Well, a portable Blu-ray player was inevitable, and it looks like Panasonic will be the first company to get one to the market. But there’s plenty of room for improvement. First of all, the LCD display only has WSVGA or 1024×600 resolution. I know you can argue that cramming a resolution of 1920×1080 into an 8.9-inch display is kind of pointless, but I still want it. The player also isn’t exactly what I’d call tiny, so this isn’t the type of thing you’ll be bringing with you on an airplane (at least this first model) particularly since the built-in rechargeable battery is only good for about 3 hours.
Panasonic did manage to include BD-live functionality, but the player doesn’t come with wi-fi (probably to max out the battery life) so you’ll need to tether it to a network cable. But it does have an HDMI connection so you can at least hook it up to your home theater and use it as a regular Blu-ray player. The DMP-B15 will be available in late May if you’re the type who has to have everything first, but I would definitely suggest holding off until version 2.
And the full press release is available after the jump.
Panasonic is showing off a new remote concept at their booth that uses a Wii-like controller with two distinct touch pads and a small collection of unlabeled buttons. The idea behind the remote is to put all of the button labels on-screen via an overlayed GUI so that you never need to look down at a complicated collection of buttons, and away from what you’re watching.
The remote is smart enough to know when it has been picked up, and can tell if you’re holding it in your right, left or even both hands so that you can use it as a traditional channel changing remote, or as a keyboard. It also has a built-in gyro allowing you to flick your way through a collection of photos, and the dual touch pads can even be used to perform ‘pinch zoom’ type functions, without the added cost of an actual multi-touch capable pad.
I particularly like that your fingers show up on-screen as a virtual representation, so you always know which buttons you’re currently hovering over, or are about to press. And if you’re using the remote to type on the virtual on-screen keyboard, you’ll see both fingers (or thumbs) moving independently. Sadly, the Easy Touch Remote Controller is just a concept at the moment, but from what I saw it’s a fully-working concept, so actually bringing this to the market is not out of the question.
Something has got to be said about a useful product that’s able to convincingly double as a “fashion accessory” on the barely-there outfit of a booth babe. Questionable (but not entirely ineffective or unenjoyable) marketing tactics aside, FlatWire makes some amazing products that make me wish I’d have a few large to drop on a home entertainment system. Like the name sort of implies, these guys make flat wires. But I mean, really, really flat. They gave me a sample of 18 gauge electrical wire, and it’s paper thin.
So when you’re wiring pretty much anything in your home (audio equipment, home theater setup, etc.), instead of drilling holes in your walls, knocking down potentially load-bearing studs to get your cables out of view… use flat wires. Stick them on your wall, put a little plaster over them, and paint. No one will ever know they’re there.
You could argue that laying some plaster and painting is almost as labor intensive as drilling holes… but what happens when you’re faced with a brick wall? In any case, it’s nice to have options, and Flat Wire definitely impressed me with their product.
And no, not just because of the booth babe.
Prices vary depending of length and type of cable needed, but of course you’ll be paying a bit of a premium. Nothing outlandish though: 25ft of 18 gauge speaker wires will set you back $38 for instance. Not cheap, but this ain’t no Monster cables.
iGo is known for their line of multi-device chargers. They use an array of interchangeable tips to allow you to charge pretty much anything under the sun. But they do other things as well, and one product that caught my eye is the iGo Green Technology Surge Protector. It’s basically a glorified powerbar with a halfway decent design that won’t look terrible next to your entertainment center. But more importantly, what it does is stop your devices from sucking power when they’re on standby. It features 8 sockets: 4 regular ones, and 4 with the iGo Green Tech. So, lets say you plug your plasma into one of the 4 green ones, when you turn it off, it wont keep on drawing power. In the long run, this can save you a bunch of money, and well, like pretty much everything at CES this year, is Green.
It’s going to cost $69 and be available this summer.
We’re big fans of Eye-Fi, makers of SD cards with integrated WiFi which allow you to use any digicam to send your pictures to your network. I won’t spend a good deal of time speaking about their features, other than to let you guys know that as of “sometime in ’09″, the cards will also let you upload videos as well as pictures.
I got a demo on the showfloor and have to admit it works quite well.
BotJunkie reported last week that iRobot was planning on releasing a new product at CES this year. We speculated that it might be something related to the Create, the ConnectR, or even possibly a lawn mower. But we were totally, completely wrong: it’s the second generation Looj, an updated and improved version of the Looj gutter cleaning robot. We got ourselves a video demo at the CES Pepcom event tonight, and it does look like it works better than the original (with fake leaves, anyway):
Now, this is not simply a Looj with a bigger battery and a fresh coat of paint. To their credit, iRobot paid a lot of attention to their customers, and made a whole bunch of changes and improvements to the Looj based on user feedback. The augur has been redesigned, the antenna is now internal, the battery is easier to remove, and the Looj moves slower, making it more efficient and gutter cleaning.
The second generation Looj goes on sale this spring starting at $129.99.
For the record, after seeing the Looj demo, I asked iRobot about three things: the future of the Create, when we’re going to see a robotic lawn mower, and what’s going on with the ConnectR. iRobot said that they are generally happy with how the Create is going, that it’s a good educational tool, and they have no immediate plans for hardware updates any time soon. They wouldn’t speculate on a lawn mower, but we know they’re working on it.
As for the ConnectR, based on feedback that they got from their beta testing, iRobot has decided that the ConnectR basically needs a total hardware and software redesign, and will likely reemerge on a non-Roomba based platform. It’s also been more or less shelved for the time being, primarily because iRobot wants to make something that operates like the Roomba or Looj: you push one button, and it just works. The ConnectR was too complicated, and they need to rethink it, but iRobot also said that they feel telepresence is going to be big, and they’re still planning on making something happen with that… They’re just not sure yet what it’s going to be.
Amongst the endless forest of LED/OLED/Plasma TVs and of course netbooks, you occasionally stumble across something genuinely unique and original at CES. And today I was quite happy to discover the EasyBloom just before I headed back to OG HQ. But don’t let the cartoony flower design mislead you, this thing is one clever piece of tech. Before you actually plant your garden or even decide what flora to buy, you stick the top section of the EasyBloom in the ground where you intend your garden to be. Over the next 24 hours it will record the environmental conditions in that location including available sunlight, soil conditions, moisture and temperature, and that data is then synced with the company’s website where you’ll be provided with a list of what plants will grow best in those conditions.
And once your garden is planted, you can use the EasyBloom again to keep track of the soil conditions to let you know if you’ve been over or under-watering, or what you can do to improve the health of your plants if things aren’t growing as well as you’d hoped. Best of all, unlike many things at CES, the EasyBloom is available now for $59.95.
The OLED Association brought some of it’s cooler toys to CES this year, like this proof of concept foldable AMOLED display from Samsung. It’s just a prototype at this time, but it works, and shows just how flexible and durable an AMOLED display can be. There was even a crease in the middle from where the screen had been constantly folded (it can actually close all the way like a book or clamshell PDA) but it didn’t seem to interfere with the display whatsoever.
This transparent AMOLED worked so well that it apparently caused my camera’s autofocus to look right through it. While it wasn’t as transparent as glass when powered off, it did manage to create the ghostly illusion you get when projecting video onto steam or a waterfall, but with the color and crispness of an AMOLED display. Might not be useful for everyone, but I can see every casino in Vegas using something like this.
And I guess I’m not as gung-ho about 3D video displays as everyone else at CES this year, but if you found just the right angle when looking at this glasses-free AMOLED display, the 3D effect was rather impressive.
We saw prototypes of LG’s wristwatch cellphone at CES last year, and believe it or not, these are actually going into production this year. The design is finalized and the software is nearly ready to go, and it’ll hit Europe in Q2 of this year for an unspecified price. It’s going to Europe first because LG doesn’t have to worry about carrier monopoly there, but they say it’ll get to the US sometime this year for sure. It’s got quad band GSM, 3G, a touchscreen, Bluetooth, voice recognition, text to speech, and basically everything you’d expect and want in a functional phone that you can wear on your wrist. If I didn’t already have an iPhone, I’d go nuts for one of these.
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By David Ponce
