

thanks for teaching me everything from scratch, knocking some design sense into someone who knows absolutely nothing about it. I can’t stress how big an influence you’ve been on me, and I feel I’ve developed leaps and bounds under your guidance. From someone who knows jack about custom CSS and CMS, you’ve turned me into someone who is confident of handling any web development project.

I believe I still have so much more to learn from you, and it’s been an amazing experience working under you, and I doubt that will ever change.

5) Weiling

You made CSS so easy to pickup, I think I’ve learnt everything in barely 2 weeks. Thanks for always giving me advice and pointers, and answering any questions I have. It means a lot to have someone guide me when I was picking up all these new forms of knowledge.

Before I head into the first post of this blog, you might be wondering where all my old posts are, well sad to say, I broke my side when I was fiddling with my cPanel and due to lack of foresight, I did not backup my old site, and hence the 40+ posts I made in 5 months are all gone down the drain. Hence a new layout, and a new site.

I realised with the old x0dus.com that I dearly miss blogging about the things I want to blog about. Towards the end of last year I was already getting a little sick of blogging about what people on Google search about.

Enough of that. I realised I enjoyed blogging more when I was younger simply because I wrote what my heart told me, and not what Google trends dictate.

So here we are, with the pair of Aktimate Mini, sitting proudly on my desk. I am absolutely in love with the sounds it produces. It burnt one big giant hole in my pocket, but trust me, if you are an entry-level audiophile, the $840 dollars.

Closeup Photos

30 cm, White Piano Gloss Finish is something to die for.

Back of the Aktimate Mini, took me a while to figure out the banana plugs, but I eventually did anyway. Real easy to setup!

Personal Review

With my old Creative I-Trigue speakers, the problem was that when I crank up the volume of the music I am listening to the bass would sound really artificial and high volumes. Acoustic sounds also lose their warmness and comes across as really flat.

The Aktinate Mini has NO issue playing music at volumes that can shake your windows, and preserve the quality of the music at the same time. Acoustic guitars retain their warm tone, and it’s bass is punchy and not draggy, unlike the lower end speakers.

Nightwish’s Dark Chest of Wonders came across perfect when played from my iPod. I could definitely feel that the drums of the band was placed to the left of the recording, it’s amazing how much depth you can get out of the Aktimate Mini. Basically you could hear how far the instruments are away from one another. Truely amazing.

Jason Mraz never crooned so beautifully before, and for relatively quiet and soothing songs like I’m Yours, I did not hear any sign of statics when I cranked up the volume. Aktimate wasn’t lying when they claimed they designed the speakers ideally for iPods.

In Singapore, if you are looking for an audiophile computer/music speakers that is either 2.0 or 2.1, you only have 3 choices. I came to this conclusion after hours and hours of combing audiophile forums online.

You can either get the Aego-M speakers (around $300 SGD), the AudioEngine 5 (around $500 SGD) or the Aktimate Mini which cost $840 SGD. Of course you get what you pay for. When I was auditioning for my pair of Aktimate Mini I also tested out the AudioEngine 5, and I played Green Day’s 21 Guns on both systems, the clear winner was the Aktimate Mini, there was simply no competition!

The Aktimate Mini has the ability to reproduce studio quality music at the loudest volumes, and it does an amazing job in filling up a room with music for being just 30cm tall.

Get the Aktimate Mini, and never look back on other speaker systems again. There is only one official dealer of the Aktimate Mini in Singapore, which is CD Acoustics at The Adelphi across Funan IT Mall, near City Hall MRT Station. The shopowner, Uncle Jimmy is extremely patient and could let you audition the speakers till the cows come home.

3rd Party Reviews

“Exceptionally inviting, they reward extended listening like no other iPod speaker…”, “Your average iPod user would be gobsmacked by the combination of clarity, detail and finesse the Aktimate Minis offer – and even hardened audiophiles will love them” – HiFi World

“First, it’s a very good speaker system with balanced tonal quality that casual and critical listeners will enjoy. Second, when combined with its many other capabilities, it’s a real winner. The AktiMate system would be a great choice for an office, bedroom, or as a main stereo system in a dorm room or apartment.” – About.com

So Much On Speakers?

Some people ask me is it worth it to spend so much money on a pair of speakers, my answer is always that depends on what music is to you.

To me, I am in a phase of my life where I am rarely gaming on my PC, and mostly just doing work on the PC all the time. When I work, I love to listen to music as it keeps me relaxed and at the same time motivated.

In fact one of the ultimate pleasures in this life for me ever since I got the Aktimate Mini, is to switch on the air-conditioning at night, close the doors and windows and listen to music in my room. It’s an amazing feeling when you have audiophile speakers churning out the music for you. Everything comes alive.

Get the Aktimate Mini speakers like me, and you will never look back.