I spent the last few days at CES talking to people about our product but made a fair amount of time to see some great stuff. There was so much to see it truly blew my mind and I cant remember 90% of it but I had a few highlights.
First, Windows Home Server looks very cool and might make Vista tolerable for me. Or at least give it company. The features are great and I like the idea of backups for all the systems. I can see buying one for the house (yes, my actual house) and using it. It’s not to be confused with Windows Server. The two are not at all the same but they both do what they should do for their target market. One thing they did very well is to eliminate most of the “wizzard” crap. MS, please, please, please stop with the wizards. It makes operating systems SO hard to use. (see OSX).
Sony seems to have given up on fighting with Apple over players and now makes a ton of iPod playing equipment. I guess that’s the way of the world. Since Sony managed to win the HD DVD wars with Blu-Ray, they must be feeling like they can let go of their ATRAC players. The new ES receivers are also nice. I’m actually pretty impressed with Sony this year.
The 150″ plasma was very disconcerting. Great, but so huge it freaked me out. I think that was Panasonic. A few other panel makers were engaging in size contests. Boys will be boys.
Pioneer’s new receivers are pretty and do even more neat stuff. Might have to look at it for replacing the Rotel I’m not loving. The not dealing with HDMI in spite of having the ports is a big no-no for me. Rotel dissapointed me so much with their TERRIBLE 70s’ style remote and OSD that won’t show in 720p or 1080i. Their “fix” is to run another composite cable to the TV and switch sources when I want to edit the system settings. Uh, no. Try again. People, it’s simple, don’t release stuff that does not work. Back to work.
I think Dice Electronics came up with a great fix for integrating ipods by using an FM intercept that also sends the titles to the radio over RDS. It’s completely slick and going in the A3. Dice has been a fav of mine for years. They make things that WORK. (see above).
I was blow away by the number of GPS players. I think Garmin is sweating. There are so many players in the market now we’ll see prices drop by at least 50% in 08. By 09, your toaster will have topo maps because it’s so cheap to include.
Cobra has some new radar detectors that are making me regret buying the Escort 8500 X50 that seems to be grumpy in the morning and false Ka band for no reason… Then it settles down. Annoying. The Cobra people were very cool, I like their use of LCD displays, it’s also very slick.
I spotted some amazing GPS tracking gadgets that let you track anything you put it in, even without line-of-sight. Could be used for evil, thats the only downside. It works nationwide wherever there’s cell signal. The demo the guy gave me was stunning. It’s CHEAP too. $250 for the unit and $10 a month. How about never losing your bag again. How about knowing where your car is, always. It’s the future, people.
But, a real highlight was the BMW Pit Lane Park exhibit.
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My video is not as good as some that other people took but I do my part to add to the video universe. The setup there is great. Not cheesy at all. The F1 was there on site and the sound it made starting up sent me into ecstasy. The smoking of tires was kind of ok, the sound was the sexy bit. And there was a lot of sound.
CES is sensory overload. I was so blown away the whole time I had no concept of anything outside of the event. I went in to the CES zone. I’m just now getting a clear head.
