Items tagged with CES2013
It’s a big day for Canonical, maker of Ubuntu; in addition to today being the official launch of the Ubuntu-optimized Steam for Linux client, the company announced that the Touch Developer Preview of Ubuntu for smartphones will be coming on February 21st (along with tools for flashing devices). It looks like you’ll need a Galaxy Nexus or Nexus 4 smartphone to take advantage. On its own, Ubuntu for smartphones looks terrific--the hands-on video we shot at CES can attest to that--but what’s even more compelling is that the same Ubuntu source code will underpin smartphones, tablets, and computers, as well as perhaps even TVs, thus offering a totally unified experience across multiple...
Read more...
CES is chock full of enough new products and technologies to make even the most cynical techie salivate, but as always, there are a handful of items that tend to rise to the top and stand out for being the best products of their kind or for true innovation. We thought we'd run down a short list of the stand-out products of this year's CES and highlight them here for the HOT hardware that they are. If you’re a gamer, you have to be pumped about this year’s CES. We know that a Steam console is in the works, and we got to feast our eyes on two terrific mobile gaming devices in the Razer Edge and NVIDIA’s Project SHIELD. SHIELD looks like a game controller enabled with a 5-inch...
Read more...
Like a siren song, In Win’s H-Frame and D-Frame open air cases called to us from across the show floor at CES. In Win’s booth was tucked away in a corner, which was a rather demure setting for the company’s sizzling cases. Specifically, the H-Frame and D-Frame cases pulled us in for a closer look. The H-Frame was a CES darling, and indeed it’s striking. It looks like one giant heat sink, which is essentially how the case was designed. It’s built from 11 parallel aluminum fins that help dissipate heat in tandem with the open air design of the chassis, and the silver-and-blue color scheme is svelte and striking. It has a single 5.25-inch bay, three 3.5-inch bays (one...
Read more...
Last week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas was arguably the most important one in Microsoft's history. Think about the circumstances: tablets and smartphones are getting the attention that desktops and notebooks once had, PC sales growth is down, and Windows 8 is an operating system for a new era, one in which Microsoft very much wants to be a part of. Why, then, didn't Microsoft make a bigger splash? It's a curious question, one that led the Associated Press to deem CES a "missed chance" for Microsoft to promote the heck out of all these new Windows 8 devices unveiled at the convention. CES was also a great opportunity to build solidarity between Microsoft and its hardware partners....
Read more...
CES is a blast in part because we get to see and touch exciting technology and amazing prototypes and grill companies in person about the latest rumors pertaining to their products. Yet for as exciting as all of that may be, it’s also a time for companies to simply look us in the eye and proudly show off their latest wares, whether they’re headline-grabbers or just solid updates to existing product lines. Dell fell into the latter camp this year for the most part, showing off their latest products to us away from the bustle of the show floor, at a quiet restaurant banquet room down the road. (We do enjoy pounding the pavement on the show floor, but it was nice to not have to shout...
Read more...
We’re hearing a lot of talk about mobile at CES, but we’re also seeing some great PC hardware, as well. Antec had some interesting products to show us on both fronts. The first product to catch our eye was the Antec GX700. Marketing Coordinator Justin Chou tells us Antec went out of its way to build an inexpensive, but high-quality chassis for DIYers who want to conserve budget dollars for other components like processors, motherboards, and graphics cards. The GX700 rings in at $59.99 and has good looking internal layout. For example, there’s a reasonable amount of room behind the mobo tray, and there are holes throughout the cases’ interior to help you tuck cables...
Read more...
Over the years, SanDisk has become best known as a supplier of flash memory cards and accessories. But the SanDisk folks we talked to at CES today say they'd really like to squeeze SSDs onto that list as well. In fact, SSDs were all they wanted to talk about at the show. And in terms of its specifications, their new consumer SSD, the SanDisk Ultra Plus, seems excellent. We'll need to test it before giving the Ultra Plus an official thumbs up or down, but CES is all about the quick take, so here's ours. The SanDisk Ultra Plus SSD comes in 64, 128, and 256GB flavors. Expected sequential read/write speeds for the 128GB version are 530MBps / 290MBps and random read/write speeds...
Read more...
Over the last few years, Rosewill has significantly expanded their product offerings. The company used to offer only a few PC-related accessories and cases, but now have everything from high-end power supplies to dedicated RAID enclosures in their product stack, with just about anything else you could imagine in-between. While gallivanting around CES, we had a quick meeting with the folks at Rosewill, just as they began setting up their suite. There weren’t many any new announcements, but we got to see the new Helios RK-9200 dual-LED mechanical keyboard first-hand along with the recently announced Throne full tower, in both white and black. The Rosewill Helios RK-9200 Dual-LED...
Read more...
Lian-Li has a wide selection of computer chassis available supporting virtually every size of motherboard imaginable, but the company is about to release many more. We swung by Lian-Li’s booth at CES to see what’s coming down the pike, and we ended up ogling a whole fleet of all-metal, intriguing cases. All of the cases we saw on display have the same basic look and design: they’re all black, with a brushed metal finish and gray metal interiors. That may sound somewhat dreary, but up close in person, it’s a striking and attractive look. Notably, there are no plastic parts on these cases; the Lian-Li brass reportedly won’t have it. Lian Li PC-V850 One of our favorites...
Read more...
It's a new year, which means you may very well be in the market for a new LCD. If you're a gamer, and you're in the market, BenQ's new RL2455HM may be worth a look. Launched at CES 2013, this LCD slots into the company's growing line of gaming monitors. It features a 1ms grey-to-grey response time, 2-watt stereo speakers, dual HDMI ports, as well as advanced custom settings, such as BenQ's Black eQualizer, Display Mode, and Smart Scaling to give players an edge over their opponents. The RL2455HM also features a 60Hz refresh rate tuned to match console video output for seamless connectivity, a 24-inch widescreen (16:9) full HD LED screen, LED backlighting, and a 12 million to 1 contrast ratio....
Read more...
We had a chance to swing by Roccat’s suite today to see their latest and greatest products including the company’s first mechanical keyboard, a Beta version of Power Grid, and a couple of mouse pads. First, we got to see the Ryos mechanical keyboard series. The Ryos MK keyboard features Cherry switches, 2MB of memory, and a 32-bit ARM Cortex M3 Processor. The Ryos MK is expected to be available in April for $99.99. The Ryos MK Pro also features Cherry switches and 2MB of memory, but this keyboard comes with two 32-bit Cortex processors. The MK Pro version will come with different color options—black, brown, red, and blue. It will also be available in April with a price of $149.99....
Read more...
While visiting LG's booth, we had a chance to see the company's latest OLED TVs. LG plans to ship its 55-inch OLED TV in March in the US. As you would expect from an OLED TV, it's absolutely gorgeous and pencil-thin. LG was also showing off its new 55-inch curved OLED TV known as the EA9800. The company wouldn't give us any information on shipping or availability regarding the EA9800. LG's OLED TVs are gorgeous and pencil-thin. As you can see from the photo, LG put three of these curved OLEDs side-by-side to create a nice, wide arc. The EA9800 offers full Cinema 3D support. Like other OLED TVs, the EA9800 offers a stunning picture that can only be truly appreciated in real life. Thanks...
Read more...
Micron on Thursday introduced its new M500 solid state drive (SSD) with terabyte-class capacity, an ultra-slim design, and increased response times compared to previous SSD products, all at an "affordable price point." The M500 SSD will be sold to consumers, businesses, and system builders under the Crucial brand, and to OEM customers under the Micron brand. So, how "affordable" is it? The 960GB M500 will initially sell for less than $600. That's a chunk of change, for sure, but well under a buck per gigabyte (62.5 cents per gigabyte, to be exact). Despite the high cost of entry for the flagship capacity, that's a pretty good value, as far as SSD pricing goes. Micron's SSD will also be available...
Read more...
OCZ used the Consumer Electronics Show to unveil their latest high-end solid state drive, the Vector PCI Express. As its name suggests, the Vector PCI Express leverages the same in-house developed Indilinx Barefoot 3 controller technology used in OCZ’s excellent Vector SATA III SSD (reviewed here), but the new drive attaches to a system via PCI Express. We posted news of OCZ’s initial announcement here, but have since been able to check it out in person and witness a few benchmark runs. A quick visual inspection of the OCZ Vector PCI Express reveals a pair of Barefoot 3 controllers on board, along with a boatload Intel NAND and Micron SDRAM cache. There is also a removable...
Read more...
Although Xi3 made CES headlines for other things this week, the company has some tasty wares to show off in the form of its unique modular computers, and we got a firsthand look. There are just a handful of models in the lineup thus far, but despite their small size, these machines pack a wallop. The X7A is the highest end unit in the group and should offer dual- or quad-core APUs (up to the 3.2GHz R-464L) with up to HD 7660G graphics (supporting a max resolution of 4096x2160) and 384 programmable cores. What sets Xi3’s computers apart is the modularity of the devices. Essentially, the motherboard is split into three smaller boards, each with a different purpose and set of chips. For example,...
Read more...
Although Canonical is still hunting for OEM partners to develop handsets for Ubuntu on smartphones, the OS is alive and well, running smooth and pretty on prototype handsets at CES 2013. The Canonical folks were kind enough to give us a demo, which you can see below: Note in particular the lack of any hardware button on this device; that’s on purpose, as Canonical wants Ubuntu to be a touch-only affair. Because there are no hardware partners on board yet (that we know of), the best we can do on specs is what Canonical says will be basic system requirements for entry-level and high-end phones. At the least, Ubuntu will need a dual-core Cortex A9 processor with at least 512MB of memory, and...
Read more...
Gigabyte gave us a tour of its new laptops, tablets, and everything in-between this week in Las Vegas. As with all of the big names at CES, Gigabyte is serious about getting touch screens on most devices running Windows 8 (with the exception of some of its heavy-duty gamer laptops - and even those will likely have touch down the road). One standout is the new Gigabyte S1185 tablet, which has an 11.6-inch full HD IPS display. Forget RT for this baby - the S1185 runs true Windows 8 on a third-gen Intel Core processor. Pair the tablet with the magnetic keyboard, and you have yourself a Windows 8 PC. Gigabyte also has itself a behemoth of a gaming laptop. The Gigabyte P2742G...
Read more...
We spent some time with representatives from Intel at the Consumer Electronics show and saw a couple of interesting demos in action. In addition to announcing that 7W Ivy Bridge-based processors are coming down the pipeline, Intel was touting the low power characteristics and efficiency of its current Clover Trail Atom processors, which are featured in a number of Windows 8 tablets. Intel is on a mission to rebut the notion that ARM-based processors are more power efficient than Intel’s. In one demo, Intel had wired up a number of sensors to the batteries on a quartet of tablets to monitor power consumption in real-time. Two of the tablets (a Samsung ATIV and Dell XPS 10) were built...
Read more...
We took a close-up gander at some of MSI's new laptops this week at CES and two caught our eye. The MSI GT70 Dragon Edition is turning heads (and snagged a CES Innovations award) for its bright-red chassis, which sports dragon engravings. The $2699 system has a 17.3-inch, 1920x1080 screen and boasts an Intel Core i7-3630QM processor. Other features to note include Nvidia GeForce GTX 680M graphics, as well as Killer technology for wireless (N1202) and LAN (E2200). Another standout is the MSI Quadro Workstation which is targeted at business users and students involved in 3D design and animation. (The laptop was running AutoCAD for our demo.) As you might have guessed, the laptop runs Nvidia...
Read more...
It's easy to see why T-Mobile USA appointed John Legere as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of its business unit back in September of last year. He's a charismatic dude, and if T-Mobile didn't snag him, Comedy Central might have. That's the impression you get after listening to him lambast AT&T and other wireless competitors. Legere didn't pull many punches at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, calling AT&T's 3G network "crap" before laying into Sprint and Verizon. "Does anyone use AT&T in New York City?," Legere asked the audience at CES, according to PCMag.com "Is anyone satisfied with their service? Of course not. The network's crap." He later backpedaled by refuting...
Read more...
Plenty of folks thought that Razer was blowing smoke when it announced that it was developing a high end gaming tablet, dubbed Project Fiona, at last year’s CES. A year later, lo and behold, the company has a whole booth full of them at CES 2013. And the device is gorgeous. After garnering loads of input from actual PC gamers, Razer put together what is, in the most basic sense, a 10.1-inch tablet, albeit one loaded with high-end hardware and also essentially a Windows 8 PC and a portable gaming console, all wrapped up in one device. There are two models slated for release in Q1, with the base model set for a price tag of $999. The Razer Edge Pro Before we get into the specs, here’s...
Read more...
While at MSI’s suite today, we had the chance to get some hands on time with the company’s latest ultrabook convertible, the Slider S20. Announced late last week, this ultrabook is set to be available later this month with a price tag of $1,199.99. Key specifications and features include Windows 8 along with an Intel Core i5 processor, 1920x1080 HD IPS 10-point touchscreen, 8GB of DDR3 memory, and a 128GB SSD. This ultrabook weighs in at 2.2 pounds and measures less than 1 inch thick. As you’ll see in the video below, the Slider S20 has two USB 3.0 ports, miniHDMI, headphone, LAN, and volume controls. The sliding mechanism is nice and smooth, and you can tilt the...
Read more...
