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Canwest News Service
The Financial Post's technology reporter, Matt Hartley, is in Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show, billed as the world's largest consumer technology trade show. He'll be filing daily from the show, which runs until Sunday, on technology trends and developments and the latest gadgets for the Financial Post as well as posting frequent blogs and video to financialpost.com/fpposted—
MOVING PRESENTATION
It didn't take Research In Motion Ltd. long to get into the swing of things.
Although the BlackBerry maker isn't expected to launch any new handsets here on The Strip, RIM did take the wraps off the BlackBerry Presenter, an accessory for the famous smartphones that will allow users to project and deliver PowerPoint presentations using a BlackBerry.
The small device attaches to a TV or a projector using either VGA or S-Video and then connects wirelessly to the BlackBerry using BlueTooth technology. With a range of about 10 metres, the BlackBerry Presenter will allow professionals to move around more than my second-year English professor while delivering presentations.
The device will be available through Black-Berry's own store and other retailers at a cost of $199.
CALL FOR BACKUP
There are thousands of different uses for a BlackBerry, but thanks to a Canadian company, a BlackBerry will soon be able to automatically back up your computer in just a few moments.
Yesterday at CES, Richmond Hill, Ont.-based Storage Appliance Corp., maker of the Clickfree brand of USB storage devices that come pre-installed with software that automatically backs up computers, announced a handful of new backup devices, including the Traveler for BlackBerry.
The Traveler for BlackBerry is a microSD card that comes loaded with Clickfree's backup software. Once Traveler is installed in a Black-Berry, users need only connect the BlackBerry to their computer via a USB cable and the software on the card finds, organizes and backs up the files on the computer.
One can easily see this becoming a favourite for business travellers who are also BlackBerry users.
The Traveler for BlackBerry will begin shipping in April of this year. A 16 GB model will cost $100, while a 32 GB model will cost $160.
MEDIA CIRCUS
On Tuesday night many of the reporters and media expected to converge on Las Vegas for the mother of all consumer electronics trade shows were crammed into the ballroom of the Venetian Hotel for CES Unveiled.
For a few hours last night, thousands of journalists, cameramen and bloggers were on hand to catch an early glimpse of some of the gadgets sure to create a buzz around CES.
To put it bluntly, it's a media circus. Exhibitors lined the walls with their booths, and at the midpoint of the evening, it was impossible to take three or four steps without bumping into a cameraman for a local U.S. television station or a blogger from a website that specializes in reviewing iPod docking stations.
UFO SIGHTING
Judging by the crowds gathered around the station for Parrot Inc., a French company, Parrot could be a household name before very long. The company spent the night wowing the media with its Parrot AR Drone, which is an augmented reality quadricopter you control by using your iPhone. Sounds impressive, no? Best of all, it totally looks like a UFO.
The Drone uses two cameras embedded on its football-sized body to turn the world around you into a video game. Using the iPhone as both the gaming screen and the controller, the user simply tilts the iPhone to maneouvre the Drone, which broadcasts back the video it sees as the gaming environment. It then projects objects such as robots or other flying devices into the augmented reality it perceives, and voila, you've got yourself a truly interactive video game.
The maker of the Drone said it expects it to be available in North America sometime in 2010. It also has made the code for the software that powers the Drone freely available online, which means anyone could create games to work with the Drone and which will also work with other WiFi-enabled devices, such as game consoles or other smartphones.
mhartley@nationalpost.com
