Best of the Best from CES 2010
Microsoft has put a lot of eggs into its remarkable Project Natal. For the uninitiated, project natal is the cover name for a clutch of integrated hardware and software designed to be able to sense motion in multiple dimensions simultaneously, velocity, color, angle and deflection. Some of you are thinking, "Hey, didn't Nintendo do all that with the Wii?" You'd be right — to a point. The enormous difference is that with Natal-enabled devices, you don't have to hold a controller. Kicking a virtual soccer ball, swinging a golf club, pointing and gesturing don't require anything except a nearby natal-enabled device and you. As has happened with Microsoft's wonderful Surface operating system (those exotic table computers seen regularly on CNN - think John King's political reviews on that huge touch screen monitor - and in the movie Quantum of Solace), really creative and broadly useful ideas rapidly morph into technology that is itself as useful as it is fascinating. Microsoft is also putting its Windows 7 operating system into a variety of Slate computers (what every other manufacturer calls a tablet PC). No doubt Apple is gearing up to compete in the tablet arena within the next three months.
Yet more technology to separate you from the best part of $5000 will show up this Spring in the form of 3D televisions. Whether they'll niche out or gradually become the de facto standard to follow HD remains to be seen obviously, but don't hold your breath for bags and bags of content. Frankly, all of the current 3D implementations (spiral polarizing, single side-by-side anamorphic stereo, single strip over-and-under stereo, stereoscopic digital 3D) require glasses to present the image stream to the eyes, and they all give me a faint headache. Lots of other people feel the same way, so the 3D TV makers have a got a lot of work to do before they start selling migraine boxes into the mass market. A two hour 3D movie is one thing, but daily 3D couch-potato sessions lasting four or five hours each will melt your brain.
The Panasonic VT25 Plasma 3D HDTV will be available this Spring. Look for many others to follow. By the way, 3D HD content is slated to be delivered to consumers on 3D Blu-Ray disc.
Forget about traditional backlit LCD TV and computer monitors. The market in 2010 will be inundated with vastly superior LED backlit screens as well as native OLED screens. What you're going to see (and crave) amounts to a significant step up in color depth, color saturation, realistic color, great dynamic range, deep blacks and razor sharp pictures. Finally, I think, I'm going to take a 46" LED or OLED plunge.
Intel introduced its Wireless Display (WiDi) adapter. It's basically a receiver box/device with a short cable that you plug into your HD TV. Thereafter, any WiDi-enabled laptop or PC can wirelessly display on that TV. Very handy, and it beats having to install a dedicated media PC in your living room. Look for WiDi boxes and Widi-enabled laptops and PCs this Spring. Think presentations, media streaming and gaming.
Eye-Fi got a lot of attention with its new Pro X2 802.11n, 8GB SDHC card. Well deserved attention of course, and more digital SLR owners should consider these Class 6 SD cards. Now if only Eye-Fi would come out with one of these things in CF format, I'd buy one, like, in a second.
Plastic Logic Que ebook reader is, as mentioned in a previous post, big and good looking and very, very thin. The form factor is too large to stuff into a camera bag or purse, but it will fit easily into an attache case, briefcase or messenger bag. eReaders are all over the place now, so don't be surprised to find yourself looking at a Kindle, Cybook, Sony eReader or Que online sometime soon. I love my Sony PRS-600 eReader and it goes everywhere with me (and it fits into a front pocket of my Domke camera bag). The Alex Reader from Spring Design is Google Android-based and it seems to work extremely well. The only problem is, no e-ink. It's an LCD screen-based ereader/tablet. Surprisingly readable though.The iRiver Story is a bit better yet. eReaders and more eReaders.
I hate Windows Mobile, but T-Mobile in North American is about to start flogging the HTC HD2 in its stores (U.S. first). It's been a European model for the past few months and it's about time it crossed the Atlantic. All anybody says about this ultrathin, 4.3" touchscreen smartphone is, "Nice, really, really nice."
It was apparent at CES 2010 that small laptops and netbooks are sort of meeting in the middle. I (still) like my year old Acer Aspire One, so I'm going to hang onto it for another year of walkabouts, travel and so on. But Lenovo (IdeaPad), HP and Dell (Mini) are all coming out with much more powerful new models. Intel will no doubt be shipping lots of dual core Atom processors, and you're going to have a choice between Windows 7, Linux and Google Android operating systems. Some of these new netbooks fold into touchscreen tablets (the Lenovo IdeaPad S10-t) and may finally convince me that tablets have some use. So if somebody blends an ebook reader with a netbook tablet under 2 pounds (less than half a kilo), I'll line up to get one.
Yet more technology to separate you from the best part of $5000 will show up this Spring in the form of 3D televisions. Whether they'll niche out or gradually become the de facto standard to follow HD remains to be seen obviously, but don't hold your breath for bags and bags of content. Frankly, all of the current 3D implementations (spiral polarizing, single side-by-side anamorphic stereo, single strip over-and-under stereo, stereoscopic digital 3D) require glasses to present the image stream to the eyes, and they all give me a faint headache. Lots of other people feel the same way, so the 3D TV makers have a got a lot of work to do before they start selling migraine boxes into the mass market. A two hour 3D movie is one thing, but daily 3D couch-potato sessions lasting four or five hours each will melt your brain.
The Panasonic VT25 Plasma 3D HDTV will be available this Spring. Look for many others to follow. By the way, 3D HD content is slated to be delivered to consumers on 3D Blu-Ray disc.
Forget about traditional backlit LCD TV and computer monitors. The market in 2010 will be inundated with vastly superior LED backlit screens as well as native OLED screens. What you're going to see (and crave) amounts to a significant step up in color depth, color saturation, realistic color, great dynamic range, deep blacks and razor sharp pictures. Finally, I think, I'm going to take a 46" LED or OLED plunge.
Intel introduced its Wireless Display (WiDi) adapter. It's basically a receiver box/device with a short cable that you plug into your HD TV. Thereafter, any WiDi-enabled laptop or PC can wirelessly display on that TV. Very handy, and it beats having to install a dedicated media PC in your living room. Look for WiDi boxes and Widi-enabled laptops and PCs this Spring. Think presentations, media streaming and gaming.
Eye-Fi got a lot of attention with its new Pro X2 802.11n, 8GB SDHC card. Well deserved attention of course, and more digital SLR owners should consider these Class 6 SD cards. Now if only Eye-Fi would come out with one of these things in CF format, I'd buy one, like, in a second.
Plastic Logic Que ebook reader is, as mentioned in a previous post, big and good looking and very, very thin. The form factor is too large to stuff into a camera bag or purse, but it will fit easily into an attache case, briefcase or messenger bag. eReaders are all over the place now, so don't be surprised to find yourself looking at a Kindle, Cybook, Sony eReader or Que online sometime soon. I love my Sony PRS-600 eReader and it goes everywhere with me (and it fits into a front pocket of my Domke camera bag). The Alex Reader from Spring Design is Google Android-based and it seems to work extremely well. The only problem is, no e-ink. It's an LCD screen-based ereader/tablet. Surprisingly readable though.The iRiver Story is a bit better yet. eReaders and more eReaders.
I hate Windows Mobile, but T-Mobile in North American is about to start flogging the HTC HD2 in its stores (U.S. first). It's been a European model for the past few months and it's about time it crossed the Atlantic. All anybody says about this ultrathin, 4.3" touchscreen smartphone is, "Nice, really, really nice."
It was apparent at CES 2010 that small laptops and netbooks are sort of meeting in the middle. I (still) like my year old Acer Aspire One, so I'm going to hang onto it for another year of walkabouts, travel and so on. But Lenovo (IdeaPad), HP and Dell (Mini) are all coming out with much more powerful new models. Intel will no doubt be shipping lots of dual core Atom processors, and you're going to have a choice between Windows 7, Linux and Google Android operating systems. Some of these new netbooks fold into touchscreen tablets (the Lenovo IdeaPad S10-t) and may finally convince me that tablets have some use. So if somebody blends an ebook reader with a netbook tablet under 2 pounds (less than half a kilo), I'll line up to get one.
Labels: best of CES 2010, CES 2010, CES wrap up
posted by Howard Carson, Managing Editor @ 9:31 PM
