I don't know about you but I'm one of those individuals who started straying away from Microsoft when it comes to their browser and web services like MSN, Hotmail etc.

Don't get me wrong though. I love Microsoft products. Heck, I even develop using Microsoft products and I can never imagine a world without Visual Studio. It's just that lately, I've found them to be trying too hard and somehow, it just doesn't have that 'appealing factor' or shall I say 'google' factor. So much so that I now use Firefox as my primary browser (experimenting with Google's latest - Chrome), for chatting, I use Skype, for blogging - you're reading it right now - Blogger.

What could be the cause though? I don't know - but one thing for sure, I might have put Microsoft web products away for too long.

It all started with Hotmail
Jeez! How much it has changed!

It now uses AJAX technology. Very similar to Gmail. Interface is extremely fast, colourful and doesn't give you that aged 'hotmail' feel. Even the name has changed - it's now called Windows Live Mail. The big plus? 5 GB of STORAGE and Hotmail even provides personalized domains - ie. yourname@yourname.com! Much similar to Google Apps.

The MSN Live Messenger (a.k.a MSN Messenger) experience
Just 15 minutes ago, I was thinking of installing MSN Messenger. It's been EONS since I've used MSN. There are a couple of reasons why... not much of a chatty person online plus sometimes you just want your private time online doing whatever we're doing... you know what I mean??? :P

So anyway, I went ahead, did the download and voila! Not only does MSN Live Messenger come with a funky looking installation software - it even offers additional LIVE software which I could add into the download bundle! It was when I saw Microsoft Writer (more on this later).

Messenger was downloaded. Nothing much to shout about though I haven't given it a thorough poke and play yet.

Instead, I was more interested in Microsoft Live Writer which I opted into the download.

Microsoft Live Writer...
Sounds like another Microsoft Word wannabe? Nope. It's Microsoft's latest and greatest and FREE-est software meant for bloggers like me! It's basically a software which allows you to post blogs without having to logon into your blog provider's site - in my case - blogger.com.

What really amazed me was how EASY it was to configure!

1. Start the app
2. Key in the blog address - www.benjern.com
3. Key in my username & password
4. DONE!

Within moments, the software has detected the provider I used, loaded all the relevant settings... Next thing I knew, I was brought into a screen where my blogging template was downloaded, my categories (in blogger terms - tags) were loaded - I was just ready to go!

The awesome interface which is clean and EXTREMELY functional is another GREAT plus. Beat's Blogger's web posting interface.

I must say, as simple as it seems and sounds, this is one killer app for bloggers and I'd highly recommend it to everyone. Download it here.

Microsoft... welcome back to the playing field...
With Microsoft Internet Explorer 8.0 leaving it's beta stage soon along with these 'LIVE' enhancements to Microsoft's Web Services, it looks like Microsoft is back on track.

Checkout their Live search! - even that looks good and works great!

PS. This entire post was written through Microsoft's Live Writer :)

It was a weekend of torture (well for my car at least – the rest of pretty lovely actually). Anyway, let me just tell you about my car. If you know guys, cars are like our pride and joy. So last weekend, I was driving out for breakfast when something felt amiss, a signal came on my dashboard then the car's display said "rear number plate light faulty"… so I thought it was just a fused bulb or something. Didn't think much of it until I reversed and then AGAIN, my usual reverse sensor sound BLARED through my ears – this time, it was much longer than usual. Something wasn't right.

Still, I had my breakfast and finally got home when I decided to look at my car. This was what I found…

A cable was dangling out of my car's bumper – it's sock was pulled out of place, the protection sleeve around the cable was chewed on, then there were scratches all over my exhaust area, the right side of my rear bumper was 'munched' on… then there it was, traces of HAIR. DOG HAIR! It's either one of my dogs or all of them decided that my car looked like candy (especially AFTER A WASH!!!).

What can I say? Get upset? Pluck their fur? Shave them bold? Paint them pink? I didn't know what to do but immediately pushed away all the anger and headed to the mechanic to at see what the extent of the damage…is

2 hours later and all is good. Mechanic patched it up and apparently this is what he said "your dogs are VERY smart… they didn't chew all the way in, just the bracket only" – PHEW! You have no idea how good that felt… 30 bucks and the problem was solved. Now on to the rest of the bumper… I'll take care of it after the Raya holidays.

Okay, on to something that's less painful – well, it was more torture for someone else :P, Nadia returned to the show after a 2-week holiday and we decided to give her a quick do-up through some "wacky beauty tips" we got from Yahoo.com.

Beauty tip #1
Use regular toothpaste on pimples and lips. Pimples, to calm it down. Lips, to get it nice and big – apparently makes it more pouty.

Beauty tip #2
Make your hair smell GREAT for a long time. Solution? Spray perfume on it… of course, for Nadia, I just took my perfume and gave her a manly smell :)

The result? Gorgeous.

Okay, that's for today's blog. Got something to say? Drop it by my e-mail – benloh@flyfm.com.my!

I couldn't believe my ears when I heard that the Pagi Show didn't speak about Google Chrome when I wasn't on the show. The coolest, latest, free-est browser released during my 2-week leave. Come on man, the moment I found out it was coming out to the world to attack Mozilla Firefox and Internet Explorer – I just couldn't wait to get it downloaded.

The moment it was launched in the US, I logged on to Google and quickly got it downloaded.

So you're thinking, it's just another browser right? You have no idea how wrong you are – think about it, it's got a REALLY sleek interface and have you ever been in a situation where you were surfing, had loads of websites open and suddenly one dumb website decided to hang your browser and POOF! all your open websites were closed along with that 'crashing' site?

Google Chrome prevents all of that. It even has this really cool welcome page that greets you whenever you launch the browser – showing you your top 9 websites along with screenshots so that you could simply point, click and voila – your most commonly visited site.

If that's not enough, Google Chrome even has this "incognito" mode, it's just a fancy way of calling Private Browsing. Imagine you are surfing at sites where you don't want your mum, sis, dad, friend, dog, pet Chihuahua or cat to checkout – and I'm talking about your personal webmail or online banking sites okay… :P Just wack the incognito mode, surf the site you want, close it and POOF! everything – history, cookies, images, temporary internet files, every single trace you can think of will be wiped out during that incognito browsing mode. Cool or WHAT?

To think that this is just a Beta browser (testing stages) it really means that there are loads more things in place for the web surfing world. Just imagine the completed product.

Check it out and you won't regret it. :) Download it for free @ http://www.google.com/chrome

What else happened today? Well, more like yesterday, Fabes decided to place a frog on his head and stuck a honker near his forehead… why? I don't know. This is why I had to take the picture.

Okay, that's all for this week's blogs. More next week & Selamat Hari Raya to my Muslim friends – for those not celebrating – HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

Got anything to say? Drop it by benloh@flyfm.com.my!