Category: Gadget Shows
CES 2009: Liveblogging the SHARP conference
It’s a murky Wednesday morning here in Vegas and I’m caffeined up to the nines to prevent an onset of jet lag. I’m sitting in the Sharp press conference, awaiting news of their lineup for 2009- will I be wowed or left wanting? Read on to find out…
20:33 Two new Blu-ray players are announced. They incorporate several features to improve the home experience, with lower power consumption and advanced audio clarity. They’ll cost from $229-$269, and have incorporate 2GB USB sticks to easily upload content. That’s all for now folks!
CES 2009: LG showing off prototype LG-GD910 watch-phone hybrid device
When I was a wee nipper, I used to talk into my watch and imagine that my friends could hear me. They invariably couldn’t, which is probably just as well, but perhaps someone heard me, and now they work for LG. The LG-GD910 is basically a phone that you wear on your wrist.
As you can imagine, there’s not much in the way of features – “you can wear it on your wrist” being top of the pile. Additionally, though, it’s waterproof, weighs 85 grams, and has voice calling, text to speech, and stereo Bluetooth, which officially makes it better than the iPhone, in one category at least. It’ll have three real buttons, a touchscreen, and weigh 85g. Due for release “this year”.
LG (via IntoMobile)
For more CES coverage, click here.
CES 2009: New SD card standard paves the way for 2TB capacities
The SD association has announced a new top-end to the capacities of its eponymous flash memory cards. The new spec is called “SDXC” – short for “eXtended Capacity”, and it’ll hold up to 2TB of data, with transfer speeds rocketing up to 104MB/s. In contrast, the previous maximums were 32GB and 10MB/s.
This is just a specification – there’s no products yet – and support for the format will have to make its way into devices before it’ll be much use selling the cards. However, I think it’s fairly safe to say that we’ll be seeing these on shelves in a year or so.
(via Gizmodo)
For more CES coverage, click here
CES 2009: WowWee Cinemin Pico Projectors – candybar, swivel and dock
Last time we heard from WowWee, they showed Ashley a robot at last year’s CES. I guess they decided that there’s not much money in robots, because this year they’ve got a bunch of cheap, tiny, but remarkably attractive projectors instead.
From left to right, there’s the “Stick”, which takes SD cards, but also has some internal memory, the “Station”, which lets you both dock your iPod and display its contents, and the “Swivel” which has a 90° hinge, letting you project your videos skyward. It also packs a three-hour battery life, for those long sessions of lying on your back. No pricing or availability yet, beyond “2009”.
Find more CES coverage here. Tempted? I sure am.
Related posts: Optoma Pico portable projector – pack 60 inches in your pocket | Toshiba pico projector – nice tech but is it totally useless?
Rock adds Intel's Q9000 quad-core chip to its Xtreme 780 gaming laptop
There are very few true PC gamers that’ll willingly buy a laptop over a desktop, primarily because the performance-price difference is so great. Rock’s just added an Intel Q9000 chip to its flagship gaming laptop – the Xtreme 780, but I suspect the majority of gamers out there simply won’t care.
It’s not even that great a machine. Quad-core aside, the 512MB Nvidia GeForce 9800M GTS is merely adequate, the 2GB of memory will look very meagre before the end of 2009, and a 250GB hard drive is considerably less than most gamers will need. For £1700, which is what the Xtreme 780 costs, you could make two desktop PCs that outspec this laptop.
Logitech shows off its revamped gaming lineup – two keyboards a headset and a mouse
Next up, it’s Logitech’s turn to show off its new products to the world. They’ve got the G19 keyboard, the G13 gameboard, the G9x mouse and the G35 surround sound headset. I’m going to go out on a limb and assume that the G stands for ‘gaming’, because these are all very squarely focused at PC gamers.
I’ll start with the G19, which we spotted previously, but called the G18. In every other respect, though, it seems to be the same model – it’s got the same 320 x 240 colour LCD, the same 12 macro keys, and the superb “game mode” switch that disables the Windows key so you don’t hit it by accident at a crucial moment. No sign of that D-pad, though.
Macworld 2009 Keynote live coverage: 5pm GMT today
It’s the first keynote without Steve Jobs, and Apple’s last visit to Macworld (at least for now), so it’s one to watch.
What products will Apple announce?
Will Phil Schiller wear the same outfit as Steve? (not exactly the same one, I hope)
Will Steve Jobs make a guest appearance as “one more thing” ?
Which soft rock star will play out the keynote this year?
All this, and more, will be answered at 5pm GMT (9am PST), so come back then and enjoy the roller-coaster ride that is an Apple keynote.
HP launching two Pavilion laptops, and one Firebird desktop
HP has announced a couple of new notebook PCs in its Pavilion range, and a successor to its high-end Blackbird desktop – the Firebird. Let’s take a look at the notebooks first.
They’re named Pavilion dv2 and Pavilion dv3. The dv2 is a slim-and-light machine, with 3.8 pound weight, and thickness of just one inch. The full specs aren’t available, but it’ll include an AMD Athlon processor, 12″ display, “nearly” full-size keyboard, discrete graphics and up to 500GB of hard disc space. There’s an optional external Blu-ray drive, too.
Sandisk reveals one-button-backup USB flash drives
Now that flash memory has got to a price competitive with mechanical storage, we’re starting to see it crop up in all sorts of places. One of those places is backup, where the speed of the memory presents a clear advantage over a traditional disk drive.
With that in mind, Sandisk has brought out a new backup-focused USB drive, which is the first in the world to work its magic with just a button press – no software installation needed. The capacities aren’t huge yet – the biggest is 64GB – but that should cover the contents of ‘My Documents’ for the vast majority of consumers.
The SanDisk Ultra Backup will go on sale in April, and cost between $40 (£28) and $200 (£137) depending on the size you plump for. How big is your “My Documents” folder? How about when you don’t include the porn? Let us know in the comments.
Sandisk Press Release
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Samsung announces 64GB SSD H-Series HD camcorder, and some others too
Not to be outdone by Canon, Samsung has also released info about a range of new camcorders that it’ll be bringing to market later in the year. They all come under the banner of H-Series, which seems to mean nothing except that their meaningless product numbers all begin with H.
In full, there’s the HMX-H106, HMX-H105, HMX-H104, and HMX-H100. They’ve got HD sensors, and lenses from Schneider Kreuznach that have a 10X zoom and “Optical Image Stabilisation”. One of the models in particular – the top-of-the-line HMX-H106 – comes with a 64GB SSD, which I believe is the first camcorder with a drive that big.
