CES Roundup 2020

CES Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas

It’s that time of year again when we take our annual look at some of the announcements made at the CES consumer electronics show in Las Vegas to see how they might impact on the smart home and home cinema rooms of the future.

LG ThinQ Smart Door

We have smart door locks already, but LG are looking at taking this concept a leap forward.

Biometric face and palm scanners ensure the smart door only unlocks for authorised people. However clever compartments allow couriers to drop off deliveries without the main door needing to be opened; there’s even a refrigerated compartment for perishables. The door has a mirrored interior which also incorporates a digital display that can provide information such as weather and traffic, along with receipts for what’s been delivered.

Samsung Sero

With so much video content now being shot in portrait format for social media apps like Instagram and TikTok; viewing these on a landscape format TV loses so much screen real estate. Well Samsung have the answer. Their Sero TV can rotate between landscape and portrait orientation; great for screen-casting from your phone too.

Samsung Ballie

There was also plenty of hype around Samsung’s new smart assistant or ‘life companion’ as they like to call it. This small robotic ball can follow you around the home watching and listening for your commands and then keeping an eye on your home and pets when you’re out. We suspect this personal robot is quite a few years away from reality but it looks fun!

Kohler Moxie Shower

Moxie is a smart shower head with a smart Alexa speaker built in. The speaker has great sound quality (it uses Harman Kardon drivers) and allows you to control your home from within the shower. No longer do you need to grab your phone with wet or soapy hands to hear the news headlines or skip to the next song on your morning playlist.

Latest Television Tech

Of course there were also lots of announcements from the major TV manufacturers. Dolby have announced an enhanced version of their high dynamic range (HDR) technology called Dolby Vision IQ which integrates with a light sensor in order to modify the picture settings according to the room’s ambient light levels—Panasonic and LG have already confirmed their support.

Samsung were using MicroLED technology to push the ‘bigger is better’ philosophy with “The Wall” screens ranging from a (relatively) modest 78-inches up to a mammoth 292-inch display. They are also continue to push the move to 8K resolution (see our recent thoughts on 8K) with new they near-bezelless Infinity Screens.

At last year’s CES LG announced a rollable TV that would roll down into a cabinet when not in use. This year they flipped that upside down with a ‘Roll-Down’ OLED screen that rolls down from the ceiling when you want to watch it.

Sony continues to evolve its popular Master series of OLED TVs. The latest generation will incorporate IMAX Enhanced and introduces 8K resolution to some of the range.

Let’s see which of these new products we end up integrating into our smart home installations throughout 2020…