Tech Lover's Guide to Gadgets and Gizmos
Every year during the first week in January, more than 150,000 people in the electronics industry travel to Las Vegas to the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES). More than 2,500 vendors display their latest gadgets for the upcoming year at this show, which begin to appear at retail stores during the spring and summer months. Luckily, I have been traveling to the show for more than 15 years and have a report on the coolest things that I saw there.
Game Time
Sony and Microsoft are fighting for video game living room dominance with the PS3, launching as you read this story, and the Xbox 360, which you might have been lucky enough to score over the Christmas holiday. At the same time Intel wants you to have a PC with Viiv (pronounced VIve) in your living room running Windows XP Media Center Edition.
This "product announcement" from Intel is more of a certification than an actual product, but it means that the next PC that you buy may have the fastest technologies and memory loaded within to support multimedia content. These include Intel Pentium dual-core processors, which means that the "brain within" is doing twice the processing of your typical Pentium CPU. Support for TV tuners and 7.1 surround sound will ensure that your PC will act like a personal video recorder (PVR) as well as provide you with an immersive audio experience.
Robopets
Sony has captured lots of attention with robots since their Aibo dog was introduced in 1999 for $2,000. Their 2006 model shares the same price tag but now reads blogs, speaks 1,000 words and understands 100 phrases, but Sony is losing their lead. The company to watch now is WowWee with their next generation RoboSapien and the P.E.A. Bot using technology and software licensed from Dean Kamen, inventor of the Segway scooter. The Personally Evolved Android, a two-wheeled balancing robot, sports a Max Headroom-like face on its color screen (taken from a mobile phone) and the ability to carry a beer (or soft drink) through its back-mounted cup holder. This robot truly balances on two side-by-side four-inch wheels and is an amazing sight to see racing across carpet. Expect it to retail for under $250 and become available in the fall.
If building Erector sets and Tinker-Toys are more your speed, then the Vex line from RadioShack, whose design group Ignition won an Innovations Award for the product, lets you build many types of robots with different sensory capabilities. This line of bots follows Dean Kamen's "F.I.R.S.T." robotics program, a competition among schools using a "big brother" to the VEX Robotics kit. Now, the robots at CES weren't just all for fun and games. The iRobot Roomba has a new cousin, the Scuba, which automatically cleans tile and vinyl flooring with a Clorox liquid solution. Personally, I will just stick with my Roomba to vacuum my hard flooring. Mixing water and robots still does not sound like a good idea to me.
More Music
While Apple does not exhibit at this show as their big conference is held during the following week in San Francisco, there were plenty of devices to plug your iPod into. New speaker designs that accept the portable player were on display as well as a Fish speaker that glows much like the iDog from Hasbro. My favorite accessory was a suit coat and backpack which had touch sensitive fabric buttons sewn into the lapel and straps to control the tracks and volume of the player. Look for these and more Eleksen products in the upcoming months as they allow you to keep your iPod while it is safely tucked away inside your bag, and still allowing you instant control.
The new iPod with video support is getting competition as new satellite receivers from DISH Network and DIRECTV have personal video players, little hard drives that playback video recorded from the system's personal video recorder after a syncing process. All of this happens without the need for a PC and iTunes download.
Global Navigation
If you want to always be able to know exactly where you are at any time, you need a Global Positioning System (GPS) navigation device. The latest models will play back MP3 music stored internally or even movies that you copy within. This means if you get to grandma's house and get a little bored spending quality time with the family, you can sneak away to watch a movie on your mobile phone. Her TV probably won't have a video input anyway.
In the near future you will get this type of service directly to your mobile phones, since they are required to send the required information to help assist 911 operators track your calling location. Children's phones such as the ChitterChatter allow young children to call seven different stored numbers while mom and dad keep tabs on the location of the device to within 300 feet.
All of the chaos in Vegas was worth it as this year's CES has proven that we are all crazy about gadgets. This means the Gadget Guy will have yet another year of bringing you the ins, outs and knowledge about all of these new devices. Keep tuning in right here to learn about them!
Dave wishes for a CES without cab lines and shin splints from days of walking to meetings spread out across the 28 football fields of show floor space. More photos of Dave's Vegas trip can be found in the photo section of his website at davemathews.com.
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