CES 2010 - Page 2

Getting by on about 4 hours of sleep here at CES.

Tuesday was CES Unveiled, where the standouts for me were Mitsubishi's 3DC-1000 3D adapter which allows Mitsubishi 3D-ready Home Theater TV owners the ability to display 3D from a 3D Blu-Ray player. But Parrot drew the biggest crowds with flying displays of the AR-Drone, a quadricopter with on-board Wi-Fi that can be controlled by an iPhone or iPod Touch. Looks like a match for the Department of Defense once it's made a bit more stealthier. Take a look at twitter.com/ardrone.

DTS held an invitation only dinner at Nobu at the Hard Rock. Excellent food and drink from a gracious host and the gift bag included a FlipVideo Ultra HD Camcorder. 

Wednesday saw the start of the major press events. I made it to Monster Cable (watch for its new line of Miles Davis headphones), Toshiba (keep an eye on the new Cell TV, its new flagship), Audiovox, Sharp (LCDs with a 4th color pixel), Casio (new high speed cameras and digital photo frames that can display in various artistic modes), Samsung, Panasonic and Sony, where Taylor Swift perfomed live with a 3D back up band. Most of the TV manufactors are promoting TVs that can convert 2D to 3D. Only  booth visits can determine how well this actually works.

Wednesday night was the Digital Experience's Digital Safari, less crowded than CES Unveiled. Tall models in boy shorts and halter tops were body painted and decorated to look like giraffes and  handed out jungle and safari toys. They were popular photo ops and their  pictures are probably already online. I spoke with Nuance about their latest version of Dragon Naturally Speaking 10 Speech Recognition Software with allows voice activated document and email creation and opening of applications. Will be trying this out when I get home. When Dragon works correctly it's right out of Star Trek. Clickfree provided the Transformer SE for automatic back up to free space on any USB hard drive or iPod/iPhone.

More press events today, followed by the Digital Entertainment Group at the Bellagio and Showstoppers over at the Wynn.

Back from Lunch at Piero's 2010!  (Not much of an appetite after a bad breakfast at Hash House A Go Go, the new restaurant at the Imperial Palace.) Still, Piero's was very nice. Good Italian food, tables to sit at and 21 sponsors who were set up to display and promote their products. Of interest to me was Eye-Fi with their wireless memory cards for digital cameras (www.eye.fi); FizWoz, a mobile application for selling cellphone pictures and videos to media companies(www.fizwoz.com) ; Immersion Digital with Glo, an interactive application on the Bible (www.bibleglo.com); and Openmoko with its WikiReader, the Wikipedia ebook(www.thewikireader.com). PowerGenix displayed their Nickel-Zinc (NiZn) batteries(www.powergenix.com), and Virtual Mechanics promoted SiteSpinner Pro, web design software to develop interactive web sites in both standard desktop and mobile browser resolutions(www.virtualmechanics.com).

Last night I went to the annual DEG (Digital Entertainment Group) award presentation at the Bellagio. Awards were given to industry retailers and DVD/Blu-Ray releases. The usual swag bag seemed slimmer than previous years. Most of the DVDs had been replaced by Blu-Ray releases. All of those who received the bags were extremely grateful. DEG is incredibly generous with their annual selection of product for the attending press. After DEG I managed to get down to the Wynn for Showstoppers. This invitation-only event is similar to the Digital Experience except Showstoppers does provide chairs for weary press to sit down.

Today I went to NXT's 2010 product line introduction breakfast in their Hilton suite (www.nxtsound.com). According to invitation email the press were going to experience:

Went to the "It Won't Stay In Vegas" party at the Atomic Testing Museum last. Great venue, so-so party- ran out of food in an hour, not much in the way of swag. Highlight was talking with James Segars from High Def Disc News about 3D technology. We agreed that directors and cinematographers were going to need to re-learn how to compose and edit for 3D. Changing angles rapidly and frenetic editing doesn't allow the 3D viewer enough time to readjust their vision and focal points. Sportscasters will need to rethink how to shoot their games in 3D so they can still allow the viewing audience a chance to enjoy the game without developing a splitting headache. Hopefully at some point the studios will revisit the vast library of 3D features and shorts that were filmed in earlier decades and make them available again- "Kiss Me Kate", "Dial M For Murder", "Creature From The Black Lagoon", "Inferno", "Hondo", etc.

Had a private 9 AM booth tour at Panasonic with Jamie Hodin, Account Executive with Cohn & Wolfe. Easy to be impressed with all the 3D technology on display and their 4K plasma (combination TV, wall and electric heater). By the way, the Panasonic 3D TVs at the booth do not do any 2D to 3D conversion, as offered by the other major manufacturers. And as I've mentioned before, all I can say is that the sets look great but let's wait until there are comparison technical reviews on the first generation 3D sets before anyone claims a particular brand is best. Panasonic did make an immediate sale to me (and I'll be ordering one on  Amazon shortly): their new Steam/Dry Iron Line-up with 360 degree multi-directional ironing caught my eye. Since I need a new iron for my new home, I'll be buying one of these.

Met with Magali Valance from Sensio at 11 AM. This was a very big show for Sensio. They were back in the LVCC after several years of displaying at a suite in the Flamingo. I've blogged about Sensio before, so you might know I have a fondness for this Canadian company. Sensio announced at CES that THX supports the Sensio 3D format with the THX Media Director, that Viewsonic is incorporating the Sensio 3D format within its new products, and what is probably the most important news for Sensio, that Sensio and Vizio have signed an agreement for the integration of Sensio 3D format decoder into the Vizio 3D HDTVs. Vizio is the leading North American LCD maker and sold over 1.15 million HDTVs during the last (2009) holiday season. Can Sensio and Vizio turn Costco shoppers into 3D early adopters?

At 1:30 PM I met with Torin Roher, (Rohrer Public Relations) at Optoma. I use the Optoma MovieTime DV10 when I give film lectures in the Bay area and have been impressed with its performance. At the booth Optoma's hottest products were the HD20 1080p Home Theater DLP projector which retails for under $1000; the 3D ready GT720 GameTime DLP short throw projector and the latest Pico Pocket Projector, the PK301, a 50 lumen DLP projector with 16.9 WVGA widescreen resolution, 2000:1 contrast ratio a HDMI input and a MicroSD socket that supports up to 16GB. Retail on this 8 ounce projector is $399.

Went by Datacolor and spoke with Randy Irvine, Director, Product Management. The new Spyder3HDMI was on display. It calibrates HDTVs with the appropriate firmware using an HDMI connection. Datacolor is looking for manufacturers to incorporate the firmware in future HDTVs.

Also stopped by DTS to thank them for the great sushi dinner at Nobu and took in their demo room. This year instead of using equipment worth $200,000 to demonstrate DTS they used standard home theater equipment anyone can afford. Got a copy of the latest DTS Blu-ray Demonstration Disc 14. The demo room used a battle scene from The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and a music video from Gloriana, Wild At Heart, both of which are on the demo disc. Once my home theater is set up again, I'll play the same cuts to see how they sound on my equipment.

If I still have energy I'll be going to the THX Video Tech Happy Hour tonight at the Las Vegas Boulder Station Hotel and Casino and for my birthday my friends are taking me to the David Copperfield show at the MGM Grand.

This is a wrap on CES. I'm leaving LV tomorrow to return to San Francisco. I didn't get to see everything I wanted but I certainly saw enough to hold me until next year.

Hi, Frank!

Yeah, the firmware needs to be there for the calibration to take place. Here's a link to crunchgear.com on the device with the original press release:

http://www.crunchgear.com/2010/01/04/the-datacolor-spyder3hdmi-calibrates-your-hdtv-through-hdmi/

The trick is getting the set manufacturers to install the firmware. According to Randy, currently there are only two sets with the firmware installed.

INDEPENDENT AUDIT VERIFIES MORE THAN 126,000 INDUSTRY PROFESSIONALS AT THE 2010 INTERNATIONAL CES

 

World’s Largest Technology Tradeshow Posts Twelve Percent Attendance Growth

 

Arlington, Va., May 11, 2010 – The 2010 International CES® today announced that 126,641 industry professionals attended the tradeshow’s four-day run in Las Vegas, Nevada, January 7-10, a 12 percent increase in CES attendance from the previous year. An independent audit of the 2010 International CES, performed by Veris Consulting LLC, confirms CES’ status as the world’s largest consumer technology tradeshow and North America’s largest annual tradeshow of any kind.

 

Veris is certified by the Exhibition and Event Industry Audit Commission (EEIAC) to perform audits. As part of the Veris audit, each CES attendee is counted only once, and show size is calculated using only exhibit space actually sold, not hallways or bartered space.

 

“The CES was overflowing with innovative new products, and this audit proves that the 2010 International CES successfully attracted top executives, retail buyers, content providers, entertainment executives, venture capitalists, engineers, government officials and media from every corner of the world,” said Gary Shapiro, president and CEO, Consumer Electronics Association (CEA)®, producer of CES. “CES is also a must-attend global event as evidenced by our more than 24,000 international attendees.”

 

2,500 global companies, including a record 330 first time exhibitors, unveiled an estimated 20,000 new technology products across 1.4 million net square feet of exhibit space. More, 24,364 international attendees from 136 countries helped increase global attendance at CES by more than eight percent over last year. The top ten countries represented at CES are Canada, Korea, China, Japan, Mexico, United Kingdom, Taiwan, France, Brazil and Germany.

 

Senior-level executives and business decision makers continue to conduct business at CES. According to the Veris audit, 45 percent of all attendees were senior level executives, director level and above, on par with last year. Presidents, CEOs and/or business owners made up 20 percent of attendees. More than one third of all attendees are the final decision makers when it comes to new product purchases and partnerships within their organizations. More than 8,400 attendees represented companies with more than $500 million in total annual sales, nearly double the previous year.

 

The Veris audit also shows that CES attracts leaders from diverse business areas including entertainment, retail, education, engineering and venture capital. More than 12,000 retail buyers, 8,000 manufacturers and 3,000 engineers came to the 2010 CES along with more than 8,500 attendees from the software development/publishing, content development and entertainment industries, a 41 percent increase over last year.

 

Top government officials also attended the 2010 International CES. Policymakers from the U.S. House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate, the Department of Commerce, Federal Communications Commission (FCC), U.S. Department of Transportation and the U.S. Department of the Treasury were all present.

 

Every year, influential media and analysts attend the CES to report on the cutting-edge technologies and trends in consumer technology. The 2010 CES drew more than 5,000 press, bloggers and financial and industry analysts.

 

The CES audit provides absolute verification of exhibition records, including direct on-site observation, examination of registration systems and testing of attendee records. Post-show analysis included direct confirmation sampling, reconciliation of attendance lists, elimination of duplicate names and verification of demographic data with the source of documentation.

 

Final audit numbers may differ from estimates given on-site due to additional badge pick-ups and badge reader reports. This audit complies with the industry standards for audits adopted by both the Exhibition and Event Industry Audit Commission (EEIAC) and the International Association of Exhibition and Events (IAEE).

 

The 2011 International CES is scheduled to run January 6-9 in Las Vegas, Nevada.

 

Just received this today from CEA. Attendance was up 12% from 2009 which is a good sign for the industry. When you're at the show though it can be hard to judge how many people are there. Some areas of the convention center looked like Death Valley and the more popular booths had a population density of Hong Kong. One simple way to judge is by the lines at the restrooms. If there's a long queue for the loo, it's a good show.