There was literally no info on this besides the name, but it’s more or less self explanatory. I really liked the look, and it was somehow relaxing to stand there and look at the calm artwork in the midst of CES. The four displays are interlinked, but they’re not exactly skinny or light, and it makes the screen itself somewhat questionable when it comes to practicality as a piece of furniture. Hmm, if only someone would come up with some really skinny displays…
CES is big. You just won’t believe how vastly, hugely, mind-bogglingly big it is. I mean, you may think it’s a long way to get around your local Best Buy, but that’s just peanuts to CES. This is a picture looking toward the middle of the central hall, showing the ever present crush of people and gigantic corporate logos. There are six more halls, plus a second convention center and a couple hotels filled with exhibitors. Wish me luck, I’m gonna need it.
I covered a lot of emerging automotive tech at the LA Auto Show back in November. Most of the stuff on display in the North Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center wasn’t really new or innovative; there was a lot (a lot) of audio systems, in-car video, GPS, etc… But there were a few pretty cars around, and a couple interesting things. First, the interesting things:
General Motors Hydrogen Powertrain
The GM people I talked to didn’t seem to have a clue about this, but apparently it’s a hydrogen version of the Chevy Volt. Maybe we’ll hear more tomorrow, after the GM keynote. [ Chevy Volt ]
FLIR Dash Cams
Thermal infrared cameras are good for more things than just taking weird pictures of hot people. Their ability to see in the dark makes them useful when you’re driving way, way too fast at night. FLIR systems are already optional on some 5, 6, and 7 series BMWs (where it adds about $2000 to the sticker price), and if you like the idea but don’t like BMWs, you can buy a kit to install a small FLIR camera on your dashboard with an attached video screen. Seems like it might be distracting, but when I talked to some of the FLIR guys a little later that night, they described it like using a rearview mirror: you’re peripherally aware of it until something shows up. In the case of the FLIR system, it usually spots animals, which show up as bright white since they’re warm. FLIR says they’re working on a system to partially automate obstacle detection by looking for telltale thermal movement patterns that indicate an object might collide with the car. [ FLIR Driver Vision Enhancement ]
Kicker Subs
As you might expect from a hall full of car audio, there was a relentless undertone of bass pounding away everywhere. The winner when it comes to sheer pain, though, was Kicker, with this van, which was overstuffed with amps and subwoofers (notice the giant box o’ amps on the floor). I stuck my head in to get the full effect, which was a huge mistake… The air pressure oscillations practically shattered my skull. [ Kicker ]
Eye Candy
And then there were these cars just lying around, looking slick:
There are a bunch of celebrities here at CES, but I’m ignoring most of them, since all they’re good for is stealing my valuable gadget sniffing time on the show floor. I say most, because (besides Bill), I am devoting an hour to one conference session more or less solely because of the celebrity panel, which includes Lucy Lawless (Xena, and Cylon Number Three on Battlestar Galactica), Neal Stephenson (author of Snow Crash), Walt Mossberg (tech columnist for the Wall Street Journal), and Dean Kamen (inventor of the Segway, among many other things). I’ll be liveblogging this in the same way that I did the keynote.
[ UPDATE- Video of the entire thing (an hour long) up at DVICE here ]
These gadget concepts from Fujitsu aren’t exactly ready for production, but they’re interesting nonetheless. I’d like to think they have some basis in commercial reality, and they probably do in some extremely attenuated sense, but… Who really cares, they’re cool:
-Card Viewer
This device consists of a base module, with multiple electronic “cards” attached to it. Use the base to find directions, create a picture slideshow, or store other information, and then give one of the cards away. The information from the base will go along with the card.
-Fabric PC
It’s hard to tell from the picture, but this computer is, in fact, made out of fabric, based on electronic paper. It’s soft and foldable, yet retains all of the functionality of a laptop. Plus, it would make a much more effective pillow for tired bloggers than, say, a Sony Vaio does.
-Clerk Browser
This one is my favorite. Fujitsu designed it as “an information terminal which a salesclerk uses in stores,” but it’s way too cool for that. It neatly solves the biggest problem that wrist computers have: restricted display space. And wearing it makes me feel, for some reason, exactly like Batman. Yep, it’s only day 1 of CES, and already I’m going nuts.
It’s 5am, and the exhibit floor opens in 3 hours. G’night.
If you need to keep track of something, PocketFinder is the way to do it. Keep track of what, you ask? Well, anything. How about your kids? Do you know where they are right now? Are you SURE? With PocketFinder, you can be sure, even if they’re inside, where conventional GPS devices don’t function. PocketFinder is unique in that it uses both GPS signals and GSM triangulation to figure out where it is. When it’s able to, it combines them both to determine its position within 5 feet, and worst case (no GPS) it can still locate itself within 500 feet.
PocketFinder is small and waterproof, since it’s charged inductively (no wires or plugs) on a custom charging base. The interface is completely web based, and will even run on an iPhone or something similar. Like most GPS tracking devices, you can set boundary alerts, but PocketFinder also incorporates (will incorporate, they just got the patent yesterday) an accelerometer that can tell if you get into an accident and notify the proper authorities.
The unit itself costs a bit over $100, which isn’t that bad… But you do have to pay a fee every month to receive location data over the GSM network. Yay PocketFinder, boo subscription fees.
The easiest way to turn a ho-hum product into something slightly interesting is to just dress it up a bit, in a slick looking case. Here’s an example of notebooks from Dell:
Pretty, no? Same goes for these external HDs, from Toshiba:
One of those drives, you may have noticed, is smaller than the others… It’s a 1.8 inch form factor, packing 120 gigs. Toshiba also had a 160 gig 1.8 inch bare drive, but the biggest one you can currently get in a pretty little USB bus powered case is the 120. Yeah, I’d pay extra for that piano black with the blue and silver stripes… Sooo pretty.
CES is stuffed to the brim with LCDs that are slightly bigger, slightly brighter, and slightly skinnier than last year. The Crystal from Dell is a departure from the norm, with a large tempered glass bezel surrounding the LCD itself. Four speakers (as well as the monitor controls) are embedded directly in the glass, with exposed wiring that definitely looks different, but in a good way. There’s an integrated webcam, and the monitor has a response time of 2ms. Downside: the 22″ Crystal costs about $1200, which is rather substantial for the modest 1680×1050 resolution it offers.
This wraparound display from Alienware was probably the most obviously interesting eye candy at the Pepcom show at CES. It’s rear projection, with a wraparound effect that mimics peripheral vision, which is great for FPS games like Crysis (which it ran without a hitch). I’m not sure exactly what’s in there, but if you look very closely at the picture, you can see three vague vertical lines, which makes me suspect that there are four projectors working in concert. It doesn’t slow the screen down, though… The response time (this is not a typo) is 0.02ms, and the resolution is a whopping 2880 x 900. Although this unit is only a prototype, it should be commercially available sometime in the latter half of 2008. Price? Yeah, good luck.
Related Tags: CES08, Displays, Furniture
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