Sign up for the FREE Tell Membership and receive benefits that include the digital edition of Tell Magazine sent straight to your inbox, product giveaways, coupons and much more!
Sign up for the FREE Tell Membership and receive benefits that include the digital edition of Tell Magazine sent straight to your inbox, product giveaways, coupons and much more!
Although I wouldn’t exactly call myself a fan of Vegas, I did prefer waking up to out-of-place palm trees and relative warmth as opposed to the eleven-degree frigidity we enjoyed in ice-encrusted Connecticut this morning. Brr.
I’ll probably post a final CES report later today or tomorrow, but here now is my third product round-up for CES 2009, in no particular order:
RealDVD – Although I only expected to hear whispers of it in the dark and shadowy back alleys of the Las Vegas Convention Center, Real Networks’ legally-entrenched RealDVD product was on prominent display in the Real booth this year. If you haven’t heard of it before now, RealDVD is a computer software application which allows you to save a copy of your DVD to your hard drive – not unlike the "Digital Copy" version found on select DVDs and Blu-ray Discs. Last year when Real began selling the program, the Hollywood studios promptly rallied together and took legal action forcing Real to take the application off the market; this is precisely what happened to the DVD X Copy program a few years back. However, unlike DVD X Copy, RealDVD does not allow consumers to strip away a disc’s anti-piracy security layer or unwanted content such as menus, the FBI warning, etc. What you get is an exact copy of what the studios encoded on disc. Also, RealDVD does not allow you to burn a physical copy of the "saved DVD" nor can you share the file with others. After spending a few minutes with it, the software appears to be rather slick and it’s incredibly easy to use. You can bet more than a few folks will be interested to see what happens at the preliminary injunction hearing, currently scheduled for March. You can read more about the RealDVD case here.
Eviant - Taking a page from Samsung’s "Touch of Color" play book, upstart TV maker Eviant had a modest booth featuring a rainbow assortment of vividly-colored small screen LCDs. Available in black, white, pink, red, green and blue, models in Eviant’s "Sheet" series are ATSC-compatible and can display signals ranging from 480i through 1080i via several connection options, including HDMI. On display were 10, 13 and 19-inch models, with some featuring a side-mounted, slot-loading DVD player. The picture quality on display wasn’t particularly noteworthy, but the size and color options do present an aesthetically appealing alternative for the kitchen or the bedroom.
Road Mice – OK, now here’s a product that’s just plain cool. It’s probably not going to win any awards and it’s hardly revolutionary – but that doesn’t make it any less fun. So just what exactly is a Road Mouse? Quite simply, it’s a car-shaped computer mouse. While that may not sound terribly exciting, car aficionados will love these accurately-detailed mice designed to look like select Chrysler, Chevy and Ford hot rods. If you have a Chevy Camaro, Ford Mustang or Dodge Charger fanatic in your family, I can’t think of a better gift idea. Road Mice feature your standard right and left mouse buttons and they comprise the vehicle "hood," complete with a backlit scroll wheel. The icing on the cake? The corresponding headlight glows with each button click. Each mouse comes with a USB receiver for wireless operation so there are no ugly wires to take away from the sight of a sexy Camaro parked on your mouse pad. A Road Mouse will set you back $45 and they’re available online and at select retailers.
TiVo – The DVR pioneers at TiVo didn’t have new hardware to talk about, but they were delighted to show off the new Tivo Search interface, currently in its Beta release. Designed from the ground up to leverage widescreen, high definition displays, TiVo Search takes full advantage of the added screen real estate and gives you more useful information than ever before. Unlike its "Swivel Search" predecessor, TiVo Search allows you to enter any letter or word from a TV show or movie to find what you’re looking for – acting much like an internet search engine. Also welcome is the new "Episode Guide" which neatly organizes and displays what’s available – new and old – for a particular series. The "Discovery Bar" is another worthy addition, providing fast and easy access to movie and TV series recommendations based on your current query. When you add in YouTube and broadband video recommendations plus loads of pretty graphics and a built-in priority for high def programming, TiVo owners have plenty to be excited about. Or, they could do something more pressing now and save that excitement for later – when it’s more convenient.
More to come…
Related Posts