Friday, January 4, 2013


The debut of Ultra High-Definition television

It took a while but CRT televisions have finally become the stuff of garage sales and trips to grandma's house, and 3D screens have just started to crack the home market. Now everyone's lovely flatscreen is about to become a little bit obsolete, thanks Ultra High-Definition.
After a brief flirtation with 4K high-definition, the CEA settled on the name Ultra HD. However, Sony, always one to buck a naming trend (remember Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD?) has said it will stick with numbered moniker, calling its pixel-dense displays 4K Ultra High-Definition (4K UHD).
CES 2013
LG's 55-incher, we've its since topped
Still, everyone seems to be in agreement over the spec requirements set by the CEA, defining what it takes to be called Ultra HD. According to the group, Ultra means at least 8 million pixels, with a minimum resolution of 3840 x 2160, and an aspect ratio of at least 16 x 9.
Now the question is how big will the screens at CES 2013 be? There's debate between engineers as to whether anyone can even tell the difference between UHD and regular HD on a display that's less than 100-inches. And when will these TVs become affordable? Right now they're around $20,000 (UK£12,515, AUD $19,210), keeping them firmly in Donald Trump and Richard Branson territory.

Samsung rebrands itself

Despite having the best-selling smartphone in the world and running an operating system on clip to eclipse all others, Samsung is reportedlypreparing quite the rebranding at CES 2013.
CES 2013

While we don't necessarily anticipate a radical image reimagining, we do expect Samsung will take advantage of the stage (and a keynote speech) to introduce a new facet to its business identity – a refresh, as it were.
One of CES's exhibit categories is "Digital Health and Fitness," so Samsung will likely tack onto that theme with the introduction of products (or the retooling of current devices) that fit into the health and wellness category.
Samsung has reportedly hired a design team that's worked with Nike on some of that company's branding initiatives, so we'll likely see some dynamic stuff from South Korea in Vegas.
As Samsung continues to grow from an Asian powerhouse to a global one, how it sells itself to a broad international audience will be key to its future.
We expect Stephen Woo, president of Samsung Electronics' device solutions division, to set the tone of the company's refreshed self during his keynote address Jan. 9.

World's largest TV from Samsung


World's largest Ultra HD TV from Samsung

Can you say "whoa?" Samsung is about to set mouths agape with an 85-inch Ultra HD LED TV, "the world's largest commercialized UHD LED TV."
The company made the over eight million pixel tube official Nov. 12, and we're looking forward to standing wide-eyed before the mondo television that probably makes the lights on the Strip look like dying flashlights.

Huawei Ascends take flight

With Windows Phone 8 reveals by Nokia, HTC and Samsung already in the books, it was easy to forget that a fourth manufacturer received a Microsoft nod to use the new OS.
China's Huawei confirmed just a few weeks before the show that it will bring its WP8 dish to the party in the form of the Ascend W1.
Though the Ascend W1 will be the last guest to arrive, it may turn out to be the phone everyone flocks to if a cheap asking price is tacked on.
The firm may also introduce the higher-end Ascend W3, a phone with a 4.5-inch display that recently leaked online.

Galaxy S4 with Full HD Super AMOLED display

As the major hardware manufacturer taking up CES real estate, it's no surprise Samsung should (so far) dominate the rumor mill.
This one has a Full HD Super AMOLED display arriving at the show, but that's not all: chances are we'll see such a screen housed inside the Galaxy S4.
A Samsung source reported that the display's resolution will reach 1920 x 1080 and a staggering 441 ppi, but the real point of interest is in the ultra-thin and energy efficient AMOLED technology.
Fingers crossed Samsung decides to bring a SIV with such a screen as its CES carry on.

Intel to outline new tablet chips

In the mood for some T-time?
Intel is supposedly prepping the introduction of a next gen processor at CES 2013: the Bay Trail-T.
The Bay Trail-T is rumored as a quad-core scheduled for a 2014 launch, though CES will see the series' debut plus info on what manufactures are building slates based off the Trail-T.
A SoC sibling is also expected at the Vegas show. Dubbed the Valleyview-T, the chip could take on Nvidia's Tegra 3 and Qualcomm's S4.
Look for long battery lives plus 22nm prowess, superior audio, boosted memory capacity and amped up graphics when used in conjunction with the Gen7 Intel GPU. There's even talk 3D video recording could be in the cards.

A tablet to take notice of

There's a good chance we'll see a good number of tablets at the show, but there's two we've heard about recently that could really turn some heads.
Asus is reportedly working on a tablet with the model name ME172V, a slate that could reach no more than 7 inches, come with a microSD slot for expandable memory and flash a price that puts the Google Nexus 7 on notice.
And while Samsung's Galaxy S4 is stealing most of the South Korean company's 2013 thunder, we've heard the firm might be planning a 13.3-inch tablet to take on Asus' Transformer series.
The 13-incher would even feature a QWERTY keyboard dock.