The ML400 – The Perfect Daily Driver

YousefCars, Kuwait, Mercedes, Photography, Review Leave a Comment

Just before ramadan I had the chance of trying out the new ML400 with the twin-turbo V6 that powered it just as well as a V8.

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With the exterior you can notice smoother lines, beautiful chrome accents and an aggressive front end with DRLs that give the car that extra hint of aggressiveness in the morning.

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You can feel that the ML is quite spacious, the exterior dimensions are just about right for an SUV, its not too wide or too narrow and was a pleasure to drive.

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The rear of the car and the lines in the back lights were modernistic, and the hint of chrome on the front and rear ends is just enough for you to feel its not just a carry on from the previous models.

I was amazed by the amount of technology in the car, the all angle camera, the driver awareness system the nice ambient LED lights at night, and the AC was soo cold I had to turn it down often! Its one of the best AC’s I’ve tried in an SUV. It also had a cooled/heated cup holders which was pretty cool, it couldn’t really cool a beverage but was able to maintain the temperature longer.

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The interior of the ML400 makes you feel at everything was in place and everything is there, with both comfort and styling. The wood accents looked beautiful, the double sun-roof was a great plus and let in quite a lot of light in the morning, the boot space was spacious and was able to fit two large passenger bags without any trouble. The overhead display, dials and center console was easy to get to and always within reach or a button away. The back seats had ample legroom, and the seats were quite comfortable and spacious.

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For me the ML400 was a great daily driver vehicle, I would’ve like more aggressive sounds from the engine to match the great engine performance (I thought it was too quite). On the road and stability wize it handled more like a sedan than and SUV it felt very stable on the road, it was easy to take turns at high speeds and not once did I feel threatened by the fact that I was driving an SUV, I felt quite in control. Fuel economy was also a plus (with the bi-turbo v6), good performance + good AC + good fuel economy, what else can we ask for!

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For more photographs from the ML’s photoshoot, check out the following album :

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#I’m_Kuwaiti

YousefKuwait, Uncategorized Leave a Comment

The events that took place in Kuwait the past couple of days left me looking for words to describe what and how I felt. I was disgusted by the fact that such people will try to plant hatred in the hearts of neighbours, coworkers friends and family or justify their beliefs and by killing innocent people in a place of worship and while during prayer. Sinni or Shi’i we’re one we’re Kuwaiti. My condolences to the families of the martyrs and to all of the Kuwaiti people and I ask Allah to keep Kuwait a safe and peaceful nation, without hatred and segregation. What we learned and showed the world that no extremism can set the Kuwaiti people apart and it was unfortunate that it took tragic events for Kuwaitis to prove to the world how close we really are as a family and as a nation.

Khawater 11 – The last Season!

YousefAnnouncement, Arabic, Education, General, Islamiyat, Life 2 Comments

AhmadAlshugairi

For those of you who know me, you’d understand how disappointed I was when I found out that Khawater 11 would be the last season for Ahmed AlShugairi, for the past 10 years we waited eagerly to watch Khawater on TV after fetour or the replay and the past couple of years we’ve been watching it on YouTube! According to the presenter Mr. Ahmed Alshugairi, Khawater has taken a toll on his personal life and all his 30’s and he’s decided to spend more time with his family after spending the last ten years in travelling due to preparing for Khawater seasons . I personally wish him all the best in his life and future career, the amount of work and useful information both scientific and islamic he put into the program the past years in unmatched and it is a great loss. His work is timeless, you can watch any of the seasons in Khawater and would understand that the information provided is applicable to today’s life. Most of the episodes are now translated into English on YouTube and can be accessed on his channel here.

His organization has setup a website where people can volunteer for humanitarian causes, propose different humanitarian projects, or even simply connect people to do good.

http://i7san.net/

For more information on Ahmed Alshugairi, you can check out his different social media channels here :

utubeButton fbButton TwitterButton instaButton

 

After a Month of Construction – Im BACK

YousefAnnouncement Leave a Comment

Its been a hectic 3 weeks, waking up at 4 AM and getting to bed by 10 PM to wake up fresh and monitor the construction buying the material, finding workers and all that… Although it was a small expansion to the house, it felt like I was building a whole floor :/ However its done now and back to my schedule and little free time that I have.

Keeping it short, Mubarak 3alaikoum el shahar Oo kell 3am wento b5air (ramadan greetings in english arabic hehe). I’ll be back to posting starting tomorrow, i’ve got a couple of posts lined up and a couple of photos that I need to edit before posting! Wish you all a pleasant day and stay tune!

 

Get Windows 10 For Free!

YousefApplications, Technology, Windows 1 Comment

One hell of a notification showed up on my desktop this morning!

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Apparently windows 10 is rolling out to be “reserved” by customers! Here what the rest of the prompts said  :

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Can’t wait for the windows 10 Freeeeeee Upgrade :D, make sure you keep your eyes on your taskbar to reserve the downlooad of the free Windows 10 upgrade. (around 3 GBs)

Here’s Windows 10’s preview from Microsoft  :

 

The Ecobee3 Installation and First Run

YousefElectronics, Kuwait, Life, Smart home, Technology 2 Comments

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At last it arrived on Sunday and installed successfully on the same day, I just couldn’t wait to try it out. The installation took about 40 mins in total in addition to removing the old thermostat and reading the instructions. The unit requires that your old AC must have a Common or “C” wire, basically remove the faceplate and check your wires before buying the Ecobee3.

It was an easy install, simply Disconnect the Mains from the AC unit in the roof, label the wires, remove the old thermostat and install and rewire the new Ecobee3 Thermostat! Simple Plug and play really for the average DIY’er.

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Then I started the Main power to the AC Unit and the Ecobee3 came to life! It was an easy install, I read some of the comments suggesting that the touch screen was hard to use but it was flawless, and the on Screen keyboard to enter the WiFi password into the Ecobee was what you would expect from any modern touchscreen. In the end of the installation, i activated the remote sensor and placed that in the bedroom, where I need the temperature to be regulated the most.

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To access the Ecobee3 from the phone, it was a simple download from the App store and I was able to connect to the Ecobee3 by entering it’s code in to the ecobee App.

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The ecobee3 is also accessible via PC through the Ecobee3 website and in the future through the Apple Watch (don’t have one so didn’t really try).

Ecobee3 on Apple Watch

Courtesy of Ecobee.com

 

Overall it is what i wanted initially which was a movable thermostat I can take to any room (the wireless sensor) and being able to increase or decrease the settings from the comfort of my bed, but I think it opened up my eyes to the possibilities of energy saving, increasing the life of the AC compressor via scheduling and setting the compressor work time.

The downsides (which are a work in progress) are that the scheduling intervals are at 30 minute increments (you can’t really expect our life to work with 30 minute increments!) I would like to set a higher temperature just before I wake up i.e. 4:50 AM not 4:30 AM in scheduling, so I think there is room for improvement there as well as having the ability to create the scheduling titles ourselves and not be restricted to (Away, Home, Sleep), as well as accessing the different sensors around the house via the app or website which you can only do on the unit itself (I think they are upgrading this feature as they added an icon in the website). I’m sure all of the downsides are an area of improvement and will be looked at for future updates!

Ecobee3 Web AC Management

Ecobee3 Web AC Management

 

 

But I totally love it, and I think I will be looking for products for a smarter home and especially those products that an average-moderate DIY’er can install which will have an impact both for the comfort of our lives, educating my children on Smart Homes and the overall environmental impact. Feel free to shoot any questions in the comments section!

The Battle of the Thermostats

YousefElectronics, Smart home, Technology Leave a Comment

I have a problem with the AC that I have in my home in that the thermostat (the device that controls the AC) isn’t in the bedroom, now that’s good and bad as well, you see at night I kind of get temperature fluctuations, which means it either gets too cold or too hot and it just messes up my sleep and I end up having to wake up and change the temp. manually on the thermostat in the corridor of my house which is a good 20 steps away, by that time there’s a 50% chance that I can go back to sleep.

Nest, Honeywell, Ecobee Comparison

 

I was looking for a “Smart” thermostat that would solve the problem by me connecting to it remotely via my phone over wi-fi and controlling the temperature, i was inclined to buying NEST thermostat, but going through the reviews on Amazon.com I learned that a lot of people suffered from temperature fluctuations, i.e. in plain english the AC doesn’t turn off or on at 1 Degree or 0.5 Degree Increments/Decrements, it takes it a good +/- 2 to 3 degrees to get your AC to start or stop and that would mean it would get too cold or too warm which would make my problem even worse.

Nest and Honeywell, to keep it short going through the reviews, I learned that a couple of people replaced their NEST to a more sensitive Honeywell, the disadvantages of the Honeywell was that it didn’t have a proximity sensor (which the nest has) and the screen would remain on virtually as long as its connected to a power supply, and their installation instructions were a bit vague to me!

Nest beats all the companies hands down when it comes to providing a compatibility chart and ease of installation, but i’m not that bad withe electronics and i’d be ok installing all three at my home. So by this time nest was out of the comparison (due to insensitivity), and while I was about to purchase the Honeywell, I saw the Ecobee3 (ok the name for me was new, and the logo not so techy enough for me) but they had the perfect solution to my problem! Their thermostats have 2 sensors – one remote sensor and one on the thermostat itself (or more if you buy them), and you can set your AC to work depending on which sensor you choose for yourself! I.e. I can have a sensor that would sense the temperature in the bedroom and it would fix the high temperature variances that I get due to being furthest away from the thermostat, now all of them can learn your habits, and all of them have different perks, but my buying point in this case and with no hesitation was the wireless temperature sensor! Got it off Amazon for $249.99 and about $17 of Tax, and shipping would be around $65 via myus, and I should get it theoretically by Sunday, i’ll do the installation and right up the experience a couple of days later!

 

Here’s the link to the Ecobee3 Thermostat on Amazon.

BTW both the Nest and Honeywell are offered at Xcite, but they are a little overpriced (at 99 KD).

Update:  Here’s an installer’s insight on the Ecobee3 and an unboxing and installation.

WordPress Security Vulnerability and the update to WordPress 4.2 is Out!

YousefAnnouncement, Blogging, Wordpress Leave a Comment

I just received email from Envato regarding an XSS security vulnerability affecting multiple wordpress plugins and themes!

These are some of the plugins currently affected :

“The official WordPress Official Documentation (Codex) for these functions was not very clear and misled many plugin developers to use them in an insecure way. The developers assumed that these functions would escape the user input for them, when it does not. This simple detail, caused many of the most popular plugins to be vulnerable to XSS.
To date, this is the list of affected plugins:

Source : https://blog.sucuri.net/

The best thing to do now is head on to your admin panel and update all of your plugins and themes to ensure that you don’t get effected by this!

More details are available via the following links (Source – Envato) :