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Why Chinese tech giants could surprise you at CES 2015
The spotlight doesn't often fall on the lesser-known Chinese-speaking (both mainland and Taiwanese) companies that set up booth space each January at CES. But if you do pay close attention to their yearly reveals, you'll often find some of the show's more interesting gadgets. Brands like ASUS and Lenovo (among many others) have a knack for either inventing new device categories or pushing the limits of existing formulas. They virtually define the landscape for hybrid PCs, and they're often willing to stretch the boundaries of smartphones, wearables and TVs. In anticipation of the coming CES, we attempt to gauge just what each of these major Chinese-language players will bring to Las Vegas in 2015. But first, let's indulge in a little history lesson.
With webOS and wearables, LG's moving beyond just displays at CES
Samsung and Sony may grab a larger share of the CES fanfare, but don't count LG out. It has quite the annual presence in Las Vegas, too. The Korean company uses the tech industry's January soiree as the backdrop for a wide selection of product reveals -- everything from wearables to smartphones to 4K TVs -- and it has a sizable booth to house it all. It's almost a given that LG will offer up improvements to more of the same at this CES. But before we try to gauge what the company may have in store for 2015, let's first take a look at how far LG's come.
How Samsung became the king of CES and where it's going next
Long before Transformers director Michael Bay choked onstage at Samsung's lavish CES 2014 press conference, the Korean company was just another electronics outfit begging for attention. But after decades at CES, Samsung is now the undisputed king of the show. Its blowout media events are the largest and most difficult to get into. Samsung Electronics CEO BK Yoon is kicking off the show next month by hosting the prestigious opening keynote. And it's one of the few tech giants left standing at CES, as Microsoft and others abandon it. Samsung's glorious rise mirrors its ascent in the mobile industry, and it's also yet another example of the company's oft-repeated formula for success: Time, money and perseverance lead to victory.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Tablets
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. Tablets: the other living room screen. For a category that was once regarded as an odd-duck luxury for the early adopter, 2012 certainly saw the portable computing tech grow closer to becoming a true laptop alternative. With an ever-increasing number of high-resolution displays, faster multi-core processors, a range of form factors and varied price points, it seems there's now a tab for just about everyone. So while last January's CES brought us news of 1,920 x 1,200 screens, quad-core CPUs and a proliferation of Android Ice Cream Sandwich offerings, the year ahead aims to take that same tack and turn it up a few notches. That said, don't expect this upcoming CES to play host to a glut of next-gen tablet reveals -- from what we gather, many major manufacturers are holding off for Mobile World Congress 2013's more focused global stage.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Household
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. Last year, we saw the likes of Motorola, LG and Samsung continue to demonstrate their technical skills on washing machines, fridges, home automation and even cars. While some Engadget editors struggled to see even half the appeal of those WiFi-connected washing machines at CES 2012, Motorola's Connected Home gateway showed a realistic vision of how a wireless home should work, with its gateway router tying your Android devices to your thermostat, security system and lighting. However, we haven't heard much since January from Motorola when it comes to its household system, so it wouldn't surprise us if the Google-owned manufacturer has a refreshed, possibly deeper system to show us this time. But what else will the middle of Nevada have to offer the forward-looking homemaker in the next year? We have more ideas after the break.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Gaming
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. Gaming and CES are estranged partners -- CES spawned the annual Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3 for short) way back in 1995, after gaming exhibitors required more space than CES could offer. As such, the game industry's presence at CES is ... well, there isn't much of a presence to speak of. Smart, smaller companies have traditionally taken good advantage of this; CES 2012 featured the unveiling of the Wikipad and Razer's Project Fiona, while Gaikai gave us our first hands-on with its LG-based game streaming service. As for the big three console manufacturers? Nintendo gave press another chance to check out the Wii U, but it was nothing more than the E3 demo many had seen months earlier.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Displays
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. Looking for what's going to be new in home theaters for CES 2013 is largely a good news / bad news situation. The bad news? The list of tech we're expecting to see (Ultra HD -- aka 4K / 8K, OLED, connected TV and second-screen interaction) is almost an exact mirror of the high-profile launches from last year's show. The good news, however, is that there are plenty of reasons to be optimistic that this is the year we'll actually see the technology become available and / or more useful in our daily lives.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Digital Cameras
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. Las Vegas has seen its fair share of digital camera launches, but with the PMA show all but defunct, manufacturers are shifting their focus to overseas events, like Photokina in Cologne, IFA in Berlin and even newcomer CP+ in Yokohama, Japan. That trade show trio helps to keep the international airlines in business, but it doesn't do us much good at CES, when nearly every other consumer electronics category gets a major products boost. That's not to say there won't be any new cameras at all -- PMA does have a small presence at the show, and major players like Canon, Nikon, Samsung and Sony all invest in significant floor space (they'll need some new products to fill their shelves, after all). But announcements are largely spread throughout the year.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Autos
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. We love CES for many things, but primarily we're there for the gadgets -- the phones, the tablets, the laptops and even the HDTVS, plus all the random stuff we find on the show floor that defies polite categorization. Lately, though, we've come more and more to love CES for something else: cars. It's become a bit of a must-attend event for auto lovers too, with more and more major manufacturers showing up each year, rolling out their high-tech wares to show the industry just how well they're keeping in touch with the broader world of tech.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview
The sudden rush of device announcements and hands-on posts that come with the advent of each CES can feel a bit overwhelming if you don't know what to expect. And while we can't predict what's to come with unfailing precision, we're more than happy to give you an idea of what's on our radar this time around. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. The road to CES 2013 starts here, so go on and click the available category links after the break and stay tuned for more.
Engadget's CES 2013 Preview: Audio
With CES looming like an electrically charged storm of news and announcements, it's time for us to give you our best bets on what you'll see come January. During the month of December, we'll bring you a series of CES preview posts, forecasting what you can expect when the news deluge begins. For more of what's to come, check out our hub. Audio companies tend to march to their own drumbeats when it comes to new goods, but CES usually brings us a few crowd pleasers. We saw a bigger push for wireless at CES 2011 with the onset of AirPlay adoption and further dives into Bluetooth-equipped wares. Since then, nothing too exciting has shown up at the event, with companies focusing on expanding and evolving their existing product lines. While it's hard to know for sure, we don't expect to see anything that'll be exceptionally innovative on a widespread scale -- mostly. Naturally, you can count on a bigger assortment of wireless solutions, and likely the first big showing of the end of days for the speaker dock -- excluding anything that Apple's Lightning connector might make its way onto. Still, the idea of the dock can live on with additions like Qi inductive charging, as we've seen from the likes of JBL and TDK already. The appearance of still more celebrity-endorsed headphones is certainly something to expect as well, even if the trend has already jumped the shark -- don't tell Fiddy. That said, major companies like Sennheiser have joined the headphone bandwagon in their own ways, and we are likely to see more cans in the $100 to $400 range with street-focused looks and audiophile DNA. Of course, CES also sets aside a chunk of space in the LVCC for those into HiFi audio, with many boutique brands showing off their latest and best -- usually with price tags to make your wallet cringe. What has us really excited, though? We're hearing talk that transparent speaker technology is poised to make a comeback. Imagine the shell of your tablet, smartphone or laptop also serving as an essentially invisible speaker. Aside from the prospect of even svelter devices, the tech has the potential to sound miles better than the tinny-sounding speaker drivers most of our gadgets currently use. One thing is for sure, much of what we'll see will be in the early stages of development -- even products that seem ready to roll have taken more than six months to hit retail in the past. Aside from all that, stay patient, because sometimes surprises come when we least expect them. Darren Murph contributed to this post.
We're live from CES 2012!
We've landed in Vegas, just in time to enjoy the proverbial calm before the storm that will be the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show. Motorized carts zoom around the parking lot as the Las Vegas Convention Center begins to take shape -- as always, getting the million-dollar-booths fully dressed before the curtain comes up next week seems an impossible task, but the crews will come through, making the finished product a far-cry from what we see today. And as exciting as it can be to roam the halls of the LVCC and surrounding venues during the show, the pageantry of CES is really about the products, including many of which we haven't heard so much as a peep about in the weeks leading up to the show. But as the booths inside will remain veiled until company heads have a chance to brief attendees, a few hints have begun popping up outside the convention center, as workers hang sponsored banners above and along the massive entranceways. Some of these product hints serve to confirm previous rumors, so join us past the break for an early look at what's to come.
Engadget's CES 2012 Preview
Though the holidays are once again coming to a close, we now find ourselves just a week away from every geek's ultimate holiday -- the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show, arguably the biggest event of the year for the tech world. Thousands of companies gather in the Nevada desert to show off their latest innovations, setting the stage for what will no doubt be another stellar year in electronics. In anticipation of the onslaught we're about to experience, we want to offer up our predictions of what you can expect at the show. There's always a few wondrous surprises that nobody could ever see coming -- part of what makes CES fun -- but aside from those jaw-dropping moments, we have a pretty solid idea of what will take place next week. So join us as we break down CES 2012, one category at a time.
