Samsung Galaxy Tag Pro S Review

Back in December 2016, my old laptop died on me and I looking for something that is light and portable to bring around for my part-time studies. I started to use laptops with SSD and will not go back into the standard hard disk drive to boot up the operating system. I brought this laptop at 999 SGD. It comes with free gifts like the 32gb flash drive, a multiport adapter, and a Bluetooth speaker. I brought this for my own use and is my personal opinion




After 1.5 years still looking good!

Here are the basic specs:
Processor make: Intel Core m3
RAM: 4GB
Internal storage: 128GB


The Good:
1) The Weight - Weighing at 1.2 kg with the keyboard. It really light and portable,

2) The stand - The stand that comes with the box is sturdy and

3) The display - It is a "2k" display and I like it

4) 4gb of ram: I was surprised to this day how this tablet performs, it started up quickly and for the most part, it performed quite well without any hiccups. It feels faster than my previous laptop

5) Charging - As it is a USB type charger, I am able to use it with a normal wall charger. I got the 20,000 mAh power bank and it was able to charge. However, it charges very slowly around 8-10% / hour when powered off. If you want to charge while working, use the Samsung charger.

6) The Windows 10 Touch Experience - Although I still a desktop person and often use keyboard shortcuts, I find the touch experience a good one. For PDF and website, the ability to pinch to zoom occasionally prove to be useful for group discussion where we want to view diagrams and articles. Occasional using this to watch YouTube Video and Music is great as well!

7) Fanless design - No fan would mean the device is completely quiet. The overall heat is good as well. The performance will be affected with I run heavier applications and even running a few application at once. The performance is much better than an Atom CPU Computer that I used to have a few years ago.

8) SSD - This model is an SSD and not eMMC. The speed is fast and nimble for daily use.


The bad

Here are the problems / negative that I faced in this laptop:

1) Keyboard - It has a very little keyboard and often dust and particle will get inside the keyboard and cause the typing to be unbearable at times. As there is a gap in the keyboard, letting dust and particle to get in easily. For most of my heavy form of typing, I usually use the external Bluetooth keyboard.

2) Random Shutoff - It happened to me once in a while when I want to charge the tablet. It freezes for a while. I had to wait for a while before I turn on the tablet.


3) 4GB of Ram - For the most part that I using this tablet, it a good performer for light tasks. But if you are using an Internet browser like Google Chrome, the system will slow down and some of the websites will refresh itself due to lack of memory. I limit my tab in the browser.

Some of the heavier programs like Engineering Drawing, it was not a good experience for multiple layer drawings. So after a while, I deleted the software. Microsoft office application good to use.

4) Pen - I brought the pen and I found that it is not responsive for me to use it. The setup is not straightforward and after researching for 30 mins, I managed to find the driver for the pen in the Samsung software to update it. Not a good experience for me

5) One USB type C port - Probably a negative, as I use One drive to transfer drive and download my notes, it was not a big issue for me. I have to use the Bluetooth mouse instead of a more affordable wireless mouse



The OK
1) Storage Space - As it is not my primary computer, it still manageable for me. However, after 2 semesters, I would need to transfer all my work

2) No SD Card - It would be great if they have an external SD card to increase the storage of this laptop. As a secondary device, it alright for me.

3) LTE modem - I did use it for a while when I was out of town, this feature is very helpful and it also able to be used a wireless hotspot for my phone.

4) Battery Life -It is acceptable to me and can last around 6.5-7 hour of use. As I used it for 1,5 years, It slowly reduces to 4.5-5 hours.

5) Sound - I not a fan of sound but it sounds alright for me.

Conclusion
I really love this machine as it serves me well for the past 1.5 years and cost less than an IPad. Despite its shortcoming, it is a great secondary on the go for student and IT professionals. Maybe the next tablet would be the upcoming Microsoft surface GO.

That would be an interesting device for me as my use case are not performance orientated and I like to have something that is light and portable to bring around. As for now, I still considering between the IPad with the Pencil or the Surface Go Combo.

3 things I do before I go to bed

The habit of planning spark the birth of the Afterwork geek name for this blog as my time after work is quite precious that I need to get things done at a effective and efficient manner. I also want to have more time on the things I matter more and less on the routine stuff that I need to work on.


To start things off, these are the 3 things that I do before going to bed:

1) Time to reflect on the day (15 mins) - I will take some time to reflect on the day on my computer at home, I write it down on a word document that is saved at an online storage so that at any moment of the day, I can write on it without having a diary with me and Internet is all I need to import my thought and ideas of the day. As I getting older, I gradually enjoy this process of having a some sort of a diary of the day.

2) Writing down a list to do for tomorrow. (15 mins). I used Carl Pullein Golden 10 to everything as a template to plan the day tomorrow, the time I do have to also be in line with my goals. As of July 2018, I really seen some progress in my daily goals! I in the midst to reduce this to 10 min like what the author is doing.

You have a read on his article on the Golden 10 at his website(https://medium.com/carl-pullein/its-the-daily-grind-that-will-take-you-towards-your-dream-c5eee65c0d16)

3) Prepare my clothes and Bag (5 min)- This should be the best investment of your time as preparing your clothes and bag will greatly reduce the time needed for me to go out to work. From my experience, doing this every night had saved me at least 10 min of thinking what to wear for work in the morning. I just placed it on the cupboard and just wear it and go to work.

What is Emergency Fund

 What is emergency fund.

I guess most of these content can be found in the various websites on emergency fund. The definition of an emergency fund is a stash of money set aside to cover the financial surprises life throws your way.

The surprise could be loss of job, Medical emergencies, major household repairs, sudden move due to transfer to a new office from work.

 

How I approach my own emergency fund.

One of my favorite word come up when I was studying my part time master degree is... It depends. It will make you sound intelligent as well.

It really depends on your circumstances.

For my circumstances,  I left my full time work 2 years ago to went for a part time work while studying my Master degree. From a cash flow point of view, my income is dependent on the number of hours worked. So the main concern will be able to support myself.

Thus, my income is not longer a fixed amount but a variable amount depending on the workload of the day. That affected my savings,where in some month, I will depend on my savings to support myself. As I am using OCBC360 account, I also lost the interest gain from the salary component.

In addition to that, I would also need to pay for my own tuition fees for my part time Masters.  I decided back then that I would set aside 10 months of expenses. This also takes into account of the time to find a job after I completed my studies.

Moving forward to today, I had managed to find work back in May, with a regular and consistent income, I reduce my emergency fund gradually back to 6 months of expenses and the rest will be used for investment. 

To conclude, the topic on how much emergency fund one would need depends on the circumstance of the person.

How I manage my money !

As full time employee, we love the moment when our salary comes into out account. It sound like a moment of triumph and a reward for our hard work in the office. We then quickly use the money for the things we will like to spend on. Items like food, clothes, Holidays, the latest electronics gadgets etc.

However, at the end of the week, we left with nothing. I recalled on one of my ex colleague would resort to eating cup noodles that was supplied in the office for his 3 meals.

Today, I would like to share how I managed my salary into different account. This is just a guide but and not definitive.

I split my account into 3 type of account

1) Salary Account
2) Pay yourself first account
3) Investment Account
4) Saving/ Emergency Fund Account

Salary Account (DBS Multiplier Account)
As I just joined a new company, I immediately applied for DBS Multiplier Account as it give a much better interest rate as compared to OCBC360 account. The account can be done online when you have a DBS/ POSB account online.I help to earn at least 1.85% over here.

Pay yourself Account (POSB)
I usually put 10% over here for expenses for personal development and things I want to get.

Investment Account (Standard Charted Bank)
I used the Standard Charted Online trading account for trading stocks. I opened this account in 2014. I use it to trade SG and Overseas ETF at a lower commission rate.

Emergency Fund account (CIMB FastSaver)
Here I put away 6 month of expenses while it help to give 1% interest. No fuss!

2018 Mid Year Finanical Resolution?

I guess it really weird to have a Mid Year resolution for this year as I had just decided to restart this blog. But nevertheless, Here are my Goals

1) Career Goal - Probation - I just got a full time job as a Naval Architect/ Engineer with a new company after 2.5 years studying part time in my master degree and working part time from a previous company. Currently, I working hard to learn the ropes and getting accustomed to the work culture of the company.

With this full time job, it really restarted my 2018 goal resolution as one of the goals is to find a full time job in the midst of the downturn of the Maritime Industry. With the new job, my aim is to save up 5k by the end of 2018.

2)  Health Goals - Working out twice a week. Still working on this and in progress.

3) Financial Goals - In addition to the 5k saving. I also plan to re balance my ETF Portfolio on July 2018. I also transfer my Salary to the DBS Multiplier Account to earn interest.

4) This blog - My aim for the blog is to type a blog post every 1 to 2 weeks on my take on personal finance and hopefully I can learn how to manage a website in the future if time permits.

Looking forward to share more

AWG

I back...

Hi Everyone,

It has been a long while since I write in this blog, Times flies and I had completed Master Degree in Offshore Technology in Dec 2017.

Some Updates to my Life
1) I left my previous company to complete my Master Degree in Offshore Technology in 2016
2) I managed to find a part time job that does inspection service. I took up the job as it fit into my part time degree requirement and also to live without digging into my saving.
3) Due to the Oil and Gas downturn, I do take modules that not are not oil and gas related.
4) I completed my Masters Degree at the end of 2017. I looking forward to graduate in 2018
5) After a while looking for Job, but I managed to find job in a Engineering company that similar to what I currently doing. I have to relearn and also realign myself to the interview session.

During the period of life, I lost motivation to work on the blog as I was busy juggling with work, part time studies and personal commitment. It was a busy moment in my life where I need to be focused on my lose heart during my part time journey.

One of my Goals for 2018 is to revive this blog and think on the content I can
For now my plan are:

1) Personal Finance and Decision that I done after I left my previous company
2) Experience of studying part time while working


Stay Tuned...
AWG