[CES 2010] On The Ground At CES 2010 – What’s Buzzin’ ?

By David Ponce

So here we are in North America’s largest convention, and we’re getting ready to die, one footstep at a time to bring you news on the hottest tech for 2010. CES proper doesn’t start until Thursday, but there’s plenty of previews and other pre-show events to keep us busy until then. One of the first of these is CES Unveiled.

So what are some of the early trends we’re seeing this year?

3D TVs
It’s sadly looking like manufacturers are still trying to jumpstart this technology. Several manufacturers, like Panasonic and LG were showing off their early prototypes in the hopes of impressing us. To be honest, we’re not. Maybe time will prove us wrong but the market isn’t ready for 3D, Avatar be damned. We’ve barely managed to get people to switch to HD, it’ll be a while before they can be convinced to upgrade to a set that requires viewers to don special glasses and for which there is barely any content. Maybe one day, but not yet.

Media Players
Plenty of set top boxes that promise to send your digital media files right to your TV. Be it pictures, music, or video of varying formats. The most notable of these is the Boxee Box, but there’s also PopBox (we weren’t impressed) and Seagate’s FreeAgent Theater (clunky interface).

eBook Readers
We’re thinking the Kindle’s got this part of the industry rollin’, because there were a bunch of eBook readers at Unveiled. There was the Irex and the Alex, though we suspect there will be plenty more on the actual show floor.

Of course there were plenty of other things, and we’ll get to the most interesting bits in the coming hours. For now, we’re jetlagged and hitting the sack to recharge for the week ahead.

Wish us luck!