CES 2010 Thoughts
With this year’s CES wrapping up tomorrow, I thought I’d take a few minutes to point out a few things about the announced products. Not everything that was shown off will make it to market, and that’s probably for the best.
There are too many eBook readers. Not only are there too many in general, but there are a number of companies with different types of e-inks and screens that are just different enough to annoy the public in having to try and figure out which one is the “best”. With that, most of the off-brand readers don’t have an easy way to acquire content, which is probably the biggest reason they’ll fail. Obviously, the Nook and Kindle are manufactured by major retailers, and a few of them are being supported by either Barnes & Noble or Borders. Definitely in their best interests. The ones who are trying to blur the line between tablet PC and eBook reader, in my opinion, are making a mistake. Do something well, or don’t do it at all. To be sure, at least one or two of these manufacturers has a chance to wrap up the “cheap” market, but more than likely, that honor will be bestowed upon a brand like Insignia or Dynex, since Best Buy can just stack the shelves with them for the uninformed customer.
Almost every tablet PC that was showcased appears headed for failure before they even get to market. The only differences between the tablets of 2010 and the tablets of 2003 is processor speed, lack of a stylus, more variety in screen sizes, and operating systems. It really just boils down to small PCs with Windows 7 or Android on them. To say nothing about Chrome OS due out later this year. As I said about eBook readers, do something well, or don’t do it at all. There were a few form factors that looked halfway interesting, but I don’t think this attitude of “Hey, Apple’s going to release a tablet so we better take the keyboard off our laptop and make it touchscreen too” is going to do any good for anyone…except Apple. I may sound like a fanboy, and I can be to a point, but the thing that I assume Apple is going to do is make their product different enough that the new functionality is cool enough to justify a second or third computer for $1,000 just to consume media content on.
Pocket projectors are a joke for regular consumers. I’m not sure if they plan to market these devices, or cell phones with projector capabilities to people like me, but they’re wasting their time if they do.
3D TV will be a hit, but only because they’re going to force it on us. My problem with 3D programs in general is that I have to take off my glasses to use their glasses. That makes everything blurry. It’s also somewhat gimmicky. I would prefer to have them keep working on tech to improve contrast, energy consumption, and connectedness. Oh, and screen size. That industry knows it’s getting to the point where the difference between 480 hz and 120 hz is not going to be noticeable enough to justify these new costs. So, they figure 3D will sell more TVs. So they’re going to make us watch it, and like it. But I’ll be fighting it all the way. Plus, extra glasses are rumored to be over $100 a pair! How will that go over when you invited 7 friends over for the Superbowl…?
Laptops with processors that aren’t Intel or AMD are just going to confuse consumers. I’m a tech guy and now that people are going to start to ask me if they should buy a laptop with a Tegra 2 processor vs an Atom processor is not going to be an easy conversation to have.
I don’t think a single handset manufacturer did any actual innovation. We may be getting to a point where the mobile phone industry enters another period of lack of innovation. Other than upgraded processors and 5 megapixel cameras, what else is actually new an interesting out there? I guess the next push will be the wireless TV standard and how to monetize that with the best resolution.
I’m still not impressed with TV connected digital media players. Until we can get all the networks together, I don’t care about subscribing to Revision3 or watching YouTube videos. And Hulu is still not officially supported on any of them – which will probably get tossed out now that Comcast owns them anyway.
DLNA is starting to show promise. It might be another year or two, but this could be the future for cable providers.
Wireless HD should be getting more attention. And while a few companies are working on innovating with that, they really should develop a standard and get that whole process going. I have way too many cables in my entertainment center.
All in all, I feel disappointed at what’s been showcased and announced. Heck, even Microsoft whiffed on everything except the Mediaroom 2.0 (which could be good).
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