The networked home is something of an emerging zeitgeist, offering today’s consumers a domestic dreamworld in which every object in your house can be remotely controlled, synced together, and activated according to preset patterns, from heating systems and coffee makers to alarms and personalized lighting.
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[CES 2014] JVC today unveiled a new lineup of Everio camcorders that are immune to the elements. These rugged camcorders are water, dust, shock and freeze-proof, making them perfect companions to document your extreme adventures. Both models, GZ-R70 and GZR-10, feature JVC’s quad-proof structure which makes them water resistant up to 5m and able to withstand drops from as high as 1.5m. The camcorders will capture full 1080p HD video in temperatures as low as –10˚C/14˚F.
On a single charge, JVC claims that these two Everio models can provide 4.5 hours of battery life. Apart from that they feature 40x optical zoom, a 2.5 megapixel back-illuminated CMOS image sensor, audio that zooms along with the picture, and compatibility with popular editing softwares such as Final Cut Pro X and iMovie. The company’s FALCONBRID engine facilitates efficient processing of audio and video to deliver optimum images and sound. Coupled with its K2 technology, the camcorders are capable of effectively restoring sound during playback so that elements like gusts of wind or traffic noise don’t spoil the soundtrack. JVC GZ-R70 with 32GB internal memory and a built-in LED light will be available in April 2014 for $499.95. The JVC GZ-R10 will be available in black, blue and red colors in March 2014 for $399.95.
JVC Everio Rugged And Weather-Proof Camcorders Unveiled original content from Ubergizmo. 
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While we won’t go too far into the long-term listening experience involved in the Razer Adaro series headphones and earbuds appearing this week at CES 2014, we will say this: … Continue reading
CES! CES! CES!
TechCrunch is excited to be back at the annual Consumer Electronic Show for yet another year. Our schedule is packed and we’re streaming all the tomfoolery live. You can watch it right here.
Today’s schedule features booth tours of the big boys, namely Samsung, Sony, and Intel. Our teams will also hit up Eureka Park and CES’ notorious North Hall where they will be no doubt overwhelmed by iStuff accessories.
Then, at 11:00 am PDT, tune in to watch the first session of the inaugural Hardware Battlefield where 14 hardware startups will pitch to rounds of judges, competing for a $50,000 prize.
Everything is streamed live and uncut. I have a 1,000 bonus points to the readers that call out our mistakes on Twitter using the #cescrunch.
Tobii’s eye-tracking technology continues to make its way to mainstream devices. We’ve seen it work with laptops, arcade machines and Windows 8 tablets, and now Tobii has partnered with SteelSeries to release the EyeX, an eye-tracking accessory meant to work with PC games.
In case you’re not familiar with Tobii’s technology, its eye tracker uses microprojectors to beam near-infrared light to the users’ eyes. Then the trackers’ sensors analyze the reflections of that light along with the user’s facial features to accurately detect where he’s looking.
In the demo below, Tobii shows three ways that eye-tracking can be used to augment StarCraft II. First is the ability to move the view to a particular location by looking at an enlarged view of the mini-map (i.e. a map). Second is the ability to center the view to the point where the user is looking, and finally the ability to order units where to move, attack and more just by looking at the target. Skip to around 2:45 in the video for the demo:
The EyeX can also be used in e-sports broadcasts and to help developers improve their game by showing where a player is looking as he’s playing. Skip to around 12:30 in the video below to see that function in action:
As you can see the hardware seems quite capable, but it’s not going to succeed if developers don’t integrate it – and integrate it well– into their games.
Tobii & SteelSeries will release EyeX developer kits this year for $195 (USD), but for a limited time they can be bought for a steep discount: $95 for US customers and €75 for non-US customers. Just enter the promo code ‘CES2014′ on Tobii’s online shop when prompted. As with its tablet incarnation, I can see the EyeX being a boon not just for creating better or new ways to play games, but to help the disabled play conventional games as well. I hope developers and hardware hackers will explore that possibility too.
[via Tobii via Destructoid]
[CES 2014] It has been a while since Sony has talked about PlayStation 4 sales statistics. Microsoft knows that too, and it broke its silence yesterday to announce that in 2013 the company was able to sell over three million Xbox One units, after it was launched in mid-November. We knew that it was just a matter of time before Sony came out with a number of its own, and as it turns out, the number is bigger than Microsoft’s. At CES 2014 today, Sony has formally announced that during the time the PS4 was available in 2013, the company sold over 4.2 million units around the globe.
Though it warrants mentioning here that the PS4 had a bit of a head start. Sony launched its new gaming console on November 15th whereas the Xbox One came out on November 22nd, but the former was launched in fewer markets than the latter, which was initially offered in 13 markets. In two weeks after launch, Sony was able to sell 2.1 million units around the world while in the first 24 hours of availability, sales topped 1 million units. The figures are impressive, there’s no doubt about that, and they’re bound to climb up in 2014, the year has just begun. The PS4 vs Xbox One battle isn’t ending anytime soon.
Sony PS4 Sales Leave Xbox One Far Behind With Over 4.2 Million Units Moved In 2013 original content from Ubergizmo. 
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Expanding the product line it unveiled late last summer, Sennheiser has announced a new Ivory headphones model in its MOMENTUM product family, adding a creamy new color to its on-ear … Continue reading
It was an inauspicious beginning. At the MakerBot event last night at CES 2014 the intro music tended towards soft hard rock. On the plate was a lilting guitar anthem by the Foo Fighters and then a song by Incubus, Pardon Me.
So pardon me while I burst into flames.
Luckily, nothing did.
Instead, as I sat in the audience last night, I was struck just how exciting the proceedings were. Bre Pettis, CEO and a former school teacher, came out coughing, saying “Cool,” dressed in black like a nerdy Johnny Cash. He had a lot to say and his presentation was, in some strange way, a near-perfect facsimile of an Apple keynote: the amazing stuff the company is doing (3D-printed hands, soccer balls that students in the third world kick around and then use to light their homes at night), the retail spaces they’ve opened throughout the Northeast. The sales, the total employees, the dross that borders on self promotion but is a necessary part of the CE dance.
Then there was some information on their MakerBot Academy, an effort to push MakerBots into every classroom. “My parents bought me an Apple II+,” said Pettis, comparing his plans to another major hardware player that pushed their product into classrooms before the business world knew what was happening.
Arguably, the home PC market and the home 3D printer markets are, in a way, opposed. Home computers can do anything while 3D printers can only make anything. However, 3D printers allow for the imagination to run rampant. By creating things out of thin air they are a high-tech magic wand, a technology that allows us to hack the physical world in the same way Apple II users hacked the digital.
MakerBot products do two things right: first, they mirror the best practices of the CE giants. They are simple, easy-to-use, and offer intuitive, free software solutions. The segmentation of the products into Mini (for everyone), the Replicator (for the prosumer), and the ultra-large Z18 (for the small manufacturing shop) is spot-on and the trade dress – the sexy design, the cartridge-like filament holders, and the removable extruders move the 3D printer from a wonky, home-brew object of nerd veneration to a usable product that anyone with a rudimentary understanding of coffee makers can use.
MakerBot also owns the conversation when it comes to 3D printers. While the tinkerers online scream “Sell-out!”, Pettis is defining the face of 3D printing for the world. Through branding, design, and enough open source software and hardware to remain dangerous, he is selling a world where 3D printers are as ubiquitous as samurai swords were in Kill Bill – familiar tools that everyone has and everyone understands but few can use with precision or effect.
I’m a proponent of 3D printing, as you well know. I’ve owned a MakerBot for a few years now and it’s changed the way I think of how things are built and expanded my skill set in the way my original Atari 800XL all those years ago taught me that computers weren’t scary, and that they could be a source of pleasure and a true calling. A company that changes the world at CES is a rare treat. Everything else at this circus is a sideshow. MakerBot is the real deal.
[CES 2014] Some of us find it hard to make our smartphones last an entire day on a single charge. If you are constantly using data hungry applications, playing games, streaming content and taking a lot of pictures and videos, chances are your iPhone’s battery will die out faster than it would if you sparingly used the smartphone throughout the day. In such cases, removable batteries save the day, but the iPhone’s battery can’t be removed. Which is why there are a plethora of cases out there that come with external battery packs for the iPhone. Mophie makes such cases, and at CES 2014 it has announced the Space Pack for iPhone, a case that solves yet another dilemma.
Despite the fact that the latest iPhones can be purchased with onboard storage as high as 64GB, some find it to be insufficient. The alternative is to carry a portable wireless HDD which let you store and stream content on your mobile device. If you don’t want to carry around another piece of technology but would appreciate the additional storage, the Space Pack is for you. It not only promises to double the battery life of your iPhone, it also offers 16GB and 32GB of storage to extend that baked into the smartphone. Space Pack comes with an app called Space that allows you to organize local files without having to connect the iPhone to a computer. Mophie Space Pack is available for pre-order now, it costs $149.95 and $179.95 for the 16GB and 32GB models respectively.
Mophie Space Pack For iPhone Couples External Battery With Additional Storage original content from Ubergizmo. 
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Coming along with news of the upcoming US availability, Meizu is showing off the M3 smartphone here at CES. The handset sports a 5.1-inch display with a resolution of 1800 … Continue reading
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