Danny's Weblog
Things to Bring
This folder provides my notes on things you should think about bringing with you when you come to Thailand or Cambodia.
It's organized into subfolders for various things, but like the rest of this website it presents stuff in *reverse* chronological order, so it will look rather messy. I intend to add files slowly as I think of new things, and then I'll probably collect everything in a better-organized way.
Thingstobring: If you're going to use an internet cafe
Many people will not want to risk the weight and security risk of bringing a laptop, so they'll use the many internet cafes available around Thailand, and in Phnom Penh , Siem Reap and Sihanoukville in Cambodia.
Here are some suggestions. A lot of stuff is things you can also find in Thailand, but may be difficult – like a CD pen; or things you really need to have played with before your trip – eg software.
1. If you have never used an internet cafe, try to do so locally before you go to Asia. You may well not have a clear idea of various problems like trying to access your normal email account, or how to set up and use a Hotmail account.
2. The large majority of machines I've seen were running W98, with a few W2K and XP; no Macs. Mac users need to be somewhat used to a PC, then. Also, the continuing prevalence of W98 means problems with USB device support and possible foreign-character-support problems.
3. If you bring a USB memory gizmo, it would be wise to bring the driver. It may be helpful to have the driver on a floppy too if possible, because I've found an amazingly high percentage of internet cafe PCs to have dead cdroms, even when fitted. (It's nice to be clueful enough with "Network Neighborhood" to be able to smoothly copy across the network from a machine with a working CD. )
4. Another good thing to bring with a USB gizmo is a male-to-female extender cable. Even when the PC has a front USB port available (very rare) it may have never been connected, or the bezel around the slot prevents your device being inserted. And of course it makes it much easier to plug and unplug things (eg your card reader and your backup hard drive) instead of having to crouch down in the snot, fluff and dog hair next to the tower.
5. Despite the rampant piracy, many machines do not have image editing software installed. I would look around for an open-source installable and check it out before your trip, then bring it with you to install.
6. I have seldom run into objections installing software; I have always asked first. One time the guy had to log in as administrator to allow me to install software, and then he walked away from the machine to leave me to it...
7. If you have a camera it is much easier to use a card reader to transfer the files than plug it in directly to the PC. Aside from anything else, it will probably kill its batteries.
8. It's nice to have one of the single-disk Linux distributions like Knoppix to use when you're afraid of keyloggers etc.
9. Very few people still use terminal interfaces these days, and those that do probably know this already, but the "PuTTY" package is free, easy to download, and includes a version of scp which can easily transfer multiple files much faster than other methods. Great if you have eg multiple folders of image files. Oh, of course it does ssh.
10. If you need to maintain websites you may well need to copy file hierarchies between servers. This is insufferably tedious and errorprone with normal Windows utils. I don't actually know of a free ftp client that supports interserver transfers, but the commercial ones do, and you can always install them and uninstall them when you're finished. (HMmm... can PuTTY do this?)
11. I would *never* access a financial website, including ebay, from an internet cafe machine. If you absolutely have to access such sites, bring a laptop. (Also bring your own Ethernet cable and an adapter to plug it into the *male* end of the cable going to the workstation you're using.) Be wary of DNS spoofing, too.
12. A surprising number of cafes have a CDR burner but nobody who knows how to use it. If you are already familiar with Nero and Adaptec, when they tell you "no can use" try telling them you'll do it yourself. And bring the CDRs and CDRWs with you – they're often out. Also bring a CD marker pen.
13. Even if you have no particular plans other than email, bring a regular floppy with you when you go to a cafe. Sometimes it just makes life so much easier. If you're a guru, bring a W98 bootable floppy too.
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