Getting Your Gadget Fix at CES 2007 - Wow I Want One
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These are the items that inspire gadget envy in fellow geeks. I didn't cover any of Intel's ultra-mobile PCs here because I mentioned them in an earlier article. Leaving those out, here are some gadgets guaranteed to make your fellow geeks green.
Have you ever wanted your very own mobile wi-fi hotspot that you can take with you? Autonet Mobile answers the call with what it bills as "the first ever, always-on mobile broadband network." It's designed to be used in the car, though there's no reason it can't be used in a hotel room or while camping. It uses service from Verizon Wireless and is supposed to never drop, even in tunnels. The device won't be available until the spring. It is expected to retail for $400 with a $50 monthly service charge. Coffee shops of the world, consider yourselves warned.
If you're running out of space on your hard drive, you should definitely keep your eyes open for the product Hitachi announced at CES. It's a one terabyte hard drive. Get ten or twenty of these (depending on who you ask) and you can hold the entire Library of Congress. Dubbed the Deskstar 7k1000, the best news about it is the price. It will cost $400; up to now, hard drives with this kind of capacity would set you back ten times as much. The drive is supposed to be available in retail stores within the quarter. Seagate says it is also preparing a one terabyte hard drive for shipping in the same time frame.
You need a Sony Ericsson phone for this next great gadget, but if you've ever wanted to fool people into thinking you're a spy, it's an indispensable accessory. It's a Bluetooth watch. Sony Ericsson teamed up with Fossil to create this beauty, which features an elegant analog face plus a small OLED display. You can manage Bluetooth functions from the device; the watch also lets you know when you're getting an incoming call or SMS message. You can silence the ringer, reject an incoming call, and even manipulate your music player, all from your watch. This kind of cool doesn't come cheap: expect to pay around $400.
Franklin Electronic featured a product at the show that I just might get right after I get my passport, assuming it works as advertised. No, it's not a lead-lined passport holder (thought with what I've heard about RFID, that's tempting too). It's an electronic translator, roughly the size of a PDA. That little package boasts a dictionary with 450,000 words and 12,000 phrases in 12 languages. It displays translations between any two languages on its screen, showing both phonetic and native characters for Asian languages. You can even make it speak the word or phrase so natives don't make fun of your accent. If that's not enough, they also managed to cram in an MP3 player, currency converter, world clock, alarm and voice recorder. No price was mentioned, but it should be out next month.
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