Well, surprise, surprise. It seems that the Clydesdale Bank shifting me from a Maestro card to a MasterCard Debit card does have some added advantage after all. It could be, without a hint of irony, the greatest single advantage ever in the history of banking. Yes friends it seems that a great swathe of online retailers don’t even have an OPTION for a MasterCard Debit card. A few, like Amazon, have got a MasterCard option to be sure, but does that option cover both credit and debit varieties, or only the credit ones? Some types of services are restricted specifically to debit cards. The National Lottery website won’t accept the card because it believes it’s a credit card, and their rules prevent people using credit cards on the site as party of their, very responsible, gambling policy. I’m not sure about Play.com right now because their site doesn’t have a drop down box to describe the card type. I guess I’ll just have to plug the card details in and hope for the best next time I try to order something.
Well I’m sure it’s an advantage somehow…
My bike is still out of action, and it’s starting to get me down. I know logically that we’re getting into the depth of winter and that I probably wouldn’t ride it that much if it was fully operational, but that doesn’t stop me illogically wanting to ride it anyway.
I’ve been reading reviews on various mountain bike websites, as well as trawling through the parts sections on Evans Cycles, Dales Cycles and the Edinburgh Bike Coop’s websites. From what I’ve read it seems that the old maxim holds true even for bike parts: “buy cheap, buy twice”. All three shops have an extensive collection of parts to suit every budget, but as I seem to have already been stung by what amounts to a fairly cheap FSA OEM crankset I’m not anxious to buy a budget set just for the sake of saving a few bucks.
I’ve just about settled on a Shimano M770 XT Hollowtech 2 Chainset which is at the upper end of the market, but not into the ridiculous money range. At the time of writing Evans are currently selling the OEM version for £127.99 and the original retail version for £164.99. As both versions include the bottom bracket and all the other required parts the only difference appears to be in the packaging.
As I said in my earlier post it’s not just the front chain rings that are a bit worse for wear. The rear cassette has suffered a bit of damage as well, either as a result of the front rings causing the chain to slip, or as a result of a damaged chain. Currently I’m considering the Shimano M770 XT Cassette which is an exact match for the M770 XT chainset that I mentioned above. Again the cassette is available in an OEM version for £39.99 or a retail version for £56.99. I’ll admit that I haven’t put as much research into the cassettes as I have with the chainsets, but I can’t see there being too much to chose between them.
It goes without saying of course that any replacement cassette and chain ring will have to be accompanied by a new chain to match. To be honest there doesn’t seem to be much of a difference that I can see between the various chains, but the Shimano HG93 Chain at £17.99 on Evan’s site seems an OK choice to go with the M770 XT parts that I’ve spoken about.
At the moment these three parts will set me back £185.97 in total if I go for the OEM versions. Then it would be simply a matter of getting them attached to the bike and adjusted… Simple…
After years of faithful service, and a few odd hiccups, it seems that the Clydesdale Bank has finally decided to retire their poor old Maestro cards. I’ve just got a letter through the door telling me that I can expect to receive a shiny new MasterCard Debit Card through the post in the near future.
I’m not sure what the immediate advantages are to me as the main selling point on the accompanying leaflet seems to be the fact that I can use it in millions of places around the world. Not much use when I’m a famously insular Scot that refuses to go anywhere that I can’t walk to in a day. I’ve been through the leaflet twice and I can’t see any other advantage mentioned so I guess that’s my lot.
Not entirely sure why Clydesdale have chosen to change this as Maestro is operated by MasterCard anyway so in effect it’s the same service… Isn’t it?
Published on
November 17, 2009 in
Computers, Finances, Gaming, The Tendering Process and Upgrades.
Tags: Computers, Ebuyer, Finances, Gaming, Money, The Tendering Process, Upgrades.
I’m a greedy man I think as I’m constantly looking at the price of components on ebuyer.com with an eye on improving my PC. I’ve not got much spare cash right now, and with Christmas approaching I’ll need to set some aside for presents, but I’m still plotting and planning and dreaming of a massive upgrade. I know it’s only been about a year since the last time I carried out some upgrades, but I’m planning a more comprehensive overhall this time. The old dual core AMD Athlon that I’ve got is starting to act quite tired, and windows XP is slowly choking to death under the bloat of installed crap that I’ve never got round to removing.
I’ve even gone as far as going through all the review websites and checking out what would give me the best bang for my buck. Tom’s Hardware and Tech Radar have been particularly helpful as ever. I’ve not gone overboard and went for the best of stuff, but I have tried to pick things that will last quite a long time and dramatically improve the current performance of my machine.
So far my plans are shaping up like this:
Intel Core i7 920 D0 – £214.87
ASUS P6T Deluxe V2 iX58 – £202.30
Antec 902 Nine Hundred Two Black ATX Case – £86.99
Samsung SpinPoint F1 HD103UJ 1TB Hard Drive x2 – £116.22
Corsair 6GB (3x2GB) DDR3 1600MHz XMS3 – £133.21
Grand Total: – £753.59
Unfortunately that’s far to steep for my current financial situation. In fact for that price I could more or less get the MacBook that I’m always humming and hawing about, or I could even buy a complete computer from Mesh or some of the other specialist gaming PC retailers. Advantages being that I would get the whole package with a warranty, and various other peripherals included in the price.
I’ve already got a copy of windows 7 professional that I bought, so it would be a simple matter to wipe all the preinstalled crap off a shop bought machine and set it up however the hell I like.