ID-User Experience

Useful blogs
1 Extreme Makeover@Pandan Gardens
2 Reno Journey to Our 1st House

Unfortunate ID-user experiences
3 Anyone Uses Ciseern ID Firm Before?
4 Artrend Design, Anyone Engages Them Before?
5 Will You Accept This Kind Of Workmanship?
6 My 10 Shortlisted IDs, Comments Please

Others
7 My 1st Major Reno! Will I Survive This?
8 A Journal of the Renovation Experience
9 Recommendation For Renovation Id / Contractor?
10 Sewage Smell From Toilet
11 My posts saved forumer $$$! See posts #24,#28,#35,#36,#37.

Note: Renotalk requires you to log-on to display photos.

Renovating your home is a very time-consuming, energy-ripping endeavor. Especially if you're passionate about your home and dream of creating a beautiful abode for your spouse and kids. Thus many readers seek our advice on choosing an ID/Contractor for their home renovation. Well, one common approach is to go by recommendation from friends and relatives or read forums such as Renotalk. But, as many have found out, retaining highly recommended IDs for your project does not guarantee a nicely renovated home! The process is more complex than that, as discussed in several related posts on Design Challenges & Solution.

We would urge you, if you have not begun your renovation or retained an ID/Contractor, to read about user experiences with IDs first in order to gain an idea of the problems encountered. And also to learn from mistakes made by others, such as yours truly, in their home renovation. This post seeks to provide a spectrum of user-ID experiences which may benefit you before you embark on your home renovation. After all, there are good IDs, and bad ones!

How to Research on the Net
I love and hate the Internet. "Er, how's that?" you asked. Well, I do a lot of research on the Net. The Net provides me tons of info, all accessible with a click of the mouse. But oh, so little time to read! And that's where the problem lay: I hate it when I have to wade through tons of useless info (read: junk) in my due diligence research.

But when I finally get the info I looked for - that's when I love the Net! You get immediate, useful info you can't and won't get anywhere else! Take for instance users' experiences - accessible on many sites - with a product you're keen to buy. Or what's new in technology, trends or gear. Books are often outdated on such topics by the time they are published and available.

So now I don't buy blind, like I used to before the Net was born. But you have to exercise prudence and read carefully. Not all posts or articles are genuine or sincere. Some are outright lies intended to mislead you to buy a competitive brand. But if you read through enough number of posts, you'll be able to form an opinion of the product you want to buy. If not, you simply continue your search or put off your purchase for a while.

Likewise, I have a love-hate relationship with forums. I love it when I come across intelligent, genuine posters with their helpful, sincere posts. They provide a service to others that money can't buy. But I hate it when I come across posters with their inane and gossipy posts. Posts that served to stroke their egos and nothing else. Or posters who treat the forum like their own 'kampong'. Using the forum to chit-chat. Not that I have anything against that, but it simply wasted lotta of time and bandwidth to wade through those chatty, gossipy posts. *Sigh*

However, I reserve my harshest comment for posters who are ignorant yet sensitive - forumers innocently giving wrong advice and not realizing they are a stumbling block to those seeking help or

advice. You don't want to intervene - bcoz you'll inflame their sensitive egos and start a flame war. It saddened me to see them misleading others with their misguided advice. And I was hapless about that.. until it occurred to me I could do something to help those seeking advice.

So - to cut to the chase - this post and blog is my answer to all those gossipy, time-wasting threads and posts on forums that frustrate one's research for relevant info and sound advice. I provide herein blogs and forum posts that are useful and relevant to your search for a good ID/Contractor. They also serve to highlight several points made in my blog posts about home renovation, how to choose an ID/Contractor, and mistakes made. Read those article if you wish to find out more.

Just a note: the articles / posts below posted on Renotalk forum are by no means exhaustive. Shout if you've come across posts or articles on the Net that'd be useful to others, ok?

Useful blogs
1 Extreme Makeover@Pandan Gardens
2 Reno Journey to Our 1st House

Unfortunate ID-user experiences
3 Anyone Uses Ciseern ID Firm Before?
4 Artrend Design, Anyone Engages Them Before?
5 Will You Accept This Kind Of Workmanship?
6 My 10 Shortlisted IDs, Comments Please

Others
7 My 1st Major Reno! Will I Survive This?
8 A Journal of the Renovation Experience
9 Recommendation For Renovation Id / Contractor?
10 Sewage Smell From Toilet
11 My posts saved forumer $$$! See posts #24,#28,#35,#36,#37.

Note: Renotalk requires you to log-on to display photos.