Intel dedicated part of its booth at CES to mobile Wi-Fi personal area networking (PAN). The idea is simple, Wi-Fi enabled components speak to each other using an ad hoc network without the need for a router.

The idea seems promising. Intel had a pair of Wi-Fi headphones that supposedly worked with the computer there. There were also a pair of Wi-Fi speakers under the display table that are not out yet. The PAN would work similarly to pairing your Bluetooth headset with your phone using a personal identification number. That would avoid people just randomly joining your PAN and hijacking your speakers or headphones.

Gadgetell recently got to play with an IPEVO digital picture frame, the Kaleido R7. Now, I am the guy who wrote a post denouncing digital picture frames as a pointless technology. IPEVO changed my mind.

Digital picture frames have gone through a couple of styles. It started off with toyish plastic borders and eventually moved into looking like traditional picture frames with slim borders. IPEVO decided to come up with its own design.

Looking like it belongs in a movie that is set in the future, the IPEVO is slick looking with its two-toned color scheme and flat buttons.

Shortly before CES, Canon unveiled almost a dozen new camcorders. They all were on display at CES and Gadgetell played with some of them.

Virtually all of the HD consumer camcorder line can now record in a 24Mbps mode called MXP. Why does this matter? The higher the bitrate, the higher the quality of video. If you’re a video podcaster or just like making movies, this stuff matters to you. The tape-based HV40 records in 25Mbps in HDV format.

Click for a larger image. SanDisk showed off its newest products, slotRadio and its one-touch backup USB drive, at that tiny event known as CES. No one at SanDisk would give information about what compression is used on the slotRadio microSD cards that hold 1000 songs, but they had listening stations so you could hear more »

Chumby may be working with Samsung and Sony, but it doesn’t look like they’re expanding their line up any time soon. The smallish Chumby booth had rows of picture frame like devices running the open Chumby operating system. These devices were shown because Chumby is fishing for partners.

These were reference designs for other manufacturers to buy things. When I arrived, one company was very curious about what the Chumby could do.

The Sony product that ran Chumby was a design study and was not necessarily a product yet. We’ll get you more information on the Sony/Chumby relationship soon.

Fulton Innovation brought its ecoupled wireless charging system to CES. While a competitor showed marketable products, Fulton showed working models but no finished products with release dates.

The booth simulated a home with an office, a living room, and a kitchen so a consumer or manufacturer could see how the system could be used in everyday life. On display was a modded iPhone, a Nintendo Wii remote, a remote control, a blender, several other cell phones, a laptop charger, and a portable tool chest.

We’ve told you about Hava before. It allows you to placeshift your television kind of like Slingbox. Monsoon Multimedia’s Hava goes well beyond Slingbox with its latest offerings. Media Center integration First off, the Hava integrates with Windows Media Center. The plugin tricks Media Center into thinking that your Hava feed is a TV tuner, more »

As you can image, we are prone to hearing about ever single new home media networking hard drive and back-up solution that is released onto the market. But what I saw at Iomega really impressed me (and Doug). The new Home Media Network Hard Drive provides a super easy-to-use network storage for your home. To get going all you need to do is plug in the devise to a power adaptor and a ethernet cord (which should be connected to your router). You then go through a very basic install wizard on your computer and you can begin playing back your pictures, videos and music from almost any other device, including game consoles (Xbox 360 and PS3), digital picture frames or networked TVs. There is also a USB slot on the back so you can share a printer over your home network as well. Plus, the unit backups your computer (PC or Mac) automatically — it can even be synced with two computers. Seriously, this could not get any easier. They plan to add a bunch of features in the coming months such as remote access over the net. It is available now in 500GB ($179) and 1TB ($249) options.

Click for a larger image. Geotagging is something plenty of people do their photos. Putting the data of where and when your photos were taken can be bothersome, so ATP has a solution with its PhotoFinder series. PhotoFinder allows for geotagging without a computer. The PhotoFinder mini is a two part machine. You carry around more »

If the Powermat wireless charging system lives up to its claims, Powermat is going to be huge. The idea is simple, just place a device like a phone on a Powermat and your phone is charged. There is no need for lots of wires or numerous power adapters; you just need a mat and a device. We’ve got a huge photo gallery on this one.

The walk through of the product was fantastic. Powermat had actual working versions of their product. The first thing to see was the iPhone in a sleek case atop a white mat.