CES 2012

LAS VEGAS--Have we mentioned ultrabooks?

On the first official day of the Consumer Electronics Show, we got introduced to a few more devices in this category, which is quickly establishing itself as the most heavily promoted product at this year's show. Dell today announced its high-end XPS 13. Dell had been relatively quiet on the ultrabook front until now. And its new entry is a solid one: the system goes from 6mm-18mm thick and weighs just less than 3 pounds.

A newcomer from Taiwan called Inhon showed off the carbon fiber InBook, which bears more than a passing resemblance … Read more

LAS VEGAS--Intel demonstrated today at CES a Lenovo tablet based on its new "Medfield" Atom processor and said a Windows 8 tablet based on a next-generation Atom was on the way.

The Lenovo IdeaTab K2110 tablet (see photo and video) is based on Intel's freshly-minted Medfield Atom processor--the same processor powering the Lenovo K800 smartphone announced today.

This Android Ice Cream Sandwich-based tablet is slated to appear sometime in the second quarter.

Intel and Lenovo are also demonstrating a more futuristic Lenovo tablet running Windows 8 and packing Intel's next-generation Atom chip, dubbed Clover Trail.

That … Read more

LAS VEGAS--Sprint Nextel could bring 4G LTE to the masses in a real way: through the hot prepaid market.

A prepaid 4G LTE strategy is just one of the ways the company plans to set itself apart from its larger competitors, according to Steve Elfman, president of network operations at Sprint. The company's continued support of unlimited plans, as well as its ongoing green initiative, are two others, he added.

Sprint, which held a long advantage with 4G WiMax, is suddenly playing catch up with a newer version of 4G called LTE. The company is trying to make up … Read more

LAS VEGAS--Hollywood should offer Jeff Bezos the keys to the city.

The Amazon CEO and his troops rode to the aid of the five major film studios backing UltraViolet, the name of the effort to promote the studios' vision of digital lockers and create the next generation home-entertainment format.

In the fall, when the studios began releasing movies for UV, conspicuously missing was participation from any significant Web retailer. But today, Bill Carr, Amazon's executive vice president of digital, said during a panel discussion at CES, that the merchant had signed a deal with one of the major film … Read more

LAS VEGAS--The technical hurdle preventing the iPhone from coming to T-Mobile USA could be cleared when the next iteration of the phone comes out.

That's the opinion of Neville Ray, chief technology officer of T-Mobile, who said he believes the iPhone never made it to T-Mobile because of the unique band of spectrum, known as AWS, that it uses for its wireless network.

T-Mobile has been left out in the cold as the other national carriers--and regional carrier C-Spire--have begun selling Apple's hit device. CEO Philipp Humm, speaking at a press conference at the Consumer Electronics Show today, … Read more

Nearly every device in your house, from your television to your refrigerator, is going to be networked and could very well be Android-powered, panelists said today at a CNET CES event in Las Vegas.

Of course you'd expect Eric Schmidt, executive chairman of Google, to say that. But the vision was also endorsed by executives at Google partner Samsung, Sling Media, and Benchmark Capital, who spoke to CNET's Brian Cooley and Molly Wood about ecosystem trends. Here's what they said.

Eric Schmidt, Google executive chairman

The smartphone will become the portal to other devices and appliances in … Read more

The Consumer Electronics Show may be able to do just fine without Microsoft.

The software giant's former prime floor location at the tech confab sold during the first day of 2013 space selection in an "amazingly quick" 45 minutes, a source close the conference told CNET. The space was sold to Dish and Chinese electronics maker Hisense for the same price Microsoft would have paid had it opted to attend next year's show, the source said.

Space selection for the 2013 CES, which began today, is a three-day process, so it's unknown how many exhibitors … Read more