CES two thousand sixteen didn’t switch the world, but it displayed how the world is switching
CNET spent a utter week in Las Vegas living and breathing the CES two thousand sixteen display. Here’s everything we discovered about the future of technology.
Gadgets
CNET’S CES Top 10-ish
CNET’s Brian Cooley and Scott Stein count down the top products at CES 2016.
by Brian Cooley
CES, the world’s largest and splashiest showcase for the latest and greatest in consumer electronics, is a victim of its own outsize expectations. Yes, a long list of game-changing tech products very first spotted the light of day at the display — everything from the VCR, the CD, DVD, Blu-ray, even the original Nintendo Entertainment System and the very first Xbox — but none of them switched the landscape overnight.
It’s a game of years and even decades, as these innovations trickle down from the early adopter tech community to society at large. Leisurely but surely, however, as prices drop, that stack of VHS tapes becomes a shelf utter of DVDs, then Blu-rays. And then the discs disappeared, too — a little stick streaming Netflix in their place, and for under $40, too.
The feeling you got from the floor of CES two thousand sixteen was that we’re somewhere in the middle of that timeline: You can see where all this amazing tech is gonna take us, eventually, but we’re not fairly there yet. The cars are electrical and — astonishingly — getting unlikely to crash, whether a human is driving or not. And that same sort of collision-avoidance and self-automation tech is displaying up in more drones, which were also ubiquitous at CES — including one that was big enough to ferry a person high above rush hour traffic.
Meantime, sensors and cameras are being embedded into everything — our clothes, our boots and our most mundane home appliances — so your front door can automatically unlock as you treatment, or your fridge can send you a photo to display how much milk is left. The TV photos are more supersized and lifelike than ever, with roll-up and bendable display technology aiming to supplant rigid vapid panels, and Netflix’s increasingly global network looking to switch our very definition of the medium.
That is, if we even observe big screens anymore. CES two thousand sixteen was also the big coming-out party for virtual reality, with long lines on the display floor for attendees to attempt out the likes of Oculus Rift, PlayStation VR and HTC Vive, all of which should be on sale later this year. Whether it’s widely adopted is anybody’s guess, but we can say this: The tech is undoubtedly ready for prime time.
A cynic would say, “OK, excellent — but I eyed all of that stuff last year, or the year before that.” And that person would be correct. From VR to autonomous vehicles to OLED TVs to ubiquitous sensors to wise fridges to follow-me drones, almost everything we eyed at CES two thousand sixteen wasn’t truly fresh. But it was all a bit better, a tad more refined — one step closer to you clicking “add to cart” and having it display up on your doorstep two days later.
To that end, here’s what we witnessed in Las Vegas at CES 2016.
CES stands for “Car Electronics Demonstrate”
The Chevy Bolt is shooting for a de facto sub-$30,000 beginning price.
Every year we say CES is becoming more of a car display, and that trend was again in evidence in 2016. It’s clear that the entire automotive practice is undergoing a finish transformation from the wheels up. Self-driving and semi-autonomous vehicles are now table stakes for auto manufacturers. And while the dashboard of the near future may look increasingly like a giant iPad, concepts from BMW and Visteo go beyond tapping and swiping to no-touch voice and gesture controls.
And while gasoline prices are plunging to fresh lows, the budge to electrical vehicles emerges to be unstoppable. Case in point is the long-awaited Chevy Bolt, which will bring a fully electrified vehicle with a 200-mile-per-charge range to the masses at a price of under $30,000 (after US federal rebate).
And the car news is just getting embarked. Just as CES finishes, the North American International Auto Demonstrate starts in Detroit — and our fresh sister site, TheRoadshow.com, will be covering every square inch of the demonstrate floor.
VR and AR go big for 2016
If you didn’t believe us when we said that virtual reality was going to be the big tech story of 2016, CES undoubtedly switched your mind. The big expose of Oculus Rift’s $599 price didn’t happen at a CES press conference, but it was the big VR story (albeit a controversial one) at the showcase. But Oculus isn’t the only game in town: Archrival HTC demonstrated its the latest version of its Valve-powered VR equipment, the Vive Pre, and we found it to supply an even better VR practice than Oculus. Meantime, slew of folks on the showcase floor were getting their very first taste of Sony’s PlayStation VR — and liking what they found.
But it’s not all joy and games, either. Intel highlighted the Daqri Wise Helmet at its CES keynote, displaying how VR’s sibling, augmented reality (AR), can be used in real-world work environments, for anything from construction to manufacturing. And the Recon Jet fitness glasses channel Google Glass by suggesting real-time stats for your cycling or running session.
One thing’s for sure: a lot of us will need to get used to observing the world in a entire fresh way — maybe, soon, through regular glasses, too. And if you want to get a taste of it, check out CNET’s virtual reality tour of the CES two thousand sixteen showcase floor. (It’ll work with any Android phone or iPhone, even if you don’t have goggle accessories.)