Pre-CES Announcements . . . wherein all of the 'playahs jump the gun

UPDATED 18:25 EST, JANUARY 5, 2010
UPDATED 13:30 EST, JANUARY 5, 2010
UPDATED 13:10 EST, JANUARY 5, 2010
UPDATED 10:10 EST, JANUARY 5, 2010

Digital Imaging

• Canon has a new version of its already excellent 70-200mm f/2.8 pro zoom lens - updated optics with significantly reduced chromatic aberration, the latest image stabilization, and possibly slightly faster autofocus (we'll see about that).
  
• Sony, never one to leave a good thing alone, has released its umpteenth version of its Alpha digital SLR, this one the A450 - another sub-$1000 digital SLR offering little besides feature creep, an tiny bit less power consumption, and the same 14 megapixel sensor found in several other Alphas.
  
• Lexar is showing off a new Professional 32GB 300X CF cards - isn't that great? 32GB - really - fill it up (fast at 300x) and then sit for days in front of your computer sorting through thousands of images.
  

Computers

• Lenovo has got new ThinkPad laptops coming out its ears - of the new T-series models we really like the 15.6" W510 that can be loaded with a Core 2 Extreme i7-920XM CPU (yummy), up to 16GB of RAM (yummier), and an nVidia Quadro FX-880M graphics card (yummiest). The new entry-level ultraportable X100e is the first one of its kind for Lenovo and is designed to go head-to-head with netbooks, while offering optional bluetooth and 3G, plus much more serious processing power from the Athlon Neo.
  
• We're going to keep our eye out for a retail/buyable copy of Samsung's new netbooks - the new N-series looks terrific and the N220 is especially interesting with the ultra low power new Intel Atom "Pinetrail" CPU at 1.6GHz, lovely anti-glare 10" LED backlit screen, up to 12 hours(!?) of battery life, instant-on (via the integrated Phoenix HyperSpace tool), and enough storage space and usability to satisfy a lot of business users and a lot of traveling digital imageers. I want one.
  
• 3M will be showing off its Display M2256PW, 22-inch high-definition, multi-touch LCD display - its capable of responding to 10 different simultaneous inputs (10-finger touch sensitive in other words), and its native resolution is an impressive 1680 x 1050. This will be a really interesting product for designers and other pros in a variety of disciplines who need to physically interact more fully with their work.
  
• USB 3.0 is here now, so get used to it. Western Digital is first out of the gate with its SuperSpeed USB 3.0 My Book® external hard drive, among the first devices certified. Throughput is almost 10 times faster than USB 2.0 hi-speed, and it's all allegedly backward compatible with USB 2.0 (ahem). The drive is supplied with a USB 3.0 card so you'll actually be able to use it with your now-obsolete USB 2.0-equipped computer. Lots more USB 3.0 products coming, so stay tuned.
  
• In Store Solutions launched the Freetalk TALK-7181 HD PRO PLUS webcam for Skype HD - as long as you've got a minimum 800Kbps (up & down) web connection, you can use this thing to chat via high definition video. It uses embedded H.264 encoding to compress the video stream, and at 5 megapixels and an allegedly decent lens, might put competing products to shame. Let's just see how well it works and how often prevailing ISP throttling policies ruin the use of this product.
  

eReaders

• Interead Cool-er - it's an ereader that's almost all screen (6"), making it the smallest form factor on the market (and the e-ink screen is very good too), with 2GB of internal storage, expandability via SD card slot, and a 3G version coming mid-year. This one may make grab my attention away from my excellent Sony PRS-300 and PRS-600.
  
• The Skiff Reader seems to (finally) be a reality - it's a big momma with an 11.5" screen at 1200 x 1600 pixels and 174ppi, but the screen is a metal foil design that is really remarkable by all accounts and combined with the magnesium housing amounts to barely a pound in total weight. The specs boast an active week of battery life, but we'll believe it when we see it. For large form factor magazine and newpaper reading, the Skiff looks like a serious contender.
  

Home Entertainment

• Polk Audio will be showing its single footprint surround-sound wireless speaker system - I know, I know, how can you generate surround sound from only one front-n-center positioned speaker enclosure? It's a conundrum, but several other speaker makers have already released (dreadful) similar products. Polk Audio (back in the early '90s) had a wonderful reputation for producing competitively priced, audiophile quality speakers. Then Polk seemed to have slipped overall for a time. Too many products perhaps? In recent years, Polk has been regaining its quality edge, so let's give this one a chance shall we? The system uses a method of controlled sound dispersion via individual speaker drivers in the enclosure.
  

Wireless

• Palm CEO Jon Rubinstein has told everybody that v1.3.5 of the webOS mobile will be officially launched at CES 2010 - download and store more applications, enhanced program and WiFi performance, improved battery life, and increased device speed and responsiveness are supposed to come together to make great products such as the Palm Pre work even better. Okey-dokey - we'll see - but Palm is a funny place, so many times a world-beater, but lagging far behind the market leaders for quite a few years.
  
• The Google Android pre-CES press conference was a big deal actually. In addition to its existing T-Mobile relationship, Google announced new carrier deals with Verizon in the U.S. and Vodafone in Europe. Nice. Android phones are accelerating quickly in both quality and quantity, the operating system itself is terrific, and Google will outreach Apple very shortly because Google seems to be reeling in new carriers quite quickly.
  
• (added @ 18:15 EST, Jan 5) Google again. This time the search supergiant has unveiled its Nexus One smartphone (or as ZDNet has dubbed it, the Superphone). According to ZDNet the Nexus One is 11.5mm thick (a BlackBerry Curve is 15mm thick), 130 grams in weight (an iPhone 3G weighs 135 grams), every text field is voice accessible (speak to compose an email?), it's fully multimedia enabled and also contains a 3D subsystem for Google Earth. Don't forget the gorgeous, gesture-enabled touch screen. If it actually makes phone calls too, it might actually be a real superphone.
  

Automotive

• (added @ 15:08 EST, Jan 5) Kia Motors has announced its Uvo (powered by Microsoft) in-vehicle infotainment system (really - the pre-CES press release said "infotainment") - it's a voice activated system for controlling and configuring mobile communications and the vehicle's entertainment system (radio, CD, DVD) and turn-by-turn GPS. We promised there'd be plenty of this stuff in the wake of Ford's success with Sync, so here we go.
  

Nothing from Nikon, Panasonic or Sony. Apple will not be at CES, preferring - as usual in recent years - to do its own thing when its new product announcements won't be lost in the massive noise of CES. Apple's successful corporate individualism won't flag as long as Jobs helms the company. Google will not be at CES either, but has lots of products of its own in the pipeline and will be running (Google search, Google Chrome browser, Android) on almost every laptop (and many smartphones) at CES, (added 13:15 EST, Jan 5) and has a major press conference scheduled at its Mountain View, CA headquarters. We think Google probably has the right idea - just like Microsoft all those years ago: be needed and be everywhere.

Nothing pre-CES from an awful lot of companies, but it's a reflection of the times. Retail is off all over the place and manufacturers just aren't rushing new products to market right now. Makes sense. So will CES 2010 be a yawn? We'll see about that too.

More to come . . .

Google Files Complaint Against Microsoft Over Integrated Desktop Search

You read it right. Google has filed an antitrust complaint because Windows Desktop Search is fully integrated in Windows Vista. Google is contending that Microsoft has now established an unfair advantage over the Google Desktop Search product. Google, in its complaints to U.S. federal and state prosecutors, maintained further that consumers who try to use its search tool on computers running Windows Vista were frustrated because Vista has a competing desktop search program that cannot be turned off. When the Google and Vista search programs are run simultaneously on a computer, their indexing programs slow the operating system. As a result, Google said, Vista violated Microsoft’s 2002 antitrust settlement which prohibits Microsoft from designing operating systems that limit the consumer product choices.

So far, state prosecutors have declined to carry forward the Google complaint. Lucky for Microsoft then that some sanity still exists among the denizens of the halls of justice.

Microsoft has always offered Windows (at least from Windows 95 onward) with integrated hard drive indexing and search functions. Previous to Windows Vista, the desktop search features were endlessly criticized variously for their inanity, slowness and frequent ineffectiveness. That the legions of consumers who've complained now have exactly what they asked for - a fast, accurate, easy to use desktop search engine - seems to matter little to Google.

In fact, in this situation Google seems bent on promoting its own interests even though any abject moron can figure out that Microsoft has merely invested millions to improve a feature that was already integrated. That Google might think consumers (and prosecutors) are too stupid to figure that out is less arch than it is directly insulting to all concerned.

Take a pill Google. We're on to you. You're trying to develop your own platform. That's okay. That's terrific actually. But you need an existing computer and operating system in order to do so. Bite Microsoft once too often over what is clearly an arrogantly self-serving and demanding whine, and you risk awakening the wrath of a sleeping giant. You can't have it both ways - building a business based on someone else's operating system, and then complaining when every single possible door in that operating system isn't thrown wide open for your profitable corporate enjoyment.

Google's attitude has been galling in many situations. This is only the latest Google foray to leave a bad aftertaste and I doubt it will be the last. Google may be proving to be just another big (really big) corporation, driven by all of the shareholder demands, market demands, avarice and greed which drive so many others.

Korea Slaps Google On The Hand For Fair Trade Violation

Google has been slapped with an injunction by the Korea Fair Trade Commission for alleged violations of an agreement involving Googles Adsense system. A Korean company file a complaint against google that it terminated the agreement between AdSense and themselves, and that they failed to ensure payments and to providing advertisers with a right to appeal on the methods used to assess payments. It should be interesting to see how the recent complications with AdSense work out.