CES 2016

If there’s one thing we know for sure about an Ultra HD broadcast standard, it’s that its still under development. But will TV stations really end up broadcasting 4K-resolution programming? Will the average viewer even care?

Synology makes network attached storage (NAS) servers. If your home entertainment life revolves solely around media you can stream—or you store you entire life in the cloud (on someone else’s remote server)—it’s unlikely you’ll have need of a NAS server. On the other hand, if you have thousands of digital images, movies, and songs in your collection, and you’d like to have easy access to them, a NAS server is one of the most essential digital storage components you can have. Fortunately for people with lots of files to store but not so much money, Synology introduced the DiskStation DS416j—a 4-bay NAS device the company has designed for home and small office use and budgets.

At first glance, I thought the folks at BeON Home must have a hole in their collective heads for promoting LED lights with holes in the middle of them. The BeON bulbs are smart bulbs, too, but with a difference. Can’t these guys do anything normal?

Sure, you might think that 8 million pixels of glorious UHD, 4K video would be the height of pristine image quality on its own without any room or need for improvement, but DarbeeVision would beg to differ. At CES the company demonstrated the improvement that could be had when true 4K images are processed and enhanced with the company’s proprietary Visual Presence DVP processing.

LG made a bold statement with its Signature model and other OLED TVs at CES, but it isn’t the only company hawking the technology. A surprisingly small A/V product showcase in Panasonic’s booth featured the company’s forthcoming 65CZ950 OLED UHDTV.

Chinese TV makers are all over CES showing sets with the same high-end tech that Korean and Japanese companies are touting. While some companies — HiSense, for example — will sell those models through outlets familiar to U.S. consumers like Best Buy, others like Konka have no plans to ship their premium models to these shores.