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BlackBerry's first tablet in years is a secure Galaxy Tab S
BlackBerry's first experience with tablets was more than a little traumatic, but it hasn't completely given up on the idea. The company's SecuSmart wing has teamed up with IBM to launch the SecuTablet, an extra-secure version of Samsung's Galaxy Tab S 10.5. Reportedly, the slate's included security bundle prevents sensitive data from falling into the wrong hands while allowing personal apps. Yes, you can watch YouTube on the same device that carries your classified documents. You aren't likely to find this in stores (certainly not at its $2,380 price) as a result, but ongoing German government tests hint that you may well see it in the field -- and there's a real chance that it will outlive its ill-fated predecessor.
Your polystyrene dreams can come true with an industrial robot arm
If you've been waiting to command a giant robot arm to do your artistic bidding, Robochop is here and it'll let you hack (or delicately sculpt) your own custom design from a 50-centimeter cube of "durable foam". You (or people visiting the robot arms in person) will be able to design and create a piece of furniture through a web app that will go live online at Code-n.org from March 15. More than the polystyrene creations themselves, the appeal lies in the spectacle of seeing a giant industrial robot cut away with a hot wire cutting tool: four arms will be slicing their way through 2,000 yellow blocks at Hanover's CeBIT tech show next month.
Farewell, CeBIT 2014
CeBIT 2014 is done, and it's high time that we say goodbye to the Hannover Messe. Of course, much of CeBIT's thunder has been stolen by Mobile World Congress and IFA, but given the interesting products that we've stumbled upon here, there's clearly still some life in the show. We hope that you enjoyed our efforts, and if you missed any of the news or hands-ons, grab a champagne-flavored ice cream (yes, really) and check out the unabridged list below.
When you cram an entire smartphone into a watch, you get the Exetech XS-3
Most smartwatches act as a secondary display for your phone, but there's a select few, like the Neptune Pine, that just want to replace it altogether. It's in this latter category that you'll find the chunky Exetech XS-3: a watch that stands almost two centimeters tall from your wrist. Wrapped in plastic and attached to a heavy-duty rubber strap, the hardware looks tougher than it really is. There's no back cover other than the battery itself, which is exposed to the elements and leaves us concerned as to how sweat-resistant (let alone rain-resistant) this device will be. In any case, it's with the internals and software that things start to get interesting, because the XS-3 comes pretty close to replicating every major function of a smartphone.
Power strips don't have to be ugly, just ask Powerdrobe
Yes, power strips aren't the sort of thing we usually discuss on this august periodical but sometimes we spot something at a trade show that simply demands attention. Normally, it's the sort of gear that you tuck behind or under your desk, but Korean designer Sangki Kim wanted to make something a little more stylish. That's why he built the Powerdrobe: a box that sits beneath your display (or all-in-one) to keep everything nice and tidy. Kim, who also designed the Desk Phone Dock we reviewed a few years ago, gave the box a classy rounded look and chrome toggle switches, so turning on your computer makes you feel like you work at NASA, circa 1965. On one side of the unit, there's a pair of USB ports for charging mobile devices, while on the other side you'll find either a US or European mains socket, depending on which version you buy. The back offers up either four or six further mains sockets to satisfy your lust for power, with all the mess hidden behind a solid plastic screen. The four-socket model will arrive in April and set you back $40, with the bigger unit coming later and costing a few dollars more.
An e-reader that makes calls: InkPhone promises two weeks on a charge
When we reviewed the dual-screen YotaPhone, some of you thought it'd have been better if the device simply skipped the LCD and relied on a single E Ink display instead. Well, that's exactly the approach taken by Onyx (via its Polish distributor, Arta Tech) which is showing off a prototype of the MIDIA InkPhone here at CeBIT. Packing a 4.3-inch front-lit E Ink display (no LCD here), the device is designed as a back-to-basics device for people who need really long battery life or simply those who are looking for an e-reader that can also make calls. Part of the appeal, of course, is that E Ink displays sip power, and the company promises that the InkPhone will last for more than two weeks on a single charge of its 1,800mAh battery.
Fujitsu's latest all-in-ones don't need to be turned off
With all of the talk surrounding smartphones and tablets, it's sometimes easy to forget that desktops still occupy most of our working days. Fujitsu hasn't forgotten them, however, and is wheeling out a pair of all-in-one units that'll accompany you on the 9-to-5. The Esprimo X923 comes with a 23-inch 1,920 x 1,080 IPS LCD and a wide variety of build-to-order options, including a choice of Core i3 - i7 CPUs, HDD or SSD and up to 16GB RAM. It's so far, so Fujitsu, but the company is also trumping low power active mode, a sleep state that'll keep the hardware on and connected to your network, but drawing so little power that you don't actually need to turn it off. The other model that's been outed today is the X923-T, which, as you can guess, is exactly the same as the 923, but with a touchscreen. Both are available from today, so it's high time that you started sending flattering emails to your company's purchasing manager.
Fujitsu's palm-scanning laptops won't be fooled by severed limbs
For all the popularity of fingerprint scanners, Fujitsu believes that it can go one better. The Japanese company has been working on palm-based systems for the last few years, and we've already seen turnstiles, wallets and tablets that are accessed from your hand. Fujitsu believes that palm vein sensing is around a thousand times more secure than conventional biometric methods and it's implementing the technology in its next range of business-focused laptops due out this week. We've been shown around some of these models, which have the new sensor fitted into an area that is roughly the same size and position as the company's existing fingerprint scanners, just below the bottom right corner of the keyboard. Using it is simple: Hold your hand a few inches above the sensor and the hardware will quickly scan the unique arrangement of your veins. If it judges you to be the real deal, it'll open up its secrets for your enjoyment.
We're here at CeBIT 2014!
If you don't count IFA, and for this week at least, we don't, then CeBIT is our favorite German tech show. It may be aimed squarely at business and infrastructure types, but we live in hope that there's some gems lurking between the server racks and point of sale units. Hannover's Deutsche Messe is currently full of burly scene-movers and covered by a hazy cloud of sawdust and smoke, but by Monday, it'll become one of the world's biggest trade shows. Naturally, we'll be cherry-picking the most interesting of what's on show and delivering it straight to your eyeballs via this wonderful thing called the internet.
Samsung's thing for (faux) leather continues with the ATIV Book 9 Style
Samsung's clearly been listening to Venus in Furs a lot recently, which explains why it's gone a bit crazy on the faux-leather all of a sudden. After covering both the Galaxy Note 3, Galaxy Tab Pro and Chromebook 2 in the stuff, the company has now sought to do the same to a member of its Windows notebook family. Having taken the recently refreshed ATIV Book 9 that we found at CES, this new model gains the fetish-friendly backing and, erm, not much else. We spent a few seconds with an engineering sample of this unit, and felt compelled to share our impressions with you.
CeBIT 2013 wrap-up
As it'd be poor taste to start singing So Long, Farewell from The Sound of Music, we'll have to settle for a cheery auf wiedersehen and some fond memories of our week in Hannover. Admittedly, this year's show was hardly a vintage for consumer tech news (something of a trend this year, non?), but we certainly saw a few things that made the trip worthwhile. Dan's favorite had to be the eye-tracking AR goggles, while Dana had a soft-spot for those Coby tablets. We're off to load up on chocolate and rindersteak for the flight home -- but you can re-live every nail-biting moment of the CeBIT 2013 if you take a trip past the break.
Visualized: MyMultitouch's 84-inch, 4K touchscreen (video)
Museum owners, public officials and design studio heads are just the sort who would have an excuse to splash out on one of MyMultitouch's displays. The 84-inch PixelSense-esque table is designed to be used by up to 32 fingers at once, letting groups paw around interactive exhibits on a large scale. This one, in particular, comes with a 3,840 x 2,160 UHD display, infrared-based multitouch and a steel stand that lets you mount it at a wide variety of angles. Since it's driven by any PC with a 4K-outputting graphics card, you could even use it as your own desktop display, although you'd need to drop €33,000 ($43,100), plus whatever an 84-inch desk would set you back.%Gallery-180766%
GlassUp wearable display hands-on (video)
GlassUp is a wearable computing project that turns a pair of glasses into a head-mounted secondary display for your smartphone. A projector beams images onto a glass panel baked into the right-side lens, theoretically letting you read texts, tweets and emails on the go. We got to try a very early prototype here at CeBIT, which pushed microfilm slides onto the yellow-and-black, 320 x 240 display. Unfortunately, we weren't able to see anything too clearly, or get its touch controls to work properly, so while we like the concept, we're not sure if we're sold on the implementation just yet. The company is planning to release two versions, one with Bluetooth 4.0 and one with Bluetooth 3.1 to ensure a wide range of compatibility with Android and iOS devices, and GlassUp is aiming to have finished versions ready for the Augmented World Expo in June. At the same time, it'll take to Kickstarter to generate the funds necessary for a pre-sale, priced at $399 / €299, so if you'd like to see if you should start saving, check out the video after the break.%Gallery-180759%
MSI's mid-range S30 laptop is coming to Europe for 699 euros, we go hands-on (video)
When we first heard MSI was showing off a device at CeBIT called the S30, we assumed it was the successor to the S20, the company's first Windows 8 Ultrabook. Alas, though, it's not quite an Ultrabook, and it's certainly not as well-specced a system as the S20. What we have instead is a 13-inch thin-and-light, one that's headed to Europe for €699 and up. To start with a quick rundown of the specs, it comes either a Core i3 or i5 processor, along with 4GB of RAM and a variety of storage options, with the best one being a 500GB / 64GB SSD combo. Oddly, that 1,366 x 768 display doesn't support touch -- a surprise given the price, and given that other machines in its class do include that feature. At least the touchpad seems to do a capable job of handling all the various Windows 8 gestures. Finishing up our tour, that 23mm-thick chassis (a bit too thick by Ultrabook standards) is wide enough to accommodate an Ethernet jack, along with HDMI-out and a VGA socket. Only one USB 3.0 port (plus one 2.0 connection) seems a bit stingy, though. In any case, enjoy our hands-on video, and maybe even stay tuned for a closer look at that S20 Slider.%Gallery-180783%
Hands-on with Fujitsu's waterproof, dustproof Stylistic M702 tablet (video)
Somehow we missed this at Mobile World Congress last week. We were so busy playing with Fujitsu's GPS cane and 5-inch F-02E phone that we didn't even notice the company introduce a waterproof, dustproof Android tablet. As you can see in that shot above, the Stylistic M702 is more than just water-resistant: it meets the standards for IPX5, 7 and 8, which is to say it can withstand immersion in one meter of water for up to 30 minutes. (That, and the occasional jet stream.) A close inspection of the tablet will show that all the ports are sealed with rubber-coated doors, which should keep out liquid as well as dust particles. Other than that, this more or less has all the specs you'd expect on a high-end Android tablet, including a 1.7GHz quad-core Tegra 3 processor, a 10.1-inch, 1,920 x 1,200, IPS display, 2GB of RAM, NFC, Bluetooth 4.0, MHL, dual 8MP / 1.2MP cameras and LTE connectivity. The built-in storage tops out at 32 gigs, but fortunately there's a microSD slot to give you more leeway. Out of the box it will run Android 4.0, but an upgrade to Jelly Bean is coming. Interestingly, there's also a small door housing an antenna, but that'll only be offered on the Japanese model; the European config we handled here at CeBIT had just a blank slot. Most impressive of all, potentially, is the claimed battery life: the 10,000mAh cell is rated for 15 hours of runtime, which would be a coup indeed. And at 590g (1.3 pounds) the tablet isn't even that heavy, considering the gigantic battery squeezed inside. It's available now in Europe, Africa, India and the Middle East for €999, which is expensive, sure, but perhaps it's a price corporate customers can swallow anyway.
Coby goes nuts with the Google-certified tablets, we go hands-on
You might take the Play Store and other Google apps for granted when shopping around for Android tablets, but for Coby it's a Big Deal (with a capital "B"). So much so that after releasing its first Google-certified slate back in January, it's coming out with three more, in 8-, 9- and 10-inch flavors. (A Coby rep told us the idea is to catch as many customers as possible.) Despite the different screen sizes, they all boast the same specs as the 7-inch model we showed you at CES, including a dual-core Amlogic 8226-MX CPU, 1GB of RAM, 8GB of built-in storage, a microSD reader supporting 32GB cards and a 0.3-megapixel webcam up front. They also have modest 2MP cameras 'round back, which the 7-incher doesn't have. Design-wise, the 8-inch MID 8065 and 9-inch 9760 have the same plastic construction as the 7-inch one, albeit with higher-res screens. The 10-inch MID 1065, though, has a more premium-feeling metal casing, along with an IPS panel (the pixel count tops out at 1,280 x 800, so don't get too excited). Indeed, the viewing angles are better than what we saw on the 7-incher, but you're still going to suffer delays even when you flip the tablet to change screen orientations. So far, we know the 8- and 10-inch models are coming to the US for $180 and $230. As for the 9-inch version, there's no room for it in the states, apparently, but a Coby rep from Germany told us it'll go on sale there later this month for around €219. As your lead reviews editor, I can tell you the Magic 8 Ball is turning up an "outlook not good" on a possible review, but we've added some hands-on photos below if you've just got to get a closer look.
Thermaltake and BMW's Level 10 M gaming headset hands-on
If we had a direct line to BMW's Designworks studio, we'd probably harass it to the point of requiring a court order. Thermaltake, on the other hand, have shown a lot more restraint, only harnessing the teutonic skunkworks' expertise on two previous occasions. The pair announced its Level 10 gaming headset today at CeBIT, so we decided to get our mitts all over the first examples of the hardware to be seen in public and find out what they're all about. %Gallery-180615%
'Talking Places' is the Google Glass of tour guides, we go hands-on (video)
SensoMotoric Instruments is a company that builds eye-tracking goggles for research and teaching projects, and the DFKI is the German center for artificial intelligence. Together, the pair has cooked up 'Talking Places,' a Google Glass-esque concept that is designed to help people navigate unfamiliar locations. Thanks to a combination of cutting-edge hardware and software, we were taken on a tour of a model village and were surprised to see that the unit offered up plenty of information about our surroundings. Interested in how it's done? Head on past the break.%Gallery-180584%
Samsung Galaxy S II Plus makes a random appearance at CeBIT 2013, we go hands-on
As ubiquitous as Samsung's Galaxy S II is, we imagined that its influence would wane in the face of the S III and whatever we see in a week's time. The Korean behemoth has other ideas, once again refreshing the former flagship to ensure it'll remain on store shelves as an increasingly lower-end option. Inside you've got a 1.2GHz dual-core Broadcom CPU, 1GB RAM and Android 4.1.2 (Jelly Bean). There's also a 4.3-inch WVGA (800 x 480) display, 8-megapixel rear-facing camera and a 2-megapixel lens up top, as well as GSM and HSPA+ support. How does it compare to the original? Well, it felt a lot more responsive and snappy than when we handled the Galaxy S II last, but part of that is likely due to the new Android Jelly Bean OS' buttery-smooth scrolling. Otherwise, it handled and behaved much like Samsung's aging 'droid hit. The case has now been sanded-down to reflect the company's more natural, Galaxy S III-based design cues, so if you fancy a short game of spot the difference, you can check out the gallery. %Gallery-180497%
Fujitsu shows off a tablet prototype with a built-in palm reader (hands-on)
To be honest, CeBIT is a fairly sleepy tech show, especially compared to Mobile World Congress, which just wrapped last week. For Fujitsu's part, the outfit already showed off its 5-inch smartphone and GPS cane (aka the best thing we've seen so far this year). But the company did keep at least one trick up its sleeve: a tablet with a built-in palm reader. If you recall, we knew a year ago that Fujitsu was working on a tablet that could scan the palm as a form of authentication, but we've never actually seen a finished product, or even a functioning prototype. Until today, of course. Meet us after the break for a closer look.
