Hasta La Gadget!

Dell‘s laptop and desktop lineups may hog all of the attention, but the company’s range of LCDs have proven to be contenders over the years. Not one to shy away from the professionals in attendance, the company has today released its first-ever WQHD monitor: the 27-inch UltraSharp U2711. Boasting a native 2,560 x 1,440 resolution, this beast just may pack enough pixels to sway you back into the single-monitor camp. Dell’s also trumpeting the unit’s “billion-color depth and IPS technology,” and the 6-millisecond response time, 1,000:1 contrast ratio, 350 nits of brightness and a 12-bit internal processing help to round things out. For the pros who make ends meet by editing photos or video, you’ll probably enjoy knowing that this one boasts a 110 percent color gamut, factory-tuned Adobe RGB and sRGB modes (alongside a color calibration report), custom color adjustments and a smattering of mounting options.

You’ll also find just about every port known to man: HDMI 1.3, DisplayPort, DVI-D (x2), VGA, composite, component, USB (x4) and an 8-in-1 multicard reader. ‘Course, the actual aesthetics are nothing to write home about, but again, this one’s being targeted at end users who care less about the bezel and more about true-to-life pixel performance. We had a chance to toy around with the new beast, and frankly, we were mesmerized. Without an in-house color calibrator, we can’t speak for those who need oodles of numbers and bar charts to tell if a monitor is performing correctly, but we can say that the panel was remarkably sharp, crisp and accurate — more so than our (much adored) 24-inch 2408WFP, that’s for sure. Be prepared to catch this one next month with an MSRP of $1,049.

Dell goes pro with 27-inch UltraSharp U2711 WQHD LCD monitor (hands-on) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 07 Jan 2010 00:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Panasonic was showing off its new lineup of cameras and camcorders at its display table at Digital Experience, but that wasn’t what really caught our eyes. Nope, that honor went to the DMP-B500, a portable Blu-ray player that had both a killer screen and a (fairly) slim profile. Better yet, it doubles as a standalone Blu-ray player when you connect it to your TV, and it links up nicely with other VIERA products. Also on display was a WiFi photo frame with a built in CD player and a hidden iPod dock. Calendar and photo widgets looked nice on the crisp display, and let’s just put it this way, we don’t know how much we’d mind waking up to that in the morning. You don’t have to take our word for it though, check our the goods in our hands-on gallery.

Panasonic packs a punch with portable Blu-ray player at CES (hands-on) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 23:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We just swung by Powermat’s table here at Digital Experience, and we’re really digging the newest lineup of products out of the company. It’s offering up its appropriately titled power mats in sizes for one, two, or three devices, as well as specialized folding solutions for the car or when you’re not near an outlet. The place we see the real promise, though, is with the swappable batteries we heard about earlier. That’s right, the days of those ugly, bulky cases are over if you’re lucky enough to have a device that’s supported. We saw demos for multiple models, including a handful of BlackBerrys, the Droid, and the MyTouch 3G — sorry iPhone users, you still need a jacket. Even more interestingly, there’s an app available for Android users that will allow Powermat to remotely optmThe netbook solution the folks at Powermat are hocking is more of an adapter with an external jacket, and it’s not the most elegant solution. Be sure to check the gallery below for glamour shots of the new gear in action.

Powermat CES 2010 lineup hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 22:51:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We’re not quite sure what to make of the Backflip just yet — closed, it looks almost exactly like a CLIQ, but the keyboard (which rests on the outside of the device) is allegedly rugged enough to withstand a beating. Rugged or not, we’re worried about feel — believe it or not, it has even less tactile response to it than the Droid, putting it a distant third in Moto’s QWERTY Android efforts so far. Obviously we’ll need a good deal more time to gel our opinion, but out of the gate, we’re not encouraged.

The touchpad on the back of the screen is… well, interesting, but that’s about all we can really say about it at this point — as Sanjay said during the keynote, it’ll be up to devs utilizing Moto’s API to do the really awesome stuff with it. In the meantime, it acts exactly as you’d expect a trackball or optical pad to work on Android — just upside down.

In terms of the screen and the Blur experience, it’s a dead ringer for the CLIQ, for better or worse — the big difference, of course, is the fact that the screen can be tilted. The phone’s got a sensor so it can detect when the screen’s at a 45-degree angle, putting it in a media mode and making it particularly useful as an alarm clock. Would we buy one? We’re not sure — it’s no Droid, certainly — but maybe it doesn’t have to be. Check some raw video after the break!

Continue reading Motorola Backflip hands-on

Motorola Backflip hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 21:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We don’t need to tell you that we can’t go a step at CES without seeing a new e-reader device (see Spring Alex, Sprint Skiff, and Copia Ocean), but here comes along knfb’s Blio with Mac and PC compatible software saying you don’t need new fancy hardware to read the the printed page on a screen….or may be you do. Regardless, of where the Blio software ends up we really dig it and it approaches digital reading in a whole new way. In case you didn’t know the Blio software aims to preserve the traditional book or magazine format by keeping its layout, fonts, images, but also to meld it with digital interactivity. Sounds kind of confusing, but we got a sneak peak today of the PC software (in Microsoft’s Booth…perhaps, not a coincidence. Hmm…Courier?) Hit the break for impressions and full PR. Video is on the way.

Update: Video is up, after the break.

Continue reading Blio e-reader software hands-on (Update: video!)

Blio e-reader software hands-on (Update: video!) originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 06 Jan 2010 20:11:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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