T M T » Money

Credit Crunch

Xuhui — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 19:32:55 +0000

Here is another sign of credit crunch hitting credit cards. We just received a letter from Citibank informing us that the purchase APR has been raised to 13.99% + prime with a minimum of 19.99%. The same day we got a letter from an affiliated card (store credit card) that GE (the issuing bank backing those store cards) is reducing the credit limit by 40%. Last time we checked not so long ago, we have 800 credit score. So I don’t know what would be the rate or credit limit cut for people having average credit scores.
It doesn’t affect us in either cases since we never use up the credit limit or carry a revolving balance. But for people really need the money, life will become even more difficult. As traditional banks falter, maybe this will create more openings for new payment management solutions – Paypal, Amazon etc – to grab more market share.

DIY memory upgrade

Xuhui — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 05:33:30 +0000

Hey I just got a new shiny aluminum iMac 24inch. Now my desk has become the picture of Apple commercial: space-age quality aluminum/glass iMac with no extra box, almost no wire next to the PC with a dozen wire hanging out from the back of the ugly black box to underneath the monitor. In fact, the entire iMac looks thinner than the 24 inch Dell monitor.

Well, you pay a high price for such beauty, unless you know a few tricks. For example, the base system is actually priced very competitively against similarly equipped PC systems. However, Apple charge a huge premium for any upgrade especially memory upgrade. For example to go from 1GB to 2GB costs $150 extra and to 4GB costs an additional $850. I bought a 2GB memory stick and put it in the bottom of the iMac. The whole process takes less than 2 minutes:

1. Disconnect iMac (3 wires) – 10 seconds;

2. Flip it around on my bed – 10 seconds,

3. Unscrew the bottom panel with one screw (last year’s iMac has 2 screws) – 15 seconds;

4. Put in the memory stick next to the original 1GB stick – 15 seconds;

5. Put everything back in and reconnect – 25 seconds;

Boot it up, it shows 3GB of memory, very happy. The total cost: $75.

DIY not only is satisfying, it also saves money.

Tax TIP

Xuhui — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 05:24:03 +0000

It’s Tax time. If you live in California then you must have one or more cars. Go to this website to calculate the VLF you’ve paid:

https://mv.dmv.ca.gov/FeeCalculatorWeb/vlfFees.do

In case you don’t know, you can deduct VLF in your itemized deductions. The calculator is really handy since I alway throw away that license renewal notice right after its done.