CES 2014

At Intel’s packed press conference earlier this afternoon, Mooly Eden, senior vice president, general manager of Perceptual Computing Group, announced Intel’s new RealSense technology. The new technology is designed to bring “human-like senses to Intel-based devices” through a variety of software and hardware products developed by Intel and collaborating companies...

Paris-based KEEKER was one of more than a dozen participants using an appearance at ShowStoppers LaunchIt Power Session at CES2014 to give the company’s pitch for higher-level funding and partnerships to a panel of judges. KEEKER is part mobile computer, part robot, part home entertainment system, and part security system. It looks a bit like a large, 16-inch wide by 25-inch tall egg on wheels; and it contains a built-in projector, 360-degree sound system, and a lot more. It’s either one of the silliest ideas here at CES2014, or it’s going to be a paradigm breaker. For example, one of the benefits touted in the brief pitch session was the ability of KEEKER to bring the TV to the viewer, rather than force the viewer to sit passively in front of the traditional “black box” TV set. The built-in projector can be used to display an image on any wall or ceiling. Since KEEKER is on a motorized, wheeled platform, it can be instructed to move anywhere in your home – displaying the news on the wall in your dining room, for example, and then rolling into your bedroom and shining a late-night TV show on the ceiling. (Or substitute a variety of viewing situations and content based on your own experiences.) In fact, later in the day, KEEKER was out and about in the hotel hallways displaying video on the vaulted ceiling above. KEEKER is shooting for a release date of sometime in the fourth quarter of 2014 with a tentative selling price of $5,000.

The CES can be exhausting. After awhile, after thousands of linear feet of aisles, the products start to blur. The only products that stand out are the brightly colored ones. Oh! What’s this? The Solemate Mini. Small, cute, wireless. And, it's BRIGHT YELLOW.

With the major cold spell that recently blast-chilled the country, things like keeping your house and feet warm seem less like a luxury and more like an essential means of survival. Nuheat is North Americas’ leader in electric floor heating systems, and this week they announced the industry’s first WiFi thermostat for floor heating, the Nuheat Signature.

In Japanese, “oto” means “sound.” At Leon Speakers, Horizon OTO is the name of the company’s latest soundbar, which is custom tailored to match the finish and width of any TV between 38 and 65 inches. Introduced at 2014 CES, OTO finesses six drivers—four 3-inch aluminum woofers and two cloth-dome tweeters—in a svelte MDF cabinet less than 2 inches deep; the drivers are arranged in left- and right-channel woofer-tweeter-woofer complements and powered by a 2 x 50-watt amplifier.

In addition to onboard Dolby Digital processing, OTO has a front-panel touch screen for easy control, optical and stereo analog inputs, and a wireless subwoofer output. OTO is priced at $2,895 or you can pair it with the optional Aaros A8-400 wireless subwoofer, featuring an 8-inch woofer and 400 watts of power, for $4,000.

LG isn’t just talking HDTV picture quality this year. Like other manufacturers, it’s now it’s into everything but the kitchen sink—actually they may be into that as well. In any event, if you can plug it in or it runs on batteries, LG probably makes it.

Even in TV, various forms of Smart TV and how they can light up your life are front and center this year with every TV maker. But quality HDTV and Ultra HD are my beats today and I’m sticking to them.