Today I had the chance to experience the iPhone 6 as my friend had come home with the phone. I had [posted earlier](http://chowchowbath.com/2014/11/02/iphone-6-and-6-plus-first-impressions/) about the first look of iPhone 6 and 6 plus with my opinions on which one I would suggest to buy.

I would let the picture do all the talking on how the iPhone 6 feels in my hand. For those who wish to know I have a sufficiently large hand with long fingers. The iPhone 6 feels a bit narrow than my LG G2 but only by a maximum of about 1/2 inch or so w.r.t screen. The bezel of the iPhone does not feel all that odd.

What makes all the difference though is the thickness of the iPhone compared to any other phone. Personally after toying around with the iPhone 6 and LG G2, I still feel the latter is a little bit more meatier when it comes to size and weight. It feels just about right for holding it properly compared to iPhone. But where the iPhone scores is about how thin it gets on your palm. Its absolutely gorgeous and much like the new generation of iPods if I were to give a close match. I did initially have apprehensions that the screen might be too small to read fonts on. And it kind of feels that way. But somehow if you are not the types who will be reading too much on the phone, then it is bearable for some temporary work.

Personally I feel long hours of reading on iPhone would mean strain to your eyes for sure, but then that is why safari also has Reader mode, where the fonts are enlarged so people can read more easily. That should compensate for the otherwise lousy scale of fonts on safari. If you do not appreciate slippery phones, then you will surely not appreciate the iPhone 6 as well. Its slippery as an eel and you are more liable to drop it than any other phone that you have known.

The rear is not any more beautiful in silver than would have been in space gray for example. And the antenna patterns etched onto the rear makes this iPhone more worse in terms of looks compared to previous versions. The whole backside is so slippery that the first thing you need to do is to buy yourself a super thin matte finish case for the iPhone unless you want to break it.

So after working with the iPhone 6 would I recommend it to you? Over any other android phone? If you are looking at thin phones, go no further, you will not be disappointed with this one. Absolutely gorgeous to hold and does not feel like any of the bulky phones at all. If you do not intend to use a case, god save you as you would most definitely keep letting the phone fall down even if its not of your own will 🙂

The android ecosystem along with hardware is so fragmented that its really difficult to unify that anymore in my opinion. This is however where iOS scores well. The newer refresh of iOS is uniform across Mac, iPad and iPhone and each and every native app looks and feels new and refreshed to use and enjoy. The fonts, the sizes, the colors look great on screen as compared to user interfaces such as the LG G2. This level of refinement is an absolute joy to people who use it and Apple really have done well. Given the fact that all these apps run so well with just 1GB RAM but exploiting the processor and co-processor instead, Apple is managing to sell the iPhone 6 and 6+ in large quantities.

So whether you buy the iPhone 6 or the 6+, you are not going to make a mistake. And stop comparing feature to feature with other android phones for the money you pay. If money is such a sensitive thing to you, please look at cheaper options and leave Apple alone. Else you are in for a treat with the iPhone 6.

Source : [Amazon USA Website](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/415YHInf5uL.jpg)

I am a fan of kitchen tools (using gadgets or appliances here would be wrong terminology). Each time I visit the home centre I always make it a point to keep myself updated about what the latest in kitchen tools are. However I still feel India needs to catch up with the west on introducing some great tools.

In the context of this dialogue, I happened to look out for vegetable choppers on shopping sites such as amazon USA for pointers to what is the best currently selling there. After a lot of debate on multiple choppers, I made up my mind to order the Norpro Vegetable chopper. Advertised as quite a heavy duty chopper – manual of course – I was pretty impressed with a stream of positive reviews on this tool.

An unlucky friend of mine (people who bring you things from usa are always unlucky for finding you and your job for them are they not?) agreed to carry this for me from there. Priced at a little over 25$ this sounded a nice tool to invest on for my kitchen. I have used multiple ways to get my veggies chopped and have never ever really felt good at the end result each time. The point here is to have one set of uniformly chopped veggie set which was great to look at and eat as well when cooked.

{}

The Norpro chopper is a solid piece of hardware. Its build is very very solid, and thanks to its vacuum suction below the base, it sits tight on any kitchen platform. Real tight. Doesnt budge an inch even. It has two different blade sets which give different level of chop sizes for veggies. Now remember one thing – irrespective of the type of chopper you use, the basic rule of the kitchen is that you must cut your big veggies into few smaller pieces first instead of trying to stuff that huge potato, tomato or cabbage even into such tools. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. And the end result wont be to your liking.

The Norpro is simple to use. Lift the lid, place the coarsely cut veggies on the blade and slam the lid down. Yes you heard me right, just slam the lid down. Absolute bliss. Carrots, onions, tomatoes, potatoes – fantastically cut and all evenly done. You cant ask for more. I mean how much more longer are you going to cry with that onion each day? With Norpro, it makes the onion cry instead in few seconds. Stainless steel blades ensure no rust atleast for the amount of time I have managed to use it. There is also a comb to clean up if things get stuck inside the blades. If you have a force tap, even this is not needed.

{}

No post is complete without showing you the end result for such an experience is it not? Take a look yourself and judge the result.
If you have a little over 1000 rupees, and you need a veggie cutter, and want it to have a big mouth like you or me, go for Norpro. You wont be disappointed. Cutting vegetables has never been so easy or so much fun.

I had a chance to visit the apple store for the second time today to try my luck at getting my hands on with the new iPhone 6 and 6 plus to be able to provide my opinions through this blog.

Image source : [Apple India website](http://apple.co.in)

To my luck, I visited Imagine store at the Forum mall in Koramangala and found these two phones there. So without much ado, here are some thoughts about the iPhone.

Apple had launched the iPhone a month ago with great fanfare in the USA and the subsequent India launch turned out to be a damp squib with delays in the phone being available. Its november now and the phone has finally hit the showrooms. With the HSR Layout iCentre not having the iPhone 6 or 6 plus I was forced to just understand the dimensions only by seeing the phone cases which was a practical joke.

However today finally my eyes could feast on Apple’s next marvel of engineering.

The iPhone 6 looks like an elongated and thinned down version of the iPhone 5s. Its just not as fat, but pretty narrow in terms of width. So if you are comparing it to the Samsung Note or the LG G2 or G3, no – its not going to match at all. The latter are more wider enabling us to see more text at a single glance.

Coming to the iPhone 6 plus, one look at it and you feel that its too big to use as a phone. And there is no surprise why the mind thinks like that. Now many people have said to me both in reviews and in person that the 6 plus feels like an iPad in dimension. I beg to differ on this opinion. The 6 Plus is huge, bit longer than Galaxy note, but about similar width.

One of the things about the new iPhone is its thickness. If its selling like crazy this is because of how thin it is. I personally felt the Xaiomi Mi3 and the iPhone are of similar thickness, the latter being slightly more thinner. But then the Oomph factor still remains. Apple has managed to still retain the Oomph factor even in 2014 with their latest offering.

Coming to colors its an individual and subjective choice. I personally favor the space gray over white or gold. Frankly due to its thickness the gold color does not quite cut it for the iPhone 6 much unlike how it looked on the iPhone 5S.

Finally some things about the pricing. Many people have commented that one could easily buy a bike and a normal Android phone for the price of Apple. Yes true. So if that is what you want, please go and buy it. And you can drive the bike when you want and speak on the Android phone at other times. Now I have seen many phones with 2GB ram, 3GB ram, and other blah blah. With Apple iPhone 6 plus the new A8 processor still manages to play every game without stutter and other graphics intensive apps manage to run with just 1GB of RAM. This only means the money you are paying is not for RAM. its for the 64 bit processor architecture and the phone’s ability to handle application usage elegantly.

The pricing is prohibitive. But as apple says you are getting a computer at that price packed into the phone. We can go on endlessly debating that galaxy note is better or some other phone is thinner, or Chinese phones are cheaper. All said and done, Apple manages to hold its fort this time with attributes like better processor, thinner form factor and wider acceptibility among people once again.

So what is going to be my choice or suggestion – the iPhone 6 or 6 plus? Well personally for me its anyday the iPhone 6 plus. It was confusing at first, but after five minutes of handling both, the iPhone 6 plus blew me away. Its large, yet thin. Its elegant with sharp screen, colors and font rendering. I can see a lot more than before, and the applications are tailored to show me more and look better. Yes it is large if not necessarily thick so keeping it in the pockets (shirt or pant) is going to mean it has the susceptibility to bend if pressurized. There have been reports of iPhones bending for few people, and Samsung taking this opportunity to take a dig at Apple saying their phones only bend for the worthy enough. But any sales gimmicks aside, I am already a fan of the iPhone 6 plus for its humongous screen and the usability experience. Your choice maybe same or different from mine for valid reasons which include size, thickness, cost, and so on. Happy Choosing!

I was scouting around for computer chairs for my mini SOHO space. We have all been through this phase of life of looking at hundreds of computer tables and chairs only to find after buying that it did not either suit the style quotient we expected or the functionality we wanted. Maintaining such furniture has routinely become a pain in the neck as well.

In these days of do it yourself furniture minus the hassle of a carpenter, things have become a bit more easier, but nevertheless the value for money with regards to materials being used is still a question in everyone’s minds.

I happen to work with an MNC where they have some really tough, reliable and solidly functional office chairs which has made my back feel much better since four to five years now. I happened to google the net for [**Bristol**](http://www.bristol.com.my/Home.aspx), a furniture company from Malaysia which provides these for my office. I also have a nostalic connection with Malaysia since a decade now and hence I was biased even more when I understood this was a Malaysian brand.

Their subsidiary Kleiber Interiors at Domlur along Inner Ring Road in Bangalore are the partners who procure and sell these furniture to corporate houses in bulk. However when I negotiated with them on a single piece of computer chair furniture, they were okay to procure the same for me.

Coming to the chair I bought its called Presa model, and there are a lot of things which are good about it for the given price range. For those scouting around for a chair its quite easy to understand that a decent one costs anywhere between 5000 bucks to 15000 bucks depending on how the design is. The Presa from Bristol is a chair that falls a bit shy of the 10000 bucks mark and is in between this range and offers a good bang for your buck.

Today most chairs come with a V-shaped back which takes care of your lower back region. In Presa this is sturdy and you can be rest assured that you cannot have an unergonomic seating position with this lower back support. There is a netted material made of tough reliable strands that support your back all long upto your shoulder level which goes well in tune with the lower back support.

The seat itself is made of very thick grade foam and is very comfortable and sturdy to sit on. I did find that the foam itself was a bit hard but then that is what brings about a correct seating posture and proper support for your thigh and lower leg. Initially I was thinking whether the seat height would be enough to cover my ergonomic seating position on the table where I am expected to keep both my arms on the desk while typing stuff, and I must say I was impressed. The gas lift does a sufficiently good job of raising the seat level to a decent height more than what you may actually want.

There are two levers on the chair below the seat – one for tilt adjustment, and one for height adjustment which we already spoke about. While one lever moves up or down, the other one moves front or back. Both levers are of high grade quality and precisely control the action of the chair. The tilt functionality is great, and the chair locks up exactly in whichever position you want it to and remains glued there until you unlock again. But nudging your back on the chair you can quickly click unlock the tilt and bring it back to a normal position.

This aside, there are five wheels to the chair which most unfortunately do not have a lock which other common chairs in this cateogory come with. The lock would have prevented a free spin of the chair and in the case of Presa variety, its quite easy for kids to climb onto and unknowingly slide away to crash into a wall or furniture by accident. So if you have kids who are naughty then this is the chair to keep away from them. You could always keep a carpet or something to prevent free slide though and for an adult, this is not very bothersome during normal use. Personally though I would have preferred to have a wheel lock.

In my use so far for a couple of months, I have not found the chair to accumulate an awful load of filth on the wheels like hair, dust, etc. But only time will tell whether it may nor not. That is yet to be seen.

The armrests are too short to my liking and I would have preferred slightly longer ones. These rests have small buttons on the bottom, which would adjust their height as well. Its nicely done and can be appreciated for form and function.

Every bit of cloth, plastic and metal uniquely blends with one another and the whole chair looks professionally built and behaves that way. Frankly speaking Bristol surely puts a few other furniture brands to shame with their design purpose.

I would whole heartedly recommend Bristol to anyone who needs it and the sales experience with Kleiber Interiors was a mixed bag. They had indicated to me that it would take upto 6 weeks for delivery so I knew I had to wait. But sometimes my mails could have been answered in a shorter while than usual. This is strictly not a deal breaker though and frankly they guys there were very customer sensitive.

If you want to protect your back for a long time, need a sturdily built office chair, then look no further. Bristol is the place to go to to satisfy your buying urge.

I Recently attended a training session and when the trainer gave me his business card, I was pleasantly surprised at the quality of that card. It was made of thick plastic, with surprisingly good inks used. It was shiny and so professional that it made me genuinely interested to source some for my own self with my details.

These cards were made by **[Plasma Designs UK](http://www.plasmadesign.co.uk/translucent-plastic-cards/#)**, but their costs were very prohibitive for a beggar like me. For a 100 pack of cards they were charging anywhere upwards of USD 199 which was too high for my reputation and business. So my quest naturally turned to Indian online print services that would provide me something similar. I have already ordered many items from **[Zoomin](http://www.zoomin.com)**, and **[PrintVenue](http://printvenue.in)** online but they did not have my kind of need yet. So my attention fell upon a new website **[PRINTLAND](http://printland.in)**.

This website offered me the customization capability that others did not. I could design my own card. This is where my interest in them started and somewhat ended too in a while. Hang on, I’ll tell you why.

The online customization of the business card was fairly straightforward, but adding pictures and aligning them within the card was tricky. The tool always restricted the picture size to a certain limit which was never made aware to me throughout the session. Having said that, a design that I felt was final was saved by me only to realise that the next time I visited the same page, I had to start all over again. This is for reasons unknown to me. If the tool cannot let me save my design, then its worthless as far as I concerned since the website is only going to lose a customer easily. That said, once I used my email id, they did provide me a link to my design which I could get to in a flash. Pretty yesteryear if you ask me.

My order was placed finally on July 1st, for 100 business cards made of plastic for a 1000 bucks (INR just to make matters more complete) and I waited for an email telling me when the delivery would be made and a tracking number for that delivery. July 20th and there is still no sign of that email. Due to my busy schedules I had almost forgotten about this order and by that date I gave a call to the company and asked them whether they remember my order, leave alone deliver it. First they said its already delivered, but when I insisted them on showing me proof, they said its on the way and it will be updated on the website in a day. To track my order I needed to enter order number, my last name, my pincode (maybe my favourite color, the food that I like most, my preferred actcress, my first romantic date I had with my girlfriend and maybe a few other queries as well). Sounds so much like 2005 to me after using Flipkart.

One more call and this time it gets passed onto the design department (which is probably another room in the building?). They tell me that the final design is still waiting for my approval since 20 days. I raise my eyebrows and then they realize the order itself is not taken up yet. After a thorough bashing from my end the supervisor or manager or whoever he is tells me that I would get a tracking number by a day more.

One more day passed and my patience evaporated. This is the mail I sent them :

“*I am very very disappointed by the way your company has handled my order. Since July 1st, its almost one month and you have not even bothered to inform me what is happening to my order. I have spent my hard earned money into your company’s product and this is the kind of service I deserve?*

*I am not satisfied with the way in which your company has handled this transaction and I expect you to deliver my order within one more week or refund my money if you are not able to do so.*

*Please stop giving excuses to me and call me to inform me the tracking number immediately.*”

Pat came the reply with the tracking number and the order was delivered within a day. One day delivery – after 25 days that is of placing the order. I was thrilled that finally there is a company in India that has delivered to me the same quality of product that I could expect from Plasma Designs at 1/10th the price point. One look at the package and I was blown away in all directions on the packaging done to secure it. If you can decode how to open the package below, let me know and you will get ten of my business cards free 🙂

The packaging inside was no better with thermocol all around and nastily arranged, and each business card was wrapped in a plastic cover for itself which I never understood why. The card itself was of pathetic quality and the information was just printed onto the card rather than being embossed on it the way I would have liked it. Another experience, another learning. This would be first and last time with Printland. Thanks Printland, but no thanks.

PrintVenue and Printo are pretty standard in what they offer and there is no reason to be disappointed. My strong recommendation is to stay away from Printland as far as possible as any order that you would make will only be considered after 20 days when you call them for all you know like mine was.