CES: Sennheiser shows off 2011 headphone lineup

LAS VEGAS--Headphones, headphones, and more headphones. That was the unsurprising theme from headphone-maker Sennheiser during an off-site CES event last night. The company took advantage of Pepcom to show off some of its wares for the coming year. Among them, the new Adidas fashion line, digital noise-canceling earphones with three levels of sound hushing, and new additions with integrated iPhone remotes. To check out these and more, take a gander at the gallery below.

CES: Where you can smash an Acer laptop with a hammer

If you're going to be an exhibitionist, you need two things: courage and imagination.

These are not things one would expect from an insurance company. And yet, at CES, the Worth Avenue Group bucks the trend by allowing you to turn to violence.

The Worth Avenue Group, based in Stillwater, Okla., doesn't try to call your attention to its no doubt fine insurance policies for laptops, iPhones, and iPads.

Instead, the voice of Gretchen Cathey offered: "Hey, would you like to pick up this hammer and smash this laptop?"

This sounded like a fine idea.

So … Read more

CES: Sony's tablet not aiming to be an iPad killer

LAS VEGAS--The tablet Sony has plans to release stands out at CES because it's actually not here, but mostly because Sony appears to stand alone in that it isn't positioning it as an iPad killer.

The company briefly noted that it's got a tablet in the works during yesterday's press conference.

"We'd really like to take the No. 2 position (in the tablet market) by 2012," Kunimasa Suzuki, deputy president of Sony, said at a roundtable discussion with company executives here today. Unlike the gobs of Android-powered tablets introduced this week, Sony sounded … Read more

CES: Citi swiping Dynamics' 'smart' credit cards

LAS VEGAS--Dynamics' high-tech update on the old-fashioned credit card, which we covered from Demo in September, has landed a real customer.

At CES here, the company announced that Citigroup will be launching a trial of a credit card that lets users pay with either their regular credit account or with reward points they've accumulated. The user will press a button on the credit card to select a method of payment. That will activate the card's built-in electronics and rewrite the magnetic strip on the back so standard credit card-reading machines will use the chosen account. Updated with … Read more

Hands-on with the Marvell HyperDuo hybrid storage controller

LAS VEGAS--Marvell announced its new storage controller this week that combines a regular hard-disk drive (HDD) and a solid-state drive (SSD) to create a hybrid storage solution designed to offer SSD-like performance while retaining the capacity benefits of traditional hard drives.

Intrigued by the idea, I visited the company's demonstration today and found it indeed intriguing and at the same time practical.

At the demo, Marvel used a controller card, powered by its HyperDuo chip, that has two SATA 6Gbps ports. This card is similar to any PCIe SATA controller cards you find on the market. The difference is, … Read more

CES: Vader invades Vegas to pump Blu-ray set

LAS VEGAS -- He came, he pointed, he mock-choked people.

Darth Vader descended on CES with a pack of Imperial Stormtroopers, as Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment announced the availability of preorder sales of the complete "Star Wars" saga on Blu-ray, with shipping in September.

Fox President Mike Dunn and Amazon Vice President of Music and Video Bill Carr joined the Dark Lord on stage to screen a new trailer for the Blu-ray package, which creator George Lucas announced last August at the Celebration V fan convention.

"Star Wars: The Complete Saga" on Blu-ray, officially $139.… Read more

CES: World's smallest waterproof MP3 player gets bigger

LAS VEGAS--The UWaterG2 MP3 player is truly tiny. Weighing in under an ounce, it's 1.75 inches tall and 1.25 inches wide. Even with its new orange "life jacket" that hooks around the top to keep it afloat (see photo), the device feels weightless.

And while the UWaterG2 has not been entirely reinvented for this year's CES, it's about to get a major upgrade this spring, with models that boast 4GB and 8GB of memory instead of the current 2GB. (The 2GB model is on sale in time for CES for $59.95; no … Read more

CES: Samsung's 4G Galaxy Tab revealed

LAS VEGAS--On Wednesday, Samsung announced a Wi-Fi version of the Galaxy Tab, but apparently it thinks we can't get enough Galaxy Tab news. It's probably right.

On Thursday the company, along with Verizon Wireless, announced the 4G LTE-enabled Galaxy Tab.

Unlike the Wi-Fi-only Tab, this one gets a significant upgrade in at least a couple of areas. Samsung will upgrade the rear-facing camera from 3 to 5 megapixels.

Also, the CPU gets a slight speed boost, from 1GHz to 1.2GHz, using the same Cortex A8 Hummingbird processor.

Besides those details, the rest of the specs (so far) … Read more

CES: Dell Venue smartphone debuts

LAS VEGAS--At its press conference on Thursday, Dell unveiled its new Venue smartphone.

We'll have some hands-on impressions shortly, but here are the initial specs and info.

Dynamic 4.1-inch AMOLED screen with Gorilla Glass 8-megapixel camera Runs Android 2.2 and full Flash 10.1 implementation Offers the full Dell Stage interface with Stage widgets

Pricing and availability: details in the coming weeks.