First of all, I must congratulate the organiser for the Malayian Book of Records‘ award – Largest ICT Fair – by entering PIKOM PC Fair into its pages.
The Miri community have always been waiting for this kind of yearly fair. And, I am one, who would love to get myself some of my wishlist item at a bargain price. This time round (like the previous one, last year) I was expecting PCs and notebook loaded with the new Microsoft Windows operating system – the “unhackable” Windows Vista with just a week after its first release of a security patch (LOL).
At the front entrance to the Fair this year, you can find the PIKOM table with its less than 10 pieces of booklet (while I was there) – Show Guide, which carries the various participants of the Fair it the various location throughout Malaysia. Kudos to PIKOM for the guide! Among the articles that caught my attention was the one by Mr. Low Wai Sun, who is the organising chairman and also PIKOM’s treasurer.
In his text, we are to expect booth showcasing the latest smartPDAs and smartphones, plus the 3G technologies, etc. Or, may I add, the WiMax and our very own Danawa‘s FREE -years WiFi service. Well, guys, it was AGAIN, a sad thing that we won’t be able to see those stuff in action. Danawa didn’t even have a booth to educate the Miri community on how to set up their wifi-enabled notebook to use the service but nevertheless thanks to TM Net’s booth, who at least try to answer questions on the not-so-broadband of Permy Technology Park.. (LOL) an industrial park with ‘the’ technology in its name.
Beside the absence of O2, Dopod, etc., I can’t find my stylus too! Well, I guess I have to stick to my toothpick until the next Fair, and hopefully the organiser can arrange for some booth to showcase the lastest of the ICT technologies… (psstt.. we hardly see the Bruneian, who are tech-savvy, spending their money here.)
If you are planning to buy a notebook, YES, this is the time for you to play around with the various model. And, one of the booth – STORM – have some goodies on MP4 players. Printers are plentiful and so does CDR, DVD-RW, etc..
Have a wonderful weekend…………….. now that Sanjaya is out of the American Idol!
Luckily I din go othrwise I wud b dissappointed again n again infact each year by goin 2 d fair…;)
I was so excited about the widely talked about WiMAX, Wifi, smartPDAs, etc.. And, as usual, “we can back-to-back order for you, no problem!” answer from the exhibitors.
This year, the obvious one is, Boulevard IT, who seem to have moved the entire shop to the Indoor stadium. Well, for the organiser, it is important to fill up the space :D
Overall… its another showcase failure in Miri Resort City.. sorry, but that’s the fact of doing business in Miri.
I presume it should be the same PiKoM Fair held in Kuching 2 weeks ago….went there and of course the things sold are at a bargain price…but not the technology…seems that its the same as last year…
Deejay, that was another dissapointment to the people of Kuching. No wonder the post media coverage on PIKOM PC Fair seldom highlight the success/failure of such event compare to those in West Malaysia.
For future event such as this, the ICT Unit, Sarawak should be well inform and consulted before hand. This is to ensure that organiser of similar event could capture the Sarawak government’s vision on ICT. While the Chief Minister announced the State Broadband vision with the involvement of SACOFA and Danawa Resources, PIKOM have definitely failed to gather the relevant authorities to be involve in the Fair.
On the other hand, the ICT vendors, dealers and distributors should play a more active role in promoting ICT in the State and to reduce the digital gap.
To the distributors, dealers, etc. who are in the market – if you can’t get competitive pricing from the West Malaysian, go direct to the manufacturers in Taiwan or China. I am sure the State government would be supportive with your proposal. Furthermore, the shipment passes through the South China Sea first before reaching Port Klang.
We could be getting a cheaper price if they have shipped it directly to Senari Port (at a shorter distance from China and Taiwan).
Just my opinion or PIKOM could just leave Sarawak from their future event. Its just another Cheap Sales campaign to us.. nothing special except good on paper and the media. Not so cheap though, for the BROTHER FAX 2820…before the fair it was priced at RM999 and during the fair it was RM998! Just a token RM1 less. Ya ya.. they said, the price is more than RM1,000.. Heeee! the consumer are not so stupid anymore not to read and review the hardware before they decide what to buy and at what price.
Read our lips please.
Not a problem…last time the ICT Unit and Pikom combined the exhibitions – something like E-Government and selling of computers but it did not work out as most people were more focused on the bargains rather than the E-SErvices.
Now the approach is to seperate the two so I think the E-Government and E-Services Exhibition will be done later in the year seperate from the sales hingy. But sadly the awareness thingy is usually concentrated in Kuching only.
So maybe they may shift their mind later for this year’s show. Hopefully the ICT Unit will be responsive to the public’s request.
ehehehehe… i didn’t missout dPC Fair at KLconvention Centre… kwell free online ari budget PC shot ba Ancorp Mall tok UK. laptop fujitsu model bersegi rm900 aja ehehehe
Deejay, I believe that would be the challenge for the event management team.
If it is to be done in Miri, the community here will be grateful, since our CM have announced the free wifi for 2 years, I believe, Miri is a good example of all the available technologies (minus the WiMAX and 3G).
For CDMA dail-up – Permy Technology Park (I wonder why they call it a technology park, when its not so technologically advance in many aspect.
For WiFi – The Residence Office (of course! Now that, the government officers have notebooks, we can see many of them sticked to Yahoo Messenger ;) oppss!)
For the Streamyx Broadband – Arrgghhh… its everywhere fixed line. I won’t want to talk on this ‘sensitive’ issue bearing in mind the many unhappy customer out there.
For 3G and WiMax – only in our dreams.
That’s why I never bother to go to these exhibitions..like Deejay rightly said the prices are a bargain but not the technology. If you want a ‘good’ trade fair or PC fair Wisma Seberkas has the best fair 365 days a year.. things are cheap and the exhibits are excellent.. now with more shops its like a carnival at times..
Talk abt streamyx, it’s been ages since i’ve on it and some of you might have read my rants on the topic. Till now, it has not improved, ok la maybe the speed considering i’m on 2mbps now. Download ok la but the disconnections has not improved. Some of us rely on clean uninterupted connection MOST of the time. I’m not asking for much though just don’t get DCed every 5 mins in the evening. They blame it on the torrent guys but hey, keep up with the tech la. Don’t expect the users to be what they used to be 5 years back. Now with all the file sharing capabillities ard…