Five Underappreciated Highlights of CES
Phil Lelyveld
Entertainment Technology Center
[Philip Lelyveld comment: we have the Vuzix Wrap in the 3D Lab]
[PC Mag]
Ultrabooks, tablets, and big displays dominated the 2012 International CES show last week, but buried by all the noise were a few other trends you might have missed.
Voice and Gesture Controls
Augmented Reality For Motor Vehicles
Pioneer was at the show with a heads-up display, designed to show things like driving directions and points of interests on a transparent screen visible while you continue to look straight at the road ahead. An earlier version was at last year’s show, but this year’s model looked smaller and closer to being a real product. A similar demo appeared in Mercedes-Benz’s Dynamic and Intuitive Control Experience, which also adds voice and gesture controls. The term “augmented technology” (AR) has been overused, but the idea of having the directions appear in front of you, instead of on a GPS off to the side, is quite interesting.
Other companies had neat AR demos as well, including Vuzix, which showed its Wrap 920AR eyewear—essentially glasses that show you 3D information.
Recon Instruments displayed its Android-based MOD Live system that uses GPS to display real-time location and speed inside your ski goggles. Bluetooth connects to a remote and your smartphone, so you can see caller ID or texts inside your goggles. This was also at last year’s show, but looks better now.
Faster Wired Connections
E-readers
Cloud Services
