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ASUS W90Vp: ATI Mobility Radeon HD 4870... with CrossFireby Jarred Walton on 5/29/2009 5:00 AM EST
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buzznut - Saturday, May 30, 2009 - linkLooky there, I went and missed "bash AMD day"
Damn, they're prolly still reeling. Reply
Johnmcl7 - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkIn the specs for this machine it lists an 8x DVDR drive initially, then refers to it as a blu-ray drive just further down - I assume the first entry should read bd-rom/dvd-r combo.
I have to say the pictures are extremely disappointing as the main shots of the laptop are badly underexposed concealing most of the details. I do realise these machines are not easy to get a picture of but normally the pictures in reviews are pretty decent. It would be good to see some pictures with some standard items (DVD cases or something) when the laptop is open to get a better idea of the scale, I think the sleek look makes it look smaller than it is especially given it makes the D901C look small which I didn't think possible.
As for the laptop itself I did consider one of these mainly because the price was good but decided against it due to the size/weight. I had a Dell XPS 2 then M1710 and I think that's really the upper limit to carry around with me. I have an XPS M1730 at the moment and it never leaves the house as combined with its huge powerpack makes it quite a bit bigger and heavier than the M1710, there's no way I would go bigger again.
It's a shame to see the driver situation is so poor when the performance is clearly there, it's not very encouraging for other companies to pick up mobile ATI parts either. Reply
mrbios - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkJarred (or anyone who may purchase this notebook), I have a different Asus laptop that has the same multimedia touchpad, and I did find a way to disable it. Go into the Mouse control panel, go to Device Settings, expand tapping, click on tap zones, and uncheck "enable tap zones". Reply
garydale - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkWhy is it so difficult to get good display drivers for games? The OpenGL interface is well defined so what's the problem with writing a driver for it that game developers can have confidence it will work according to spec.?
Is this a case of the hardware manufacturers screwing up with the driver or the game developers trying to get around the API to work directly with the hardware or a bit of both? Frankly, I don't care. If I want to play a game on a computer, it should install and work just like any other piece of software or hardware.
Hopefully AMD/ATI's release of details of their API will help bring stability and performance, at least for Linux games. Now will NVidia follow suit and allow the open source community to build their own drivers to end this proprietary "buggy driver" lunacy?
JarredWalton - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkI believe most of the driver updates are to optimize the way the GPU executes certain code. In theory, the drivers should run all code properly but not optimally. The reality, sadly, is that the "properly" part is only correct about 80% of the time with new titles. Add CrossFire into the mix and that seems to drop down to 50%. If you have a regular dual card CrossFire setup, disabling CrossFire in the CCC often solves compatibility issues, but that's not an option on the drivers I've received for the W90Vp.
In the case of Empire: Total War it looked like the drivers were rendering properly on one card but not on the other. If I grabbed a screenshot via the PrintScreen button, everything looked correct, but looking at the screen only the landscaping and sky were always visible and correct. The units, trees, buildings, etc. were only visible about 10% of the frames, which pretty much means you can't play the game. Reply
mbaroud - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkI own one the W90VP-A1.
I have been dyingto update the drivers, it sucks running on OUTDATED drivers :( Reply
nubie - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkIf these are simply mobile desktop replacements why doesn't somebody get on making a desktop built into the screen already?
And I don't mean the hideous monstrosity that is the Dell XP1.
I am all for laptops, but this form factor is silly above 15.4" in my opinion.
(that said, I love the tech, it is very cool.) Reply
Jackattak - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkDunno if you've been asleep for the past two years but just about every major PC manufacturer offers a desktop built-in to the screen nowadays, none of which are "hideous" (strictly my opinion, but I find it hard to find a screen "hideous", and that's essentially all these offerings are is a screen). Reply
garydale - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkIt's generally cheaper and faster to run multiple desktops in the locations you need than to lug a "desktop replacement" around. Just keep your documents (and other settings) on a USB key or implement an Internet synchronization scheme.
The simple fact is that you cannot get anything that can be reasonably called a laptop to match the performance of a desktop. Laptops don't have the space for multiple drives, they can't dissipate heat as well, and they certainly can't accommodate expansion.
To get the same performance of a desktop in a mobile platform, you have to wait for the technology to become available then pay a premium for the privilege. People have been saying laptops are getting near desktop performance for decades. What is actually happening however is the price of admission for an application platform has been decreasing.
You can get a resonable desktop today for what a hard drive would have cost you twenty years ago. However, if you want cutting edge power, you need a desktop or larger. Reply
frozentundra123456 - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkThe charts are technically labelled incorrectly. I believe for instance the first chart, black bar, means the ratio of nVidia performance to ATI, not percent improvement as it is labelled. Saying "102 percent improvement" actually means that the nVidia solution is twice as fast as the ATI, which from reading the rest of the article appears not to be what the author meant. The rest of the charts are labelled in this way also.
tynopik - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkthe charts are a COMPLETE DISASTER
the first few, I'm still not sure what they're trying to say
the FRAPS charts are better, but:
1: thousandth's of a frame per second? talk about unnecessary precision
2. NO CONSISTENCY. different tests were run for each game, it's bizarre
we have:
- W90Vp OCed / W90Vp 1080p OCed / W90Vp (new drivers? who knows?)
- OCed New Driver / OCed Init Driver / Initial Driver
- OCed New w/o CCC / OCed New Driver / OCed Init Driver / Initial Driver
3. The HD (1920x1080) benchmarks suddenly switch over to 1680x1050 with Mass Effect
- even though you have 2 charts for 1680x1050 results (one on the 1080p page and one on Standard gaming page), the results don't match (for instance on the 1080p page it says the Q6600 had 51.674 fps in Mass Effect while on the standard page it says 53.375)
I can tell it took a lot of time to run all these benchmarks on all these different platforms, but you have to FINISH! Reply
JarredWalton - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkThe 1080p Mass Effect listed as 1680x1050 is merely a typo. I'll correct the labeling of the initial charts - I didn't subtract the 100%, but it makes for an easier chart since there aren't negative values. The earlier poster is correct that it's a ratio, so 100% means equal performance. Reply
JarredWalton - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkFWIW, I initially "finished" at 5:30AM. I have now edited the graphs, added a bit more commentary, and inserted a page analyzing the overclocking results of the W90Vp. Enjoy! Reply
strikeback03 - Monday, June 01, 2009 - linkOne more - last page first paragraph under the photo, I'm guessing you said "ear splitting" but Dragon has 'your spreading" there for the description of the volume levels. Reply
Jackattak - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkLOL poor Jarred... ;) Get some rest, mate!
Thanks for the article. Was nice to see benches on a system like this. Why anyone would lug around a 17er I have no clue, though. I think the 15.4" form factor is the perfect balance of size/weight/performance.
I just wish more manufacturers offered higher-end GPUs or at least gave more options for end user installable discrete GPUs (would love to slap a 8800M GT 512 in my XPS1530). Reply
The0ne - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkI have a loaded vostro 17" with wuxga and it's very nice. However, lugging it around with me on oversea business trips can become tiresome. This thing is almost 12lbs O.o I can't imagine having this at all even if I wanted the specs.
Most people don't realize those extra small lbs will drag you down sooner than you ever can realize :) Reply
The0ne - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkOh, and this comming from a guy that's actually in shape and built lol Reply
Golgatha - Friday, May 29, 2009 - link"ATI's Mobile Driver Program -- or Lack Thereof"
Seriously, if they want to sell a multi-thousand dollar laptop, they better have drivers available the same day as the desktop GPUs. I can't imagine anyone buying a gaming laptop with anything but nVidia GPUs inside it.
BTW, I have 4870 1GB cards in Crossfire on my desktop, so this isn't a post to just bash ATI. However, they do need to get with their industry partners and correct this issue fast. Reply
Zoomer - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkDon't know what the fuss is about, I recall installing up to date ATi drivers on my 9600 mobility and possibly even the Rage 3D (can't really that well, unfortunately).
*Requires mobility modder or inf editing. Reply
JarredWalton - Saturday, May 30, 2009 - linkThe ATI Catalyst drivers on their website "install" without apparent issue, but they don't actually update the drivers - just the CCC. In the past, ATI may have provided drivers that would work with all of their chipsets, but that's not the case with modern GPUs as far as I can tell. Certainly, it's a problem with HD 4870 CrossFire. Reply
nubie - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkWell. . .
If there was a PCI-e standard for mobile, then maybe you could choose your graphics and the laptops would have to work properly with standard drivers?
What if you used DisplayPort for the interface to the display? Then you could plug in any graphics chip and it would work with the standard drivers.
You would of course need "thermal" stages, where you had a cap on the amount of power that it could dissipate, but if you wanted to set your PC on a fan and cut out a vent you could move up.
I think that a standard needs to be set already. There is no excuse for making a handful of extra or different pins, or form factors off by a few millimeters just so that you can't build your own system or upgrade it.
I would hope that as time progresses you could put a faster chip on a smaller more advanced process into an older laptop, or just choose the exact graphics you want (IE less powerful) in a system with the processing power you need. Reply
JarredWalton - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkUnfortunately, the biggest reason for a lack of unified mobile GPU standards is that OEMs along with ATI and NVIDIA like to compete in a variety of ways. Look at Apple and imagine trying to tell them they their laptops need to conform to a standard layout.
It *could* happen, and for higher performance laptops with discrete GPUs like the W90Vp, that would be ideal. In fact, the GPU modules in the W90 look very similar to the GPU modules from NVIDIA. The problem is, no one wants to do the work to make sure upgraded GPUs would work -- plus you need to worry about having not just a standardized form factor, but standardized heatsinks/fans.
Ultimately, a standardized notebook form factor would probably lose more customers than it would gain. Everyone would complain about the "boring design and aesthetics", and the number of new bugs/problems we'd see would probably skyrocket. But hey, maybe someone will prove me wrong on this and make the idea work.... Reply
Goty - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkWait, NVIDIA managed to release drivers on all platforms simultaneously ONCE and suddenly they have a unified driver model? I'd have to wait and see if that trend continues down the road, but I'm not holding my breath.
There's also the issue that a large number of notebooks simply won't accept the drivers directly from NVIDIA. Reply
JarredWalton - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkNVIDIA previously had a mobile driver program where they committed to quarterly updates, and they delivered on that three times (though the first wasn't quite "quarterly"). The drivers started out several months behind the desktop releases, and now we have drivers released on all platforms twice (185.81 and then the final 185.85) - though granted they're mostly the same thing.
As far as laptops where the NVIDIA drivers won't work, are they in the "unsupported" list? They've worked on every laptop I've tried, which ranged from 8600M to 9500M to 8800M SLI to 9800M. What laptops specifically don't work or have problems? Or are these problems caused by old and cluttered Windows installs where malware or something else gets in the way?
If NVIDIA doesn't continue to release unified drivers, we'll certainly point it out, but at the same time they've already strongly committed to minimum quarterly updates. That's more than anyone else has done for mobile graphics. Reply
rbfowler9lfc - Friday, May 29, 2009 - linkReally impressive battery life. You can watch a 1080p movie on the road, as long as it doesn't last longer than 1h. Bah! Reply


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UF women's basketball beats MSU on road
Published: Thursday, January 10, 2013 at 6:01 a.m.
Last Modified: Friday, January 11, 2013 at 12:15 a.m.
STARKVILLE, Miss. — Junior Jaterra Bonds scored 17 points and the Gators' post players stepped up and helped Florida earn a 61-55 victory against Mississippi State at Humphrey Coliseum on Thursday.
Redshirt-sophomore Kayla Lewis scored 12 points with nine rebounds, freshman Sydney Moss scored 10 points with nine boards and junior center Vicky McIntyre contributed 10 points, eight rebounds and four blocked shots for the Gators (13-4, 2-1 SEC), who earned their first road conference victory of the year.
It was a tight ballgame throughout with Florida's largest lead of the contest was nine points twice, as the Bulldogs quickly answered both times.
With the Gators holding a 51-42 lead with 8:30 remaining, MSU ripped off a 10-0 run behind a pair of three-pointers from Kendra Grant, who finished with a game-high 23 points, and took a 52-51 lead with 4:30 remaining.
Bonds answered 25 seconds later with a driving layup through traffic and started a game-ending 10-3 run that included six points from the free throw line.
Throughout the game Florida would score on more consecutive possessions, however, the Gators had several of those from the free throw line and came away with one point.
MSU (8-8, 0-3 SEC) entered the game with a tendency of sending its opponent to the free throw line, with their previous two foes making a combined 75 trips.
Thursday's game continued that trend, as Florida attempted 39 shots from the charity stripe and made 25, with eight different Gators finding their way to the line paced by Bonds, who converted 8-of-10.
Reader comments posted to this article may be published in our print edition. All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be re-published without permission. Links are encouraged.

subset: commoncrawl


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SOLD Bronze Golden Crawling Butter Krishna 7"
Item #: 74b19
Statue Details
Total Height Including Base: 7 inches
Base Width & Depth: 8 x 6 inches
Weight: 8 pounds
- Baby Krishna or Bala Krishna is crawling with a ball of butter in his hand
- As mischievous babies Krishna and his older brother, Balarama would steal jars or yogurt and butter from their families stocks or from the kitchens of their village neighbors
- This Krishna is a hand made, one of a kind, bronze sculpture cast by the artists of South India using the lost wax process, a skill passed on for generations since the Chola period
- Krishna ships the same day from our California showroom
One of the most widely revered and most popular of all Indian divinities, is Krishna worshipped as the eighth incarnation (avatar) of Vishnu. Krishna became the focus of a large number of devotional cults, which over the centuries have produced a wealth of religious poetry, music, painting and sculpture.
The child Krishna was adored for his mischievous pranks; he also performed many miracles and slew demons. As a youth, the cowherd Krishna became renown as a lover, the sound of his flute prompting gopis (wives and daughters of the cowherds) to leave their homes to dance ecstatically with him in the forests. His favorite among them was the beautiful Radha. Krishna's youthful dalliances with the gopis are interpreted as symbolic of the loving interplay between God and the human soul. Krishna affirms life in his pranks, music and lovemaking.
The rich variety of legends associated with Krishna's life led to an abundance of representation in painting and sculpture. The most reknown story surrounding Krishna is the Bahgavad Gita or Gita which is considered one of the most importatnt Hindu texts. The Gita is the conversation between Krishna and Arjuna. Krishna is explaining to Arjuna that it is Arjuna's moral obligation to fight in a war that will put him against some members of his family. Krishna like Vishnu is an upholder of the moral order of the universe.
Bronze is an extremely durable metal made from a combination of 5 metals; copper, iron, tin, with minute additions of silver and gold. This combination is called Panchaloha bronze and is the basis for making the sacred Hindu temple statues of India and the world. Copper is the most prevalent metal in the alloy. Copper also gives the metal a softer composition that allows the bronze artisans to carve the details that are prevalent in each piece. All the South Indian bronze sculpture Lotus Sculpture carries are Panchaloham and thus suited for any home altar or community temple.
Because of the durability of the metal not much is needed to maintain a bronze sculpture. Many of our customers purchase a bronze statue and perform daily puja and abhisheka consisting of bathing the Hindu deity in ghee, milk, coconut milk or other liquids. In this case nothing is needed to keep the statue clean as it will be bathed daily. If the sculpture is used for "darshan" or simply viewing the sculpture it is best to dust the statue as needed so no dirt collects in the details of the sculpture. For both polished golden bronzes and antique patina bronze statues if you would like the sculpture to shine use a cotton cloth with some coconut oil or other natural oil to wipe down the piece as needed.
Many of our bronze Hindu statues have been placed in outdoor temples. Bronze's durability makes it perfect for cold winters and hot summers of any climate. We suggest you bathe the sculpture every couple of months so that dirt does not collect on the sculpture and then use a cotton cloth with some natural oil to give the statue a shine. Both indoors and outdoors a bronze statue can be left alone which, overtime, will give the bronze an antique patina.
On some bronze statues you can see small hints of lime green, verde-gris patina. Some people prize this color for its age others want to remove it. If you would like to remove the verde-gris use a tooth brush with some coconut oil or other natural oil and lightly go over the verde-gris. This should remove the unwanted patina from the sculpture.
If you have any questions concerning your bronze statue please email us at [email protected] or call us at 1(760) 994-4455.
This sculpture is in our Oceanside, California store and ready for immediate shipping. The shipping charge is automatically calculated by UPS for shipping within the United States. Each sculpture is usually shipped within 24 hours of the order with the exception of the weekend. To obtain a shipping quote simply add the statue you are interested in to your shopping cart and then select click on the "Calculate Domestic Shipping" button. Lotus Sculpture uses Instapak foam injection packing system or bubble wrap and recycled peanuts to ensure that all our pieces arrive undamaged. Click here to learn more about Lotus Sculptures packing.International Shipping
This sculpture is in our Oceanside, California store and ready for immediate shipping to anywhere in the world. If you are in Canada please select "UPS Standard to Canada" for the shipping option. If you are an international customer please select "International Shipping" during checkout. The shipping charge will be calculated as $0. Lotus Sculpture will email you the correct shipping cost subject to your approval or you may call us at 760-994-4455 or email us at [email protected] for a shipping quote. Lotus Sculpture uses Instapak foam injection packing system or bubble wrap and recycled peanuts to ensure that all our pieces arrive undamaged. Click here to learn more about Lotus Sculptures packing.


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A delicious and healthy soup provided by HEAL nutrition. Get the recipe.
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Certain elements of cloud computing are inarguably beneficial. The ability to quickly provision, clone, and deploy servers to address capacity issues is a definite plus, and the fact that you can effortlessly add elements such as load balancers, big storage, and databases is equally compelling. However, there is a downside that needs to be understood: the fact that, in many cases, cloud server instances can exhibit wildly different performance metrics, measured from second to second.
Sure, SLAs and guarantees made by the cloud provider can address these issues after the fact, but when it's crunch time, there's nothing you can do other than communicate the problem and hope it gets fixed quickly. You may have visibility into what your instances are doing, but you have no idea what the underlying hardware is doing, how it's configured, or how oversubscribed it might be. That's the nature of the cloud.
[ Benchmarking Amazon EC2: The wacky world of cloud performance | 8 public cloud services put to the test | Stay on top of the cloud with InfoWorld's "Cloud Computing Deep Dive" special report. ]
There's no secret involved in how cloud providers operate. They have built tools around various virtualization platforms to allow for self-service VM provisioning, and they've tied in other value-adds, but in the end, it all comes down to the same basic virtualization frameworks that we use in-house today. Those, however, we control both inside and out. In the cloud, we're stuck on the inside.
Let's say we're deploying a service on a public cloud that will require some number of Web servers, at least one database server, and a load balancer. The load balancer is run by the cloud provider, and we have no visibility into its load or performance. As a result, if we start to see the number of incoming connections drop, we won't know whether the incoming load is dipping or if there's a capacity issue with the load balancer. Or to take another example, we might find the performance of our Web servers varying greatly, despite being identically configured -- as I recently saw with a cloud server instance.
As I was turning up a test instance with a well-known cloud provider, I ran some tests of the underlying server. Essentially, I used Apache's ab benchmarking tool to measure the performance of Nginx on the host, so I was hitting the server from itself, requesting the same PNG file 3,000 times, with 20 concurrent connections and a second rest between each test run. The Nginx configuration was set to cache these files, so it was simply pulling the image out of RAM and shipping it, no disk I/O involved.
Over the course of six test passes, I witnessed a high of 7,749.1 requests per second and a low of 4,754.43 requests per second. The average across all tests was 6,499.19 requests per second. This represents a substantial range in results, making it a challenge to forecast scalability metrics.
On the other hand, running the same tests against an in-house VM with the same number of vCPUs and RAM, I saw a high of 15,176.66 requests per second and a low of 14,507.47 requests per second, with an average of 14,829.52 requests per second. These are obviously much more consistent results. They're also nearly three times higher than the results from the cloud instance.
The CPUs in use were different, which accounts for some of the disparity. (The in-house VM was using Intel Xeon E5-2670 CPUs at 2.6GHz with 20MB cache, while the cloud instance was running on AMD Opteron 4332 HE CPUs at 3.0GHz with 2MB cache.) But that's not the whole story. I should have seen equally consistent results, however slower, on the cloud instance. Instead, I have a range of almost 50 percent of the average result. (This compares to a range of less than 5 percent of the average for the in-house VM.)
Cloud servers are generally sold by the vCPU count, RAM, and bandwidth utilization, but clearly not all instances are created equally. Even if they were, the capacity of the underlying hardware can vary wildly depending on where the instance happens to be. The solution from a purely operational standpoint is to overbuild your cloud infrastructure to account for these large performance disparities, but that has its own pitfalls, including extra costs.
Also, even if the instance is overbuilt, performance can suffer if the load balancer is trying to level an incoming load to several instances performing at different levels, even though they're ostensibly identical in spec. If the load balancer is directing traffic to the least loaded instance measured by number of connections, that instance may very well be underperforming as compared to other "identical" instances, which may be handling more connections but are actually operating faster.
There is no good solution to this, other than maintaining vigilance and pressing your cloud provider to deliver what was promised. I'd recommend running scheduled performance tests on your instances to check their performance levels over time and using these results as ammunition in discussions with the provider.
The reasons for using the cloud are many, but cloud servers are certainly not the hands-free panacea they might seem to be. You may reduce some responsibilities, but you will gain others.
This story, "Don't count on consistent server performance in the cloud," was originally published at InfoWorld.com. Read more of Paul Venezia's The Deep End blog at InfoWorld.com. For the latest business technology news, follow InfoWorld.com on Twitter.


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Did you know?
Membership to the Kimberley Club was an essential part of the agreement in the historic Rhodes-Barnato amalgamation deal that saw Rhodes and Barnato merging their shares in the diamond-rich Kimberley Mine – today the Big Hole.
Back in the 1880s, the Northern Cape< town of Kimberley was, literally, a very large diamond in the rough.
Higgledy-piggledy streets, mawkishly leaning shacks, ramshackle watering holes and an occasional dust storm that turned everything and everybody instantly khaki – that was early Kimberley.
But among the hardbitten 'kopje wallopers' (diggers) and the accompanying phalanx of chancers, dancers and card sharks, there was an upper-crust of ambitious men and their families.
Led informally by mogul Cecil John Rhodes, they were the deal makers and empire builders of their time. And when the Kimberley Club was founded in August 1881, they flocked together and were later described as men who would 'rather live on bread and butter than drop out of that great institution'.
Rhodes' good friend Neville Pickering was particularly pleased with the Kimberley Club: 'We have our dinners and dances – one finds oneself in evening dress every night. It's ruination to health and pocket. And then our Club is such perfection. Electric bells wherever you like to touch. Velvet pile and Turkey carpets to walk upon and then one loses oneself in a luxurious lounge.'
The diamond finds in the Kimberley area and the international business taking place right here on the dusty veld made 'The Club' very exclusive. A certain Archibald Colquhoun was impressed: 'The place was stuffed with money – more millionaires to the square foot than any other place in the world.'
The Kimberley Club burnt down twice, was rebuilt both times and when the South African (formerly Anglo-Boer) War broke out in October 1899, it was the focal point for town relief when Kimberley was besieged by Boer forces shortly after.
The Kimberley Club Christmas menu for 1899 included turtle soup, mutton cutlets, aspic of foie gras, plum pudding and Stilton cheese. That was the last time anyone in Kimberley ate so well. As the siege continued and rations dried up, luminaries like Rhodes were served horseflesh disguised as 'grilled prime veal fillet garni a la Siege'.
Two royal visits to the Kimberley Club yielded two potentially embarrassing incidents. In 1933, Prince George (son of King George V) choked on a fishbone during a gala dinner at the club. A local dentist (and club member) carefully removed the bone and there were no hard feelings.
When Queen Elizabeth visited in 1947, she left a diamond ring next to the wash stand in the cloak room. The bedroom steward found the ring, returned it and was rewarded.
These days, the Kimberley Club also operates as a four-star boutique hotel, offering 21 rooms decorated with original club furniture and added period pieces. There are three dining areas and a 'ladies' lounge' available to guests.
And if you are lucky (or unlucky) you may see the ghost of Joe van Praagh that's reputed to haunt the club. Van Praagh was a wealthy bachelor-philanthropist who lived at the club until his death in 1948.
Travel tips & Planning info
Who to contact
Kimberley Club
Tel: +27 (0) 53 832 4224
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
The Big Hole
Tel: +27 (0) 53 830 4600
How to get here
Kimberley lies about 500 km west of Johannesburg on the N12 – budget five hours' driving time. The Kimberley Club is at No. 72, Dutoitspan Road.
Best time to visit
High summer (November – March) or mid-winter in Kimberley (June – August) can be brutal (very hot in summer, very cold in winter). Best visiting times are the shoulder seasons of autumn (April – May) or spring (September – October).
Around the area
A trip to the Magersfontein battle site south of the city is a definite highlight for those interested in the South African (formerly Anglo-Boer) War. Check the listed websites for directions and more details.
Tours to do
Tours of the city, the Big Hole and outlying areas are available through the listed Kimberley website and the Big Hole website. The nocturnal Ghost Tour is one of the most popular outings. A visit to the McGregor Museum, where Cecil John Rhodes stayed during the Siege of Kimberley, is also a must.
Get around
You can explore Kimberley by driving around it yourself. Just get a printed guide of the attractions available and follow directions. Kimberley is not an overcrowded city and the traffic flow is comparatively gentle.
You could also opt for a guided tour of a day or half a day. This is perhaps better if your time in Kimberley is limited.
Length of stay
It's worthwhile staying over at the Kimberley Club for one or two nights of Victorian memories.
What to pack
Pack something fairly formal for the dinners at the club. Otherwise, pack seasonally and informally.
What to eat
The Kimberley Club offers fine dining morning, noon and night. From pork belly roast to Thai chicken and prawn curries to Karoo lamb chops to Springbok leg steaks to poached mussels, the fare is wide-ranging and of high standard.
What's happening
One of the highlights of a Kimberley year is the Northern Cape Writers' Festival held in early March.
Best buys
If you want to know more about Kimberley and the club, buy a copy of Kimberley: Turbulent City by Brian Roberts.


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Some 3,000 people, mainly women and from various different faiths, are reported to have converted to Islam in Dubai, the commercial capital of the United Arab Emirates last year. This figure represents a 71% increase in the number of converts in 2007.
In an annoucement to the media, Dr. Hamad Bin al-Shaban said, "We are spreading Islamic culture and our national identity by way of mosques, Qur'anic sciences, the Islamic legacy, research and philanthropic activities and thus ensuring our message reaches large numbers of people in an appropriate manner."
Al-Shaban also said that the message of Islam was being transmitted by qualified religious figures using advanced technology. The department concerned was reported to show special interest in new converts, to provide appropriate visual and audio materials and to hold education seminars in all languages.
Atheists' greatest dream is to create a society of robotic, insensitive and desensitized indiciduals with no fear of Allah. In recent years, however, atheists have totally failed in their ambition of establishing a society that denies the existence of Allah on the basis of no evidence whatsoever (surely He is beyond that) that has turned its back on religion and only attaches any importance to matter and material things. The theory of evolution, put forward to replace the fact of Creation, has been scientifically proved to be the greatest lie of the last century. Consciences of people have been opened up as it has emerged how the world has been deceived by fraud on the subject of evolution. This has allowed them to be freed from the dark spell of Darwinism and to see Allah's creative artistry and come to believe.
None of the methods atheists have used to try and get rid of religion have been able to prevent the turning toward faith, and the return to religious devotion is continuing at full speed. The reason for this is that Almighty Allah protects the true faith. He will cause it to prevail, against the wishes of the deniers. This is the true promise of Allah, the Omnipotent and Creator of the universe and all living things. Allah is He who keeps His promises:
"When you have seen people entering Allah's religion in droves, then glorify your Lord's praise and ask His forgiveness. He is the Ever-Returning." (Surat an-Nasr, 2-3)2009-02-03 00:00:00


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SAINT LEO, Fla. – The Saint Leo women's basketball team (7-17, 1-13 SSC) fell to Sunshine State Conference foe Nova Southeastern (15-9, 7-7 SSC) 69-57, Saturday afternoon from the Marion Bowman Activities Center.
Despite going point-for-point with NSU in the second half, the Lions could not overcome 26 turnovers and a first half that featured just six made field goals.
Elyse Clyburn captained the Lions with a career-best 14 points, while Christina Granville registered her second double-double of the year as she chipped in 11 points to go along with a team and season-high 12 boards.
An offensive stalemate over the opening 20 minutes, a Lions 10-3 deficit was cut to one, 13-12, after Sarah Winans converted one of her two first half baskets with 8:58 to play. The Sharks kept the Lions offense at bay for the remaining portion of the first half, while strong Shark interior play steadily increased the NSU lead to double figures, 29-18, going into the halftime break.
Nova Southeastern rallied-off 13 of the first 17 points in the second half to claim a 42-24 lead with 15:27 to play in the game. Granville and Clyburn combined to score the next 10 Lions' points to cut the lead to 12, 50-38, with 10:53 to play. However, the day still belonged to Nova Southeastern as they kept a double-digit running lead over the remaining portions of the game to close with the 12-point win.
The Lions out-rebounded the Sharks by one, 43-42, and collected 23 points off the bench.
The Lions will close-out their home regular season schedule on Wednesday, February 22, when the squad hosts Barry University in Sunshine State Conference action. The game is scheduled to tip at 5:30 p.m.
For the latest news, information, and updates on the women's basketball team, visit SaintLeoLions.com.


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(ARA) - Two million Americans fall victim to medical identity theft each year, according to a study by the Ponemon Institute, commissioned by Experian's ProtectMyID. While medical identity theft costs victims an average of $22,346, the potential impact can be far greater - medical identity theft could cost some victims their health, or even their lives.
Medical identity theft involves the theft of personal information - such as your name, Social Security number or Medicare number - to obtain medical care, purchase drugs or submit false claims to Medicare. The crime can damage a victim's credit rating and even be life-threatening if it causes incorrect information to appear in a victim's personal medical records, warns the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service's Office of the Inspector General (OIG).
According to the study, while more Americans now understand just what medical identity theft is, few are taking the key steps that could help prevent it. Only 57 percent of survey respondents check their medical records for accuracy, and nearly one in five (18 percent) say they don't care about the accuracy of their medical records.
"There are specific things that people can and should do to protect themselves from medical identity theft," says Ken Chaplin, senior vice president of ProtectMyID. "People have to be vigilant with their personal information and avoid letting their guard down, even with family and friends."
The Federal Trade Commission recommends you take these steps to help prevent medical identity theft:
* Before you share medical information with anyone, verify who you're talking to. Never provide information over the phone or through the mail unless you initiated the contact and you're confident you're dealing with a legitimate organization. Be aware that medical identity thieves often try to scam consumers by posing as representatives of insurance companies, doctor's offices, pharmacies and even government agencies.
* Protect your information. Keep paper copies of medical or insurance records and forms in a secure, locked file or drawer. When managing your health or insurance accounts online, be wary of any site that asks you to share sensitive information like your Social Security number, insurance account number or details of your medical conditions. Look for the hallmarks that a website is secure, including a web address (URL) that begins with "https" (the "s" stands for "secure") and a lock symbol in the lower right-hand corner of the page.
* Picking through trash is a common ploy of identity thieves. Shred your discarded health insurance forms, bills and medical records before disposing of them. Destroy the labels on your prescription pill bottles and packages before throwing them away.
The OIG also offers tips for medical identity theft protection, including:
* Treat your Medicare and Social Security numbers and cards as carefully as you would your credit cards.
* Be wary of anyone who asks for your Medicare number in exchange for "free" medical equipment or services. If what they're offering is really free, they shouldn't need your numbers.
* Never let anyone use your Medicare ID card. The Ponemon survey found that a growing number of survey respondents (5 percent more in 2012 than in 2011) have allowed a family member to use their personal identification to obtain medical services, including treatment, healthcare products or pharmaceuticals. Doing so is against the law, and may afford unscrupulous individuals the chance to use that information for unauthorized purposes.
According to the Ponemon survey, it takes, on average, about a year to resolve an instance of medical identity theft, and a quarter of the survey respondents said it took more than two years. As with a serious medical issue, resolution can be made more challenging depending on how long the problem is allowed to fester.
Take an active role in protecting your medical information from identity thieves. Check your medical records regularly and keep an eye on all your financial and credit accounts. Products like ProtectMyID can help. A comprehensive identity theft detection, protection and resolution product, it can help you prevent the damages caused by identity theft.
"Medical identity theft hits consumers both medically and financially," says Dr. Larry Ponemon, chairman and founder of the Ponemon Institute. "For three years in a row, our findings have consistently shown that medical identity theft crime continues to increase in terms of prevalence and costs to the victim."


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The Kentucky State Police and Grant County Sheriff's Department monitored what appeared to be a small gathering of the Ku Klux Klan in Grant County on May 19.
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Highlights from Mr. Adnan Oktar's interview on 20 December 2012
(Rabbi Weissmandel, who lived in Prague some 50 years ago, encountered an interesting state of affairs regarding the sequence of letters as he read the Qur'an. He discovered the word 'Torah' encoded at 50-letter intervals at the beginning of the Book of Genesis. Forty years afterward, Dr. Eliyahu Rips, a teacher of mathematical statistics at Jerusalem's Hebrew University, discovered the name 'Aaron' encoded many times and could easily be read by skipping letters between the lines in the book of Leviticus. Calculations of probability revealed that the number was too great to be coincidental, and ushered in a new beginning for investigation of the codes in the Torah.)
Aaron. The Freemasons also concentrate a lot on Aaron. Kabbalists also concentrate a lot on Aaron. When they came here to that meeting at the palace, Madonna was on my right and her children next to me. They opened the Torah there, to the parables of Aaron.
(In response to a mail from a viewer saying; "An agnostic brother of ours who does not believe in Islam thinks that because the Holy Qur'an says that a thief should have his hand cut off is, may Allah forbid, barbaric, that this cannot be Allah's command and that people fabricated it themselves. Could you shed some light on that?")
What does stealing mean? You first have to define what a thief is. What the Qur'an is referring to is someone who has made stealing his profession. Second, all people's needs are met in the Qur'an. I mean, there is no reason to steal. That person can take something when he needs it. Islamic society meets that need. He has no need of anything. If he needs a home, that need will be met. If he needs clothes, that need will be met. He needs nothing. Any needs he has will be met. It is impossible in practical terms to steal. If he is ill, then there is no punishment for that. But if he does it solely out of malice, out of wickedness, then Allah has issued such a commandment as a deterrent, but there still have to be witnesses for that to be enforced. It depends on a complaint being raised. Because Islam is based on the idea of forgiveness, Allah tells us to forgive and command what is good and forbid bad. It is a deterrent punishment.
"As for thieves, both male and female," people who make a habit of stealing. !...cut off their hands in reprisal for what they have done: an object lesson from Allah. Allah is Almighty, All-Wise. (Surat al-Ma'ida, 38)
But the next verse says, "But if anyone makes repentance after his wrongdoing and puts things right, Allah will turn towards him. Allah is Ever-Forgiving, Most Merciful. (Surat al-Ma'ida, 39) Allah immediately speaks of repentance and forgiveness. There is no theft if nobody complains. "All right, I forgive them," you say. Are you not a Muslim? In that case you must say, "I forgive them."


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Rugby festival and more coming up
Saturday, Jul 12, 2014 06:00 am
St. Albert rugby fans are invited to come down to Ellerslie fields Saturday and watch SARFC teams of all ages take to the grass and put on a show.
Firsts, Seconds, Women�s, and Juniors will play from morning until night in what is sure to be an exciting day of sports. Consult the schedule below to make sure you don�t miss out on any of the fun.
Junior Rugby Festival
The day kicks off at 9:30 a.m. with some junior rugby action.
Teams ranging from U5 to U15 boys and girls will play until 12 p.m. in non-competitive sporting fun. U9 teams and younger will play with flags instead of contact.
It will be the eighth Junior Rugby Festival of the year.
U17/U19 Women
The U17/U19 Women take to the field at noon to take on the very game Parkland Sharks.
The Sharks were in Ellerslie Park on Tuesday and absolutely pounded the winless Pirates by a score of 40-0.
SARFC Women lost their Tuesday game against the Leduc Crude 42-31 but won their match against the Pirates 46-10.
The match is only the third game in the season for these teams but neither one wants to drop below .500 in such a competitive division. It should be a good one.
SARFC Seconds
The SARFC Men�s Seconds take on the Grand Prairie Centaurs at 2 p.m.
The third place Seconds have looked solid this season with three wins, two losses, and a tie. A win over the struggling Centaurs could bump them up a spot past the second place Fort McMurray Knights.
The Centaurs are coming off of a 43-27 beating at the hands of the first place L.A. Crude and are looking for any way to snap their losing streak. The Centaurs have lost the first four games of the season and have not looked good.
The Seconds are looking for some life too after taking a 58-18 whipping from the undefeated Clan.
Both teams will be fired up for some excellent Saturday rugby action.
SARFC Firsts
The undefeated SARFC Men�s Firsts take on the winless Leprechaun Tigers this Saturday afternoon to cap off a busy rugby day at Ellerslie Park. The game starts at 4:00 p.m.
The Firsts have looked unstoppable this season and are the team to beat. In six games they�ve allowed only 48 points against and scored 255 points for an incredible 207 points differential.
The last time the Lep Tigers visited Ellerslie Park the Firsts pounded them into the ground with a one-sided 74-0 beating.
The SARFC Firsts will have two weeks to rest up after Saturday�s game before they meet the fourth place Druids on July 26.


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- 12:27 Ticket #194 (A generic event initialize function for libyaml.) created by
- I am attaching source code that I attempted to doctor up to libyaml …
- 17:38 Ticket #193 (PyYAML doesn't use __float__, etc.) created by
- I've noticed that PyYAML doesn't seem to respect the float, or other …
- 18:17 Ticket #192 (ignore_aliases breaks with numy arrays) created by
- With all numpy arrays except type double, yaml crashes with error below: …
- 11:35 Ticket #191 (CSafeLoader and CSafeDumper are missing a dispose method in 3.10 and trunk) created by
- I've attached reproducers. This was discovered in Ubuntu Oneiric, where …
Note: See TracTimeline for information about the timeline view.


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A place where companies outsource customer service or technical support, ostensibly because it's cheaper than having in-house support. They are notorious for hiring anyone who can lift a headset and operate a keyboard and firing people for completely lame reasons whenever it is no longer proffitable to keep them or they are elligable for a pay increase. A large portion of the furry community works in call centers.
"I've worked in four or five call centers over the last few years. Maybe some day I'll get a real job," Rob said, then hit his Ready button to take another call.
by Majik Fox October 28, 2004
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Jury selection begins in murder trial
Published: Monday, January 14, 2013 at 1:11 p.m.
Last Modified: Monday, January 14, 2013 at 1:11 p.m.
A woman indicted for murder in the 2012 beating, stabbing death of a 78-year-old Gainesville man went on trial Monday with the possibility of life in prison if convicted.
In addition to the murder charge, Maranda Joy Martin, 23, of Gainesville, is facing conspiracy to commit murder, kidnapping, grand theft and aggravated fleeing from law enforcement — 10 counts in all.
During jury selection Monday, potential jurors were asked if they had any personal or family history similar to the charges in the case, and if they recognized any names related to the trial. They also were asked if they knew any of the other potential jurors.
People with those perceived conflicts to the case were asked by lawyers to discuss them further, but none in the room voiced concerns about an ability to be fair.
Martin and her cousin Austin Mark Jones, 23, from Fort White, are accused of breaking into the home of Paul Quandt on Jan. 9, 2012. Martin was a former home aide of Quandt's, who lived in the Blues Creek community of homes off Northwest 43rd Street.
Police say the pair bound Quandt's hands with duct tape, beat and stabbed him, and shot him with a stun gun. They ransacked his house and stole more than $20,000 worth of gold, silver and coins as well as guns, electronics and cash, authorities said.
Quandt was left for dead. But after the attackers left, he used cooking oil to loosen the bonds on his hands and drove his electric wheelchair to the house of a neighbor, who alerted police. He told the neighbor he was attacked by two people in masks, and then he lost consciousness.
Officers spotted Jones in Quandt's white Cadillac coming out of a nearby Weschester community and gave chase. They caught Jones when he crashed into two vehicles at Southwest Fifth Avenue and 13th Street. Martin turned herself in shortly afterward.
Authorities say Quandt died from his injuries 10 days later. The pair were indicted in February.
Immediately after the indictments were issued, State Attorney Bill Cervone announced that he would be seeking the death penalty for Jones. Because of the severity of the charges, Martin could face life in prison. Cervone has told The Sun that Martin recruited Jones and set up the robbery, but Jones did the actual beating. He said that's why the state is seeking the death penalty for Jones. There's a difference between legal and moral culpability, he said, and Jones has both.
Jones' trial date has not been set.
Both have been held in the Alachua County jail since they were apprehended.
Correspondent Jessica Kegu contributed to this report.
Reader comments posted to this article may be published in our print edition. All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be re-published without permission. Links are encouraged.


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2012 International Student Ring Ceremony
April 12th, 2012 | SMWC
"This ring is a special kind of beauty. I hope my friendship with you, just like this ring, goes round and round and never ends. My time here will become a pretty flower in my heart that never dies." – Haina Fu, 2011-2012 international student from China
On Wednesday, April 11, 2012, Saint Mary-of-the-Woods President Dottie L. King, Ph.D., awarded 17 international and study abroad students with the treasured sterling silver international student ring. Etched with the continents surrounded by oak leaves, the ring is a unique reminder of their academic success and the rich cultural experience of attending an American women's only Catholic liberal arts college.
"Those who wear the ring are educated women," said Malia Hoffman, SMWC's coordinator of campus ministry. "It is worn by women from all corners of the world."
Students from China, South Korea, Taiwan and study abroad students from the U.S. received their rings in a moving ceremony in the Sacred Heart Chapel in the College's historic Le Fer Hall. Elizabeth Coley '10, assistant director of campus life, detailed the rich history of the College's international ring ceremony.
"We want our international students to return to their country with this symbolic reminder of all those they came to know and love at The Woods," Coley said.
The annual ceremony, which first began in 1995, marks the end of these diverse students' time at The Woods. The students must complete one full semester in order to qualify for the ring. This cherished memento is a tangible reminder of academic and personal achievement during their cross-cultural experience.
These international students have the same courage as Saint Mother Theodore Guerin, King said. "You embody the same spirit," she told them during the ceremony. "We are forever changed by your presence here. We hope you remember us fondly."
Congratulations to the 2012 International Ring Recipients:
Mingyue Fan
Haina Fu
Jixiang Gu
Jiayang He
Mengzi Jin
Yu He Lei
Erkang Li
Tiruo Liu
Yiqing Lu
Yi Yang
South Korea:
Ji Yeon Baek
Jisoo Lee
Yi-Hsin Chen
Yi-Ting Chiang
Wan-Ting Chu
United States:
Nicole Francis
Charlene Gerdes
Comment on this article
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*These estimates reflect new EPA methods beginning with 2008 models. Your actual mileage will vary depending on how you drive and maintain your vehicle. Actual mileage will vary with options, driving conditions, driving habits and vehicle's condition. Mileage estimates may be derived from previous year model.


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Mike Muren
& the Muren Team
Meet our Local Odenton, MD Realtors
Determining your homes value is not always easy. If you list your home to low you will leave money on the table. If you list to high you risk damaging the markets perception of your home and open yourself up to price reductions and or low offers. It takes a knowledgeable, experienced and professional Realtor to accurately assist you in deciding on the best possible listing price for your home. Mike Muren & The Muren Team of Long and Foster Real Estate have the local Odenton, MD area experts to ensure the personal attention needed is given to everyone who is considering selling their home. This allows us to provide uncompromising service to our clients and still have the marketing power of one of the largest teams with the largest privately owned real estate broker in the nation. Submit your information and one of our top Odenton, MD area Realtors will contract you with a FREE no obligation Market analysis. This will provide you information on your home's value, a time frame needed to sell your home and a customized marketing plan for your home.


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Did you know?
The Bulungula Lodge has created jobs for over 35 people in the village
Ready to make a difference? Then leave your preconceived ideas at home, and pack your smile. A wide range of local and international organisations are doing amazing community tourism projects throughout the country.
If you have more than few days, the Bulungula Lodge in the Eastern Cape should be your first stop. The lodge provides a platform for outsiders to access one of the poorest communities in South Africa. The lodge is located on one of the most remote beaches in the country.
A model of sustainable community development, Bulungula Lodge is an eco-friendly backpacker's lodge, 40% owned by the Nqileni village, where you can be as hands-on, or chilled-out as you desire. Whether you canoe, horse ride, or enjoy pancakes at the iLanga Fire Restaurant, every activity is 100% community-owned and run.
You can spend your days getting involved by making bricks, stamping corn, brewing beer or catching crayfish. Stay longer and share your expertise with the community, be it in art, teaching or nursing – all contributions are welcome.
Calabash Tours, also in the Eastern Cape, allows volunteers to go into the local schools to teach at the same time as they learn from the community. Children can benefit from your time and knowledge while you can forge relationships that will change the way you look at the world.
You2Africa offers a diverse choice of community projects with children. Work at a soup kitchen or visit a school for troubled boys, play football, share stories and change lives. Orphans and abandoned babies are a big problem in Africa. Why not spend some time looking after those without anyone to love them?
The South African branch of the international organisation Voluntours has a variety of volunteering options available, both in the wildlife conservation and humanitarian fields. Among these are conservation projects focusing on dolphins and sharks, as well as humanitarian-based projects focusing on education.
Remember that whatever community tourism project you select, make sure that the money you spend is going back into the community by choosing only those volunteer projects who follow the Fair Trade in Tourism South Africa (FTTSA) code of good practice for volunteerism.
Fair Trade in Tourism South Africa (FTTSA) is a non-profit marketing organisation that promotes sustainable community development projects, in partnership with the National Development Agency, a government organisation mandated to fund civil society programmes to alleviate unemployment and poverty in disadvantaged communities.
Travel tips & Planning info
Who to contact
Tel: +27 (0) 11 315 4049
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
Tel: + 27 (0) 21 424 2840
Email: firstname.lastname@example.com
Calabash Tours
Tel: +27 (0) 41 585 6162
Email: email@example.com
Bulungula Lodge
+27 (0) 47 577 8900
Email: email@example.com


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Did you know?
The white rhino is makes a panting sound when communicating with its family group.
A generally peaceful beast, a rhino has something of a prehistoric, Jurassic Park look about.
Its springy gait belies its tank-like weight (an average of two tons). In fact, this is the second largest animal on land, and like most charismatic mega fauna, is found only in Africa.
In South Africa you find two species of rhino: black and white. About 4800 black rhino and 20 000 white rhino survive in the wild.
At first glance, rhino conservation seems entirely superfluous. They look quite indestructible. But sadly that's not the case.
The rhino population plummeted to no more than a few hundred during the 1960s, was rebuilt through the work of dedicated conservationists, and now faces a fresh onslaught as demand for rhino horn is on the increase in the Far East.
Rhinos are poached to obtain the horn, used for centuries as a fever-reducing ingredient and as an aphrodisiac in traditional Chinese medicine, and more recently in Vietnam, where its regarded as a cure for hangovers and cancer. In the Middle East it is also in demand for prestigious dagger handles.
In South Africa rhino conservation has taken dramatic twists and turns and great battles have been and continue to be fought to save these members of the Big Five.
Between 1958 and 1964, Dr Ian Player and a handful of men worked hard to relocate white rhinos from the Umfolozi Game Reserve in KwaZulu-Natal (a sanctuary for most of the population) to promote their conservation. Until then, no one knew how to transport rhinos. Dr Player asked a local doctor how much morphine it would take to drug a large animal like a hippo or rhino, and the medico snapped back irritably: 'A bucketful man, a bucketful.
Although this strategy paid off at the time, fears are that a rapid increase in poaching today means the rhino is facing renewed risk of extinction.
In the Kruger National Park, a stronghold for white rhino, the South African National Defence Force and various other strategies are being employed in an effort to stem the tide of poaching. Conservationists are also working hard to change perceptions about consumption in markets where rhino horn is used.


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" One of Europe's largest low cost airline. UK's leading non-London centric airline. 83% of Flybe's flights are UK domestic compared to 22% easyJet and 7% Ryanair. In November 04, Flybe reported half yearly profits of £14 million. 36 aircraft in Flybe fleet. Flybe are owned by the Walker Trust, as featured in the Sunday Times Top 100 Rich List 2004. "
Having to take a short weekend break to Belfast. Ok that sounds wrong. Ok, I will try again. Having planned a short weekend break to Belfast I needed to take a flight there. (That sounds better!) Looking at all available options for the times I needed, I ended up making a booking through Booking.com with Flybe. The price was reasonable so I was quite pleased with it.
There were added extras for things such as picking your seats or hold luggage. However, as I was travelling alone and only for a short period, I had no need to add to the expense.
Having chosen online check in, I was able to book in 36 hours before flying. I was told there was a way to send this to your smartphone as a scanned code but I couldn't find that option and settled for the printing it out myself method. I would have preferred the code sent to the phone and had selected that method via Booking.com but it was beyond my ability to find it in the time I looked. That was slightly disappointing, as I would prefer to do online check-in whilst away and cannot always access a printer. Assuming that I could find out how to do so, I would definitely do that in future.
My experience of the flight itself was pretty decent. I flew from Gatwick and passed through security quickly with the printed out check-in. At the gate it was just as smooth. The plane boarded by allowing the rear most seats on first, which included me. I was greeted with the usual smooth, smiling stewards, who directed me to my seat. The plane I was on had 2 sets of 2 seats and these were leather (or something close to it.) The thing I liked most was that these were relatively wide seats with plenty of leg room. I am not a small person, playing as a forward in the pack at rugby has bulked me up over the years (not to mention the after game drinks...) I was comfortable in these seats and I did not find myself even close to impacting on the space of the other seat, unlike when I flew to the Canaries recently. There was the usual amount of overhead storage, which fitted my bag fine.
The flight itself was absolutely fine. It is a no-frills airline and you must be aware of this when booking. You are not going to be getting any snacks or drinks but that is hardly an issue. They do come round with the refreshment trolley and manage this very well. It serves the usual range of snacks at the usual over priced rates but it wasn't anything more expensive than the food in the airport. As this was a flight due to last a mere 1 hour 30 minutes, this was hardly something that I felt it was necessary to do.
I felt that the staff did their job competently and politely. Despite being in the air for just over an hour, they got around and did their snack run, 2 rubbish runs, the Duty Free run and still had time free to deliver a few personal touches, like helping out parents and taking time to smile at and talk to their small children.
My return flight was just as smooth and I feel that I can recommend them for this kind of short-haul trip. They delivered everything I needed. They got me too my destination and back with no fuss. They were relatively cheap and I felt that the staff did their job to a decent standard. You have to take this as you find it but I was wanting a bargain flight not all the frills added. In flying, as in so many other things, you can get what you pay for. However, would you want to pay much more to go on a short haul flight? I certainly wouldn't and if you are like me, then you may find this the airline for you. It runs on many short-haul routes, some 180 around Europe I believe and so you may find you can get a flight that suits you.
Overall, a good experience for the cost.
I feel it's my civic duty to warn anybody out there who may be considering flying with Flybe NOT TO!
My New Year's resolution is NEVER TO FLY WITH FLYBE AGAIN! I wrote to the CEO explaining how Flybe losing my luggage for 36 hours on the outward leg of a weekend trip to Cheltenham Literature Festival on Oct 5 had completely screwed up my plans and prevented me from attending the festival (on the first weekend I'd had off after working non-stop 7/7 in India and Kenya for a few months). Didn't hear a dickie bird. On the return leg Flybe damaged my baggage. I had to go to the official dealer myself, who of course then sent me elsewhere for the repairs. Three return trips across Paris, all requiring an afternoon off, all at MY expense. Flybe will only cover the cost of the actual repair! UNBELIEVABLE. They are so miserly, they won't even cover the cost of public transport to effect the repair that their shoddy service made necessary. So, to recap, FLYBE completely ruined the weekend, making the actual trip pointless and then they break my baggage and I'm the one who has extra time, trouble and costs putting THEIR mistake right. You'd think they'd make some form of commercial gesture and at least refund the transport costs associated with the repair, wouldn't you? Whoever they've got running PR should be sacked. Why would I ever want to travel with Flybe again? Oh! That's right. I don't! Since October I've travelled to the UK four times, each time with EUROSTAR. I heartily recommend anybody considering traveling between France and UK with Flybe to think again.
Bad experience trying to change travel date . First their frustrating and poorly written javascript website would not process it (kept springing buggy Exceptions), secondly I could not speak to a customer agent due to being permanently on a hold que( at ÂŁ1 per min.) I had to finally jump in my car and drive to the airport and physically take the ticket to the check-in desk where they changed it (and charged ÂŁ32.5 ).
As someone who has been flying regularly on low budget airlines since their inception (Ryanair,Easyjet,Aer Lingus,BMI etc), I have found the systems FLYBE employ are the worst I've came across. Their website seems to have been written by morons ( e.g. their rewards scheme doesn't accept the flight reference numbers and as I write (Boxing day) I can't book a flight for Feb 2011 from my account as the calendar is not updated) and their call centre seem to be permanently on hold. Nor do they reply to email complaints.
For all the failings of Ryanair/Easyjet -your on your own if problems occur- at least they employ efficient websites that can process the elementary tasks such as bookings and ticket changing in a seemless manner . It may be because they are much smaller than their rivals and can't make the sort of investment in the IT systems as their rivals have ,but in any case I would NOT use this airline again if an alternative exists. Their systems simply aren't fit for purpose.
Earlier today I took a short flight on a Flybe flight from Aberdeen to one of the Scottish Islands and was pleasantly surprised for such a short flight.
Booking was easy online and I took advantage of the option to pre-select my seat on the aircraft for only ÂŁ6. This was worth it as I picked a seat at the front of the aircraft which although next to an emergency exit, seats at the very front had all the legroom as normally is the case.
The flight did depart on schedule and today the aircraft was parked right next to the gate so there wasn't any having to get buses to ends of the airport.
During the flight, it was smooth other than some weather conditions making it a little bumpy and with it being a very small plane; a Sabb 340 this can be expected but is certainly less bumpier than taking the ferry sometimes which also is 12 hours whereas flying today was less than 1 hour.
I was pleasantly surprised that tea, coffee, orange juice and breakfast bars were complimentary. Even for such a short flight of only 50 minutes today, this was certainly good.
The price of the ticket was around ÂŁ105 including taxes and charges which was quite a good rate. Booking in advance sometimes is advised otherwise the price of flights can be higher unless there are sometimes special offers on which I believe there were the last time I looked at the website.
The flight landed safely on time and the flight crew were very friendly to passengers on the flight today.
I would happily fly with this airline again.
There is also the option to go with Flybe Economy Plus which costs slightly extra but gives you many extras including complimentary servisair lounge, extra baggage allowance and extra snacks/drinks complimentary on board.
Flybe are a large domestic airline operating within the UK, and to some extent, Europe. They connect a lot of smaller UK cities that the more traditional UK airlines fail to.
Being born out of Jersey European, they are now a very viable and realistic alternative for anyone travelling inter-UK, or between the UK and limited destinations in Europe.
But what about the quality of the product?
Online booking is USUALLY easy and efficient. The website has suffered some downtime in the past few months, but this now appears to be fixed. As for the transparency of prices, this is an area where some improvement is needed. The overall fare including taxes and charges is not initially evident, and furthermore, there are a lot of additional charges (such as baggage, seat selection, insurance) which get automatically added on, and which you must opt out of. This is not very user-friendly, and last time I booked, it was actually hard to navigate past the seat selection page without having a seat selected for you, and hence an extra charge. It took a bit of time to figure out how to opt out of that. Online booking therefore needs big improvements and greater transparency.
Check-in at the airport is much better. Most airports have self service counters where you can print your boarding pass and select your seat (FOR FREE). On board luggage allowance is reasonably generous at 10kg for economy.
On board it is quite cramped. Flybe operate a fleet entirely composed of Bombardier Dash 8 Q400's and Embraer E-195's. These are smaller, and less spacious than Aer Lingus, Bmi, Ryanair, Easyjet or BA's which largely operate A320's A319's or 737's for short haul routes. Instead of 3 seats at either side of the aisle, there are 2, and less overhead locker space, as well as less leg room. Bear this in mind if you are taking bulky luggage on board, as you may be retrospectively asked to check it in.
Meal services are no longer free. Food must be purchased. Due to the short haul nature of the flights, there is no in flight entertainment.
Flybe do have a good safety and on time record, although it should be noted that the Dash 8's are propeller and not jet based.
Overall, Flybe is a perfectly acceptable airline, superior in service and general customer service than Ryanair, but still with a lot to learn and improve upon.
Have flown with them three times so far - twice from Birmingham to Paris and the third from Birmingham to Aberdeen.
Birmingham to Paris CDG was problem-free, except for the second time when my wife and I were returning home from a week-long break in the City of Lights. Flybe actually operated the Air France flight, and Air France do the ground services at CDG airport, less said about that the better (long queue, not enough check-in staff) :)
However, Birmingham to Aberdeen has been in the snow this month, and the only problem was that we left about an hour late because there was a snowfall at Birmingham requiring the plane to be de-iced, which put us back to third place in the queue. The captain was able to make up about 15-20 minutes of lost time, so it wasn't as bad as I feared.
Simple check-in process, whether at the airport, or online (but make sure that you have easy access to a working printer to print off your boarding pass if you do an online check-in, or it could cost you 10 pounds at the desk for a reprint), and a nice little Bombardier Dash-8 (aka De Havilland Dash-8 for those of us old enough to remember) to fly in.
My only issues about the Dash-8 are that the seats are a bit small (I'm 6 feet tall) and close together (it's a 78-seater plane), and that it can seem quite noisy if you're seated near the engines as they're turboprops, so run at slower speeds than normal jets, and have the propellers slapped on the front.
Overall, I've had a good experience with them, although I wish they'd drop the charging for drinks and snacks onboard: the airport shops and bars charge enough as it is...
I have used flybe on a number of occasions to fly between Avignon and Southampton and Paris and Birmingham, and so far I have to say I have yet to experience any problems with my flight. I use Flybe when Ryanair's flights have not been on the day I wanted and although Ryanair's pricing has been creeping up Flybe are a little more expensive and if you book in advance you won't get as cheaper flight as if you book with Ryanair in advance.
The main advantage that I find with Flybe is that you get up to 20kgs luggage allowance instead of the usual 15kg with Ryanair. This is great for me because I travel with a backpack so to get over 20kg in it would be a real challenge. Therfore I know when I go that I am not going to be over the weight limit. Another advantage is that you do get allocated a seat. If you book online you can book your seat in advance for a charge but as I travel alone I don't mind where i sit. As a family you might want to book in advance though. It certainly relieves you of the cattle market rush that you can get on budget airlines where seats are not allocated.
One of the downsides is that the overhead cabin storage space is tiny! You would not be able to fit the maximum hand luggage size bag in there. It is most good for laptops and bags but anything else and you are stuck with it by your feet for the whole flight.
The seats on the aircraft are quite comfortable and I find it easy to fall asleep in them. During the flight they have the usual sell like most airlines but no one disturbed me the whole flight and the cabin crew were very pleasant and weren't huffy or seemingly overworked.
I did have to check-in at the machines from Southampton but they were easy to operate although the passport swipe wasn't working. I did get a sinking feeling when I saw them as I am not a fan of relying on computers but it was really quick and easy. So quick and easy that I took 5 minutes to check in and then I was hanging around. Next time I will arrive later! Then I had to proceed to drop of my baggage, which was equally as straight forward and simply produced my ticket and passport and my bag was off on its way. There were no queues either so that was a nice surprise.
If you prefer life easier than this Flybe also operate an Economy Plus programme, which allows you 30kg of luggage and also you can take a laptop on in addition to your hand luggage. This would really benefit any business travellers. Also your ticket is interchangeable so you can change it at the last minute with no charge.
Overall I like Flybe, OK a little more expensive but so much less hassle than Ryanair where you are fighting your way to the plane. If they did my regular route for a cheaper price I certainly would use them more often.
I flew with Flybe from Exeter to Amsterdam in February 2008.
I flew with my brother, for a short break back to The Netherlands. The flight itself was delayed by about an hour and a half. Although this was annoying, because we had an onward train to catch, the airline staff did a very good job at keeping us informed. They told us where to go and when etc...
The flight eventually took off, and we arrived in Amsterdam a couple of hours later, just in time to catch the last train to where we needed to go.
The flight was lovely and smooth, in a small twin propeller aircraft, and the staff were really professional, and attended to everyones needs efficiently. They took all requests seriously, (even really weird ones! Haha!)
The airline is a great boost to the region, because before they arrived, we had to go to London to catch many flights everywhere. They also generally have reasonable prices, but you need to book well in advance to get hold of these.
Overall, they are a great little airline, and are really professional.
We recently used Flybe for a trip to Northern Ireland, flew return from Manchester for around ÂŁ35 (this was booked a fair few months in advance hence the cheap price!). The booking process was smooth, however about a month later we had an email to say our flight home was cancelled and we had to take another one, which was a bit inconvenient but we did have months notice.
The checking in process is easy, you just type your confirmation into the machines at the airport, so no need to worry about printing off barcodes or anything, everything prints for you in the airport. You can even change seats to sit with your mates or grab a window seat, which we wern't expecting!
The plane itself is basic, but they flew on time and we had no problems with staff. Just what you would expect for a budget flight, no frills, can't complain for the cheap price. We had a slight bit of turbulance on the first flight, and people started screaming, which was hilarious, and a bit more on the way back, but I love turbulance!!
Other than the change in flight time, no problems with this airline!
I have flown on flybe a few times recently, because I have been going round cities looking at universities- I most recently flew down to Gatwick from Newcastle. My experience with flybe has been extremely positive I must say.
The planes that I took were never late, even the late on ones which are notoriously late (due to 15 minute shuffles run by budget airlines). From handing tickets in to be checked at the gate to getting off the plane, all of the staff were very nice and made flying all the more pleasurable.
There are two things I found particularly good about flying with flybe. Firstly the planes I flew on were small propeller panes. Although this does mean that they are nosier, in the case of the planes I flew on it meant that there were only two sets on either side of the plane. In my case I would imagine in most cases this meant that I did not have to worry about speaking to someone I did not know sitting next to me, which all though this can be nice is not something that I would chose.
The second good thing is the price which is fantastic. I paid just over ÂŁ30 return to Bristol from Newcastle including tax which is fantastic. Their prices aren't always as good but they do tend to be pretty decent. I would highly recommend flying with this company.
I flew with Flybe.com on Xmas Eve 2007 and was massively disappointed with the airline and the service received.
When I arrived at Glasgow airport I looked at the departures board and noticed that my flights to Birmingham were showing but that they were flicking between destinations under the same flight number and showing as Norwich then Birmingham so I walked upto the desk (it was not advising to check in so went to the information desk of the airline) only to be told to wait for further information which I found quite poor as it was obvious something was happening due to the information showing so I went to the check in desk to ask and was advised that due to the fact they had cancelled the Norwich flight of the previous day my flight to Birmingham was going to be going via Norwich and that this would add delays so I pointed out that I had registered an e-mail and mobile number when booking as the website clearly said to register information as they would keep me upto date with any changes, information or updates but this had not been done only to be told that they don't contact in all instances and even registering for this on the site would not guarantee anything. This was not looking good but I thought I would wait and see what they managed to do with the situation as it was obvious complaining would do nothing and was very annoyed to find that the Norwich customers got better treatment due to their delay and those who were actually booked for the Birmingham flight were left to suffer delays and poor service. The flight diverted to Norwich causing delays to my flight to Birmingham (which made no sense as Norwich was further away and to carry out the schedule flight first would have been better for customers but as they wanted the plane in Birmingham over night they did not take into account the customers) and we had to sit and wait as the Norwich passengers disembarked and a recounting of passenger numbers was carried out taking over 20 minutes before the plane even started to prepare for the onwards journey. The airline did offer free drinks but did not actually tell you this as they offered you a drinks service and then following this advised they hoped the free drinks they had just served would help to soothe the annoyance of the delays. When we arrived at Birmingham we had to wait as the steps on the plane would not come down and the plane was so old that the steps had to be specially requested causing us to be waiting for over 45 minutes after parking before being allowed to disembark the flight with no appologies offered. I contact Flybe and was told that it was outwith their control and they hoped I would fly with them again but obviously following the disgraceful service I would never fly with this airline ever again.
I have flown flybe a number of times and have found them to be reasonable.The staff are friendly and check in was very quick and efficient.One of the planes I flew on was a BAe 146. The plane itself looked quite well and modern.The seats were set up with three seats each side of the row and had a cheaper leathery feel to them.They were also wider than the seats on ryanair/easyjet with more leg room but them the cost of the flight was slightly more than I would expect to pay with a budget carrier.The smell from the engines during start up was very overpowering and the strong smell of kerosene at one stage had me worried that something might be wrong.However the flight took of on time and was nice an smooth.The smell either dissapiated or I became used to it.We landed slighlty ahead of schedule so overall was happy with the service and they didnt loose my bag.
I had one experience where i booked a flight with flybe in advance.My circumstances changed and i couldnt take the flight.I contacted flybe but they were not very helpful and would not let me have a refund or change the booking to another date.They said i could cancel but then sure whats the point if your not getting your money back.
Flybe airlines are unacceptable. I have flown with them earlier this time from manchester to paris. one way the luggage was delayed 48h, which left me very stressed, cause i was going there for my weddingand had my wedding dress in it! but finally we received it, so ok.worst thing happened on the way bag, our luggage was totally lost! they told us it probably stayed in paris, and will be sent to me in 24h time. unfortunetly it never arrived... 5 months now. happily i was insured... i lost all of my wedding presents....i received 1500 puonds from insurance and ..... 200 pound voucher from flybe! not even an apology! radiculous! not wort it....
FLYBE AIRLINE-No Frills
I needed to get to Newcastle very quickly so I decided to fly up there. The only airline that flew from London Gatwick to Newcastle was Flybe Airline. This is a no frills airline and as it only took me one hour to fly up so I did not mind that it was a little basic. The seats were fairly comfortable and the only thing I would say was the leg room was a little limited.
The staff were very friendly and helpful and was always willing to please and to make your journey as enjoyable as possible even though this was a very short flight.
It was my first time using the airline and I would certainly use them again for Domestic flights.
The only thing I would grumble about was using the website I did not find this particularly at first user friendly but I got there in the end with my booking.
The cost was reasonable and I did get a good choice of flights and prices.
Flybe flies 167 routes and to twelve countries and they fly from twentyfour different airports mostly regional ones.They fly to thirty European different countries and it is the largest no frills airline in Europe.
They are well known particularly as an domestic airline . and a majority of their routes are domestic. It is the only airline which offers a business service which have different perks particularly if you use them on a regular basis. Also they offer a loyalty card for anyone which you gather points which you can then put to further flights or services which the airline might offer.
The company owns 77 aircraft. So it is quite a sizable company and appears that it is do well.