Sunday, January 11, 2009

CES 09: A Pictorial With Words


After 2 years of offers and denials, I finally went to CES this year (had no idea it went through the weekend...) and had quite a lot of fun! It was different than I expected. I was thinking something akin to E3: dark rooms where the only lights are coming from booth lights and the glow of monitors and chicks holding glow sticks. Instead, with the exception of the main hall, all of the floors were brightly lit, much like the other traditional trade shows I attend each year for work. While I didn't get to see EVERYTHING I wanted (no Palm Pre) we had the chance to tour the majority of the show in a single day. Here are a few highlights. Click on any picture to se ea larger version.

3D Technology: No pictures, cuz that's impossible. Very unimpressed with what I saw. Very gimicky. Don't want to take glasses on and off constantly, and it was no better than the old 3D tech we had growing up.


Big TVs were impressive. At the top is me standing next to a 108" LCD from Sharp, and below that is the crazy 150" unit from Panasonic.

Tiny TVs were even more impressive. The above 2 shots are of an OLED TV. The brightness on these things are incomparable, as you can probably tell in the first shot because everything else became black on the camera. The speed and refresh is perfect, and they are so thin and light that you could store then in the sleave of a folder. They even use the new thin wire technolgy.

Microsoft had a large booth, and right in the middle were touch screen Windows 7 demo units like these. Sadly, these did not actually run Windows 7, but merely used Windows 7 technology to show how the system might work, including multi-touch features. It was basically a less impressive Surface...



LG's wristwatch phone has impressed me ever since I first saw pictures it a while back. While I didn't see it in motion, it was still cool enough to make me snap a few shots.

Cool old school cars dotted the show floor, including the above Delorean and Kitt from the REAL Knight Rider. Overall, I was shocked to see how much in car tech was part of the show, as it took up an entire hall.

Robots are cool...

1 comment:

Elk said...

From people I know that went this year I hear it was a little weak, which is a real pity. I wonder how much of that is caused by the economy.