2010 CES

There were a number of hot trends at this years CES, such as 3D televisions, Internet-connected cars, tablets, e-book readers, and Netbooks. Unfortunately, I don't cover any of that technology.

I cover portable media players, and for the most part, CES offered slim pickings. Last year, we had Sony's X-Series Walkman unveiling, a hands-on with the long-awaited Samsung P3, and a grab bag of PMP announcements from Iriver. This year, Sony was mum on the Walkman, Samsung's MP3 players seemed desperately gimmicky, and Iriver's lone PMP announcement came with scant details.

Truth be told, I was hardly surprised by what I saw. It was what I didn't see that made me feel uneasy. Going into CES, my preshow predictions promised Android-powered PMPs and all kinds of interesting fusions between iPod accessories and custom-built apps. Well, I was wrong.

Sure, there were dozens of Android-powered touch-screen devices out there, but in the looming shadow of Apple's… Read more

LAS VEGAS--Last year, I reviewed two 3D monitors: the Samsung SyncMaster 2233RZ and the ViewSonic FuHzion VX2265wm. While the ViewSonic monitor delivered a 3D experience comparative with the Samsung, its overall worse performance and lack of an onscreen display meant that, pound for pound, it just wasn't worth the investment.

At CES 2010, the company announced it's trying 3D again with the debut of the 23.6-inch V3D241wm-LED monitor. This time, the monitor had a 16:9 aspect ratio with a 1,920x1,080-pixel resolution--up from the 1,680x1,050-pixel resolution of the FuHzion VX2265wm.

The V3D241wm has … Read more

LAS VEGAS--For the past few years, Blu-ray has been at the center of CES home theater news and 2010 was no different. Whether its 3D, portable players, streaming media, HTIBs or even AV receiver/Blu-ray combos, Blu-ray seemed to play a part in nearly every aspect of the home theater gadgets announced at the show this year. Here's a quick summary of the major trends we saw.

3D is coming, like it or not 3D was the biggest story at CES 2010, and four manufacturers announced 3D Blu-ray players: Panasonic, Sony, Samsung, and Toshiba. We liked the Panasonic DMP-BD350T … Read more

LAS VEGAS--This may go down as one of the best years for computers, and laptops specifically, at the annual CES trade show. We saw new and improved Netbooks, new CPUs from Intel, and a somewhat surprising number of slate and tablet PCs.

Slates and tablets Following Lenovo's U1 Hybrid, which combined a detachable slate PC with a full Windows 7 laptop (and was many people's favorite show item), we saw glimpses of tablets from HP, Dell, and others--although most were prototypes only, and clearly intended to stake out some slate real estate before the rumored Apple tablet arrives. … Read more

LAS VEGAS--A lot of the gaming news we anticipated last month came to fruition at this year's CES in Las Vegas. While we didn't get a definitive release date for Project Natal, Microsoft did announce the motion sensing technology would be available this holiday season. How much it will cost is still a mystery and there was no sign of Natal at Microsoft's CES booth.

However, we did get some information about Xbox Live Game Room, a new online application that will allow gamers to virtually experience all the goodness of a classic arcade. Free to try … Read more

LAS VEGAS--CES 2010 didn't produce quite a showstopper like last year's Palm Pre, but there's certainly one theme that dominated the show in the cell phone and smartphone categories and that's Android, Android, and Android. After a false start at CES 2009--last year's show defied expectations to produce no Android announcements--Google's OS finally emerged from its shell this year.

Of course, there was plenty of buzz about it even before CES started, after the official announcement of the Nexus One. Though neither Google nor HTC were officially showing the Nexus One in Las Vegas (… Read more

LAS VEGAS--With mobile digital television (DTV) technology officially in the process of being rolled out, a few new Mobile TV devices are set to hit the market later this year, including LG's DP570MH, a model that combines a portable DTV with a DVD player.

Mobile DTV technology is different from the over-the-air signals you can pull in with a standard ATSC digital TV tuner and antenna. The key to Mobile TV is that you can pick up signals while you're moving in a car or even a fast train. According to LG, the new Mobile DTV standard allows … Read more

LAS VEGAS--CES 2010 has come to an end, and unlike most of what happens in Las Vegas, there are quite a few things showgoers want to make sure they carry home. Here are a few that I personally am excited about in the networking and storage categories.

First is the debut of USB 3.0 products. The technology was first announced at CES 2009, and at CES 2010 a few companies released their own products, including Seagate, LaCie, Buffalo, and Western Digital.

As there's no motherboard with built-in USB 3.0 controllers yet, all of the new USB 3.… Read more

LAS VEGAS--While there's usually a sameness to a given category's product announcements at any trade show, there was an especially striking uniformity to the cameras and camcorders debuting at CES 2010--but in a good way! This year, meaningless talk of megapixels and longer-than-thou lenses gave way to more concrete but less glamorous-sounding improvements across product lines.

On of the most thrilling developments this year is the rapid disappearance of proprietary media; both Sony and Olympus, the last holdouts, announced that most of their new products will support SD cards. At the same time, manufacturers like Canon and Panasonic, … Read more