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Backstage Crew: Day one: Nate

Monday was opening day at CES 2007, and Backstage Crew member Nate Lanxon is roaming the halls to find the most interesting gear.

CNET Reviews staff
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This is the new Plug-and-Play Blu-ray Disc offering from Hewlett Packard. The elegantly designed external drive offers both read and write capabilities, allowing you to back up a full 50 gigabytes of data to a single disc. The drive connects via USB 2.0 and is powered from a main adapter. No price has been released yet for this model, sadly, but we are told it will be made public within the next few days.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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Joining the Hewlett Packard Blu-ray disc drive comes HP's HD-DVD drive. Styled in just the same way as its cousin, its attractive curvy casing makes this a very eye-catching piece of hardware. At about $300 it is an incredibly affordable way to get onboard the high-definition disc train. It is powered by a main adapter and connects to your PC via USB 2.0.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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Here is LG's new, multifunctioning HD-DVD/Blu-ray disc drive. The drive provides read/write access to Blu-Ray discs, and read-only access to HD-DVD. This is one of many such products we can expect to see in the coming months, as it provides a consumer-friendly option to adding HD capabilities to your PC. There's no need to decide which format to adopt! That said, being able to burn 50GB of data to a single disc is a huge advantage in the world of HD video files.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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Here we have the sleek Gigabeat MEV30K from Toshiba. Unlike previous models, the MEV30K is aimed toward someone who wants a dedicated personal video player. It boasts a bright, 3.5-inch screen and will play 8 hours of video on a single charge or 30 hours of audio. Navigation through the various menus is easy, thanks to Microsoft's Portable Media Center software. The handy inclusion of a front-mounted speaker makes this a very social piece of kit, as it would be easily enjoyed by two people without sharing headphones.

Canon
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Here's a great piece of portable media technology from Polaroid, perfect for family drives when the kids can't agree on which film gets pride of place in the back seats. This DVD player boasts two separate DVD drives on the same device, each outputting to two separate LCD displays. The player outputs through standard RCA adapters and employs Polaroid's antiskip technology to ensure smooth playback on both discs. Kodak picture CDs are also supported as standard.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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Another offering from Polaroid is this stylish portable DVD player, the PDM-0082. What separates this model from the large number of other products from different companies is the cool, elegant finish. Never again would you have to make do with a standard plastic casing. Its soft, almost rubbery casing feels great in your hands, and the deep red color is very eye catching. The 8-inch screen is bright and clear, can rotate 360 degrees, and supports 6:9 wide screen natively.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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7 of 10 Nate Lanxon/CNET Networks
My final pick from Polaroid (yes, the company had some nice gear!) is the TR-0501, a wireless device that will beam your favorite TV shows around your house. The base transmitter connects to your cable TV line and sends the signal to wherever you place the 8-inch wide LCD screen. Controls are located on top of the screen, leaving the viewing area free of potential finger marks. Personally, I think this belongs in the bathroom--TV in the bath, while risky, is incredibly satisfying, and this gorgeously designed product would look great among the shampoo bottles and sponges.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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Now here's something that answers to the demand of the iPod fans: a portable DVD player with a built-in iPod dock! This is my favourite product at CES so far. It's well designed and smart to look at, features a detachable remote control, and will play all your iPod video content on the impressively sized screen (7-inch and 8.5-inch are available). The display will output 480x234 resolution video. The optical drive will play all DVD formats, along with VCD, SVCD, Video CD, and Kodak Picture CDs. There's also an SD card slot for playback of files taken from your computer. The player will recognize and play DivX, Xvid, and MPEG-4 video. Other features include stereo speakers, dual headphone jacks, and composite CVBS audio/video output. It weighs a little over two pounds and has a battery life of 2.5 hours.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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Here is the Philips SA51XX, a flash-based audio/video player that tries desperately to be a video iPod in an iPod Nano's body. If you're after a very small video player with an adequate screen size, take a look at this offering from Philips. The battery will play 4 hours of continuous video or 16 hours of music. Media transfer goes through USB 2.0, and memory sizes available are 1GB, 2GB, or 4GB. The screen is crisp, and the whole device is less than 4 inches in height and 1.8 inches in width, with a depth of a mere 0.4 inches. It'll play protected and unprotected WMA and MP3 audio, but only plays WMV video files.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by
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10 of 10 Nate Lanxon/CNET Networks
My final pick for today is another attractive product from Philips. The PMC7230 is a portable media center with a 30GB hard drive, a 320-by-240-pixel display, and up to 130 hours of video and songs. Audio playback supports MP3 and WMA, and the battery will give you 3 hours of video or 16 hours of music. The other main feature of this product is that it'll record MPEG-4 video and MP3 audio at the touch of a couple of buttons. The direct video recording facility and timer function will save you from missing your favorite shows. It's a great product from Philips and is definitely worth a look if you're a fan of mobile video.

Canon
Backstage Crew photos taken with a Canon PowerShot SD30 Digital Elph and made possible by

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