Room with a view

It is Microsoft's first new operating system in five years, so it's fair that everyone is giving Windows Vista a good deal of attention. It launched in SA, and around the world, on Tuesday.

According to some executive-level corporate customers quoted on ITWeb, it is a worthwhile upgrade, but the jury of peers is definitely still out.

Meanwhile, in China, a fake version of Vista appeared to be selling much better than the licensed option. Some reports indicated one could buy an almost-perfect carbon copy of the entire suite for the equivalent of a few rand.

"In the Chinese city of Shenzhen, scores of sellers were offering the brand new software for as little as 10 yuan ($1.30), along with Microsoft Office, anti-virus software and others," said News24 this week.

Some reports indicated one could buy an almost-perfect carbon copy of the entire Vista suite for the equivalent of a few rand.

Dave Glazier, journalist, ITWeb

Intel has implemented new transistor technology, which will allow it to produce the first working 45nm microprocessors for its next-generation of products, codenamed "Penryn". It says hundreds of millions of these microscopic transistors will be inside the next-generation Intel Core 2 Duo, Intel Core 2 Quad and Xeon families of multi-core processors.

I will take the company's word for it.

News on the wires - or rather, off the wires - this week was the agreement between the JSE-listed Altech and electronics and telecoms giant Samsung to deploy a test WiMax network. Samsung, which has lately been active in WiMax infrastructure deployments throughout the world, will build the network in Midrand.

It's an important step, since WiMax developments in SA are suffering from a variety of problems. ICASA is yet to complete a WiMax evaluation process, forcing some operators to find ways around the regulatory delays. ITWeb looked at this issue in close detail this week.

Good news this week was that Parliament is considering a Democratic Alliance (DA) proposal that ICASA be called to account for the resignation of former CEO Jackie Manche, and others.

The DA's communications spokesperson Dene Smuts also proposed the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Communications should encourage ICASA to play its own oversight role, as written in the Constitution, to ensure broadcasters are representing the fairness and diversity of views.

This was prompted by newspaper reports that SABC journalist John Perlman had resigned due to the ongoing "blacklisting" saga.

Vodacom is moving ahead with its black economic empowerment deal, but its advisors caution that no definitive decisions have yet been made. The cellular operator's management hopes to submit its proposals on suitable BEE candidates to the board in March. It will be a big deal - about R7.5 billion, said CEO Alan Knott-Craig in a statement this week.

Worrying news this week was that SA could require up to four times more bandwidth than it currently has access to, in order to successfully host the World Cup in three years. When one compares our bandwidth capacities with that of Germany, it makes for frightening reading. Analysts are concerned. The term "throttling of bandwidth" is appropriate, they say.