Singapore is most probably the best place to buy electronics and computer gadgets. The latest models are available on a low price and there are plethora of shops to visit. The topmost floor hosts a bigger store that has the full spectrum of gadgets.

Any computing and PDA related item can be found in Funan IT Mall that has five floors of shops specialising to computers, both hardware and software. To be fair, there is one Christian bookshop and a few furniture outlets, too. The lower level has some cafes and fast food joints, but usually there is too much noise from game exhibition or similar, and you really can’t hang out in the cafe for extended periods.

Most of the stores display the prices and there’s no need to haggle with the sales clerk. For haggling, consider visiting Sim Lim Square. Asian manufacturers specialise in small gadgets that sport the same design. There is not much difference in the features, but some items are more reliable than the others. Check your clerk for suggestions, sometimes you may get an honest opinion.

Funan The IT Mall, 109 North Bridge Road, Singapore

Singapore Marriott is a portrait for the country itself; everything works perfectly, everything is clean, everything is in top-notch shape, and everything is somehow bland.

The hotel is located on Orchard Road, providing an easy access to all the best shopping malls and other attractions in the area. If you prefer to have a good hotel with an excellent location, Marriott is a safe bet. If you’d like cutting edges or pampering, go somewhere else.

www.marriot.com, 320 Orchard Road, Singapore, +65 6735 5800

I’ve started to plan for the next trip — this time to the United States. It will be job related travelling, so not much time to unwind and relax. Fortunately, I’ve been in the Bay Area in California before, so there are no obligatory places to visit anymore left.

If I’d some time, I would go to visit redwood forests — they are strangely calming experience. The villages in the area, on the other hand, are quite spooky and remind me of Deliverance.

In one day in San Francisco, I’d go to visit the Apple store for gadgets, Virgin and Border’s bookstores for literature, Rasputin Records (if they still have store in downtown) for industrial music, SF MoMA for art and literature, and finally to Yerba Buena Gardens for relaxing and for popping in Sony store.

Paragon is one of the top-end malls on Orchard Road, housing brands such as Prada, Versace and others. Not all stores are designated for the rich and the famous, as there are Diesel, Benetton and other brands, too, available in the mall.

The lower level of the mall has, as usual, a food court that has both fast food joints and real restaurants. This floor is an oasis midst a busy shopping day to replenish your energy and rest your feet.

The mall hosts also Singapore Airlines city office, that has the perk of pre-check-in for all flights leaving during the next three days. Go early and reserve a good seat. Just drop off your backages at the airport.

Paragon, 290 Orchard Road, Singapore

If you’re thinking of making your own food or just repleneshing your hotel room supplies, Carrefour is the best option. There are several vast supermarkets around the city, for example, one in Suntec City Mall and another in Plaza Singapura.

As the chain is owned by the French, the wine department is very impressive. The store carries both local and international brands and the prices are cheaper than in Seven Elevens and other corner stores. Unfortunately, all products are not available in small packages and the store can be quite packed during peak hours. Oh, the funny, pungent smell in the fruit section comes from durian fruits and its part of the experience.

www.carrefour.com.sg, Suntec City Mall, 3 Temasek Boulevard and Plaza Singapura, 68 Orchard Road, Singapore

My issues with disks seem to be endless. As I mentioned earlier, I have repartitioned my Lacie BigDisk drive to host one big FAT partition (200GB) for storing my photos. This partition is accessible both to Windows and Mac. Then I had the old shrunk NTFS partition that I tried to format with Mac for backup purposes without success.

I destroyed that partition with Windows and tried to repartition the drive with Mac, but Mac’s Disk Utility could not create a new partition without changing the size of the other partitions. How peculiar and awkward!

To solve this issue, I once again attached the disk to Windows and created another FAT partition (80GB). Then I reattached the disk to Mac and tried to format that partition to Mac native format. The Disk Utility told me plain and simple that an underlying program has not been able to do its job and the partition could not be formatted. The Mac lost access to all partitions in this process and I had to eject the disk from the Disk Utility.

Attaching the drive back to PC, I found out that Mac had scrambled the whole disk and the bigger FAT partition was also lost! Fortunately I had everything backed up in another Windows box, so no data was lost.

I could see the partition with Windows tools, but they couldn’t write to the disk. The disk was marked BAD or just not accessible…

After I had tried all tricks in my arsenal and searched Google for rescue, I decided to attach the drive to another Windows machine in the living room. This machine did not see anything on the drive, but it managed to create new partitions and format them properly.

Now I had the partitions in place and I could copy the files back. This was, fortunately enough, a smooth operation. The final task was to connect the drive back to the first Windows box and assign the correct drive letters and paths back.

I learned that Mac’s disk tools are inferior and I’d better keep my hands out of them when using shared drives. I created a Linux partition to the drive, I’ll check whether Mac can use it after I have gained enough confidence that I don’t break anything (and I have made backups recently).

Books Kinokuniya is the biggest bookstore in the island state. All needs are catered for, with a special attention to Japanese books. The Chinese section is also very impressive.

The store is located on the third floor in Ngee Ann City shopping mall, and its floor layout may be confusing before you’ve orientated yourself properly. Consider browsing photographic, design and art books.

www.kinokuniya.com.sg, Ngee Ann City, Orchard Road 391, +(65) 6737 5021

Ngee Ann City is the most luxurious shopping mall in Singapore. Most of the major high profiled brands are gathered under its roof. The missing stores can be found on the other side of the road in Paragon.

The shops are not very big, more like boutiques of some sort. This creates nice intimate ambience for the whole place. There are also a few bigger stores, such as department store Takashiyama, bookstore Books Kinokuniya and appliance store Best Denki.

Ngee Ann City, Orchard Road 391, Singapore