This year's CES is expected to be the largest ever as well over 130,000 people descend on Las Vegas on January 5-8, 2006. This show is bigger for two key reasons.
The first is the fact that the digital consumer market is the next major battleground for vendors in the PC, Semiconductor, CE, cable and communications companies who realize that bringing digital technology to the masses represents the next major growth for all of these industries. In fact, you may not realize it but we are about half way through a digital journey in which the world goes from analog to digital. I put the start of the digital revolution right around 1980 with the first 25 years of this journey aimed at bringing digital technology to business. We are now embarking on the next 25 years where bringing digital technology to the masses is in full swing as billions of new connected devices will help see these industries grow exponentially especially over the next 10 years. The second key reason is that with Comdex gone, and PC companies shifting their emphasis to consumer products, they are also coming to this show in droves.
With that in mind, I offer my annual CES preview of trends and gems that I expect we will see at this years show.

Key Trends

*There will be a big emphasis on the digital home and especially the digital living room.

We will see many new products taking aim at the digital living room and trying to extend the overall PC experience to the TV itself. The approach to solving this problem is diverse. Microsoft and their partners want to make the Media Center PC the focus of extending the PC and its content to the living room and Intel's new VIIV push takes aim at the home using the Media Center PC framework as the center of VIIV's universe.
To date, there have only been about four million Media Center PC's sold WW, but that could change as prices come down and more unique form factors using the Media Center PC software take aim at the living room.
We will also see new approaches to bringing digital entertainment content to the TV experience. Media Adaptors are gaining some ground and check out Digital Deck's solution since it is one of the better media adaptors out there. Also look closely at the newest version of the Digeo cable box. Their UI is stellar and has one an Emmy award for its innovation and contribution to the TV viewing experience. And look for new “smart” set top boxes mixed with IPTV content as they try and muscle into the living room and attempt to be the center of managing the next generation of digital entertainment.

*Shift from Plasma to LCD TV's

The shift from Plasma TV's to affordable LCD TV's will be big at this years show. For the last two or three years, Plasma has been pushed hard since it had some great pricing and indeed, they helped get more and more people to buy HDTV's. But while the LCD TV's are still a bit pricey, we are finally seeing them break the $3000 barrier on 42” models and while Plasma prices come down as well, there will be a strong push towards LCD TV's since in the end, these deliver the best solution for the HDTV experience.
These LCD's TV's are especially important if you take the position that the TV is actually just a bigger monitor to view new forms of digital content and entertainment.
Eventually, whether that content comes directly from a PC or through a “smart” set top box/IPTV combo device, the role of the television becomes much more multi-purpose, multi-application driven and its role as a TV and a digital monitor becomes more pronounced.

*Mobile and wireless

As in the past, the newest and hottest cell phones and smart phones will be on display with hundreds of new models to choose from. Samsung, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Nokia and many more will use CES to showcase their latest wares. Pay attention to not only the new features, such as higher pixel cameras and new form factors, but also at the screens and displays. As cell phones and smart phones are used to display more content such as digital images, games, TV content and Web Browsing, the sharpness and fast refresh rate of these screens become important. We should see some good phones this year with OLED screens that, in my opinion, represent the future displays for all cell phones since they deliver a much brighter and sharper image and use less power then today's screens.
There will also be many products that try and bring TV to mobile devices. Everything from Crown Castles new broadcast system and Sprint and Verizon's emphasis on their mobile video solutions to dedicated services like Mobi TV, Orb Networks and even the Slingbox, which can be viewed on Windows Mobile devices, the area of video or TV on mobile will be another hot topic at the show.

*Mobile Entertainment Devices

Check out the new audio/video systems in the cars at the show. TV's and DVD play back devices built into automobiles is big and we should see a lot of new examples of this in my favorite section of the show. This is the show area where autos blare zillion megawatt sound systems through giant speakers in customized cars and I often just sit in the drivers seat of one of these cars cad crank up the audio until I come close to bursting an ear drum. I especially like the fact that you can feel the base reverberate in your bones and teeth! An experience not to be missed.

Portable Media Players will also be big this year. Of course, at this moment, Apple rules this space and their iPod with Video already gives them the dominant position in portable media players even though Microsoft and their partners have had PMP's on the market for years. But new versions of portable media players with an even better UI and transfer method is around the corner and we should see some of the newest models at CES this year.

*Napa based laptops

Intel and their partners will show off the most recent versions of their new Centrino mobile chip, code named “Napa” at this years show and from both a business and consumer standpoint, this is a big deal. These chips deliver much higher speed processors for mobile computers yet draw less battery power, thus allowing them to handle more processor intense tasks such as video and imaging and even games and let you do it longer when unplugged.
Also, look for some new Tablet PC convertibles. These will be hot as well.

*Microsoft's Vista-consumer editions

Although Microsoft's new OS, Vista, is still not scheduled to come to market until late next year, the company will show off the beta version in their booth and give consumer's their first look at this important new OS. Sources say that Microsoft will offer three versions for the consumer market once it ships and we could get our first hint of what those versions will look like at CES.

*Keynote Observation

If you look at this years keynote line-up, you could almost have flashbacks of Comdex of years past. Bill Gates from Microsoft, Paul Otellini for Intel, Sir Howard Stringer for Sony, Terry Semel for Yahoo and Larry Page for Google. All are PC companies and even though Sony is more consumer based, Sony delivered two keynotes at Comdex from 1999 and 2001 and Sony's role in laptops and PC's still give them a PC based view of the world.
This is not a coincidence. The PC industry is an $800 billion plus market and their desire to push into the consumer space represents a major shift in consumer electronics. While the consumer electronics market itself is still a serious marketplace, with WW revenues of around $120 billion, the PC guys have a lot of money and they are now shifting a strong part of their R & D and marketing emphasis to the consumer. That is also why this will be the largest CES show ever. With Comdex' demise, and PC companies adding a strong emphasis to the CE space, CES is now the most important trade show for both the PC and CE vendors and all those companies and people related to computer based technologies.


Hot Products to look for:

-I predict that one of the hottest products at the show and one that will cause a lot of buzz, will be an un-named product coming from some ex-Apple employees who created an elegant way to turn existing iPods into a serious portable media device. Although I can't name the company, I have seen this and it is an elegant and clever way to make iPods into really serious portable media players.

-DualCor cPC

This is a new handheld PC that is one of the best designed in this category so far. OQO blazed a trail with their Windows XP handheld but this new DualCor version adds an interesting twist to the concept. While it can of course run Windows XP, it also has Windows Mobile 5.0 loaded so it can be usable instantly when opened up. The idea is to let a user have a fully loaded Windows XP hand held device so they can run any XP application but also allow them to also use it in Windows Mobile 5.0 mode to at any time, access email, calendar, contacts and smaller CE based apps and just load XP when they need the full power of the XP OS. This cuts down on battery use and gives people a rather versatile hand held computer. Although this is clearly a business tool that sells for $1500 and targeted at vertical markets, it is being introduced at CES.

-Zoran's Digital to Analog converter solution

While not necessarily one of the glamour products at CES, it is perhaps the most important one. The FCC has mandated that after a specific cut off date, all broadcasting of television has to move to pure digital transmission. That means that after this date, they will cut off all current analog broadcasts and in essence, make all current analog TV's obsolete. Of course, the traditional broadcasters have been lobbying to push this date back as far as possible and have argued that it will be expensive ($300+) to deliver a digital to analog converter to consumers so that they could receive the new digital signals and still see them on their older analog sets.
But Zoran Corporation, a Silicon Valley based Semiconductor company, has created a chip that is very inexpensive and can be used in a D to A converter that can sell for under $100. They spent many hours before Senator Barton's committee this year to prove that they can deliver a low cost solution, and in the end, they almost single handedly convinced the House and Senate that they could finally set a cut-off date for all analog broadcast signals. As of today, the Senate has set February 17th, 2009 as the cut off date. After that, if you have an old analog set in your house, you will need a converter box, most likely using the Zoran Chip.
That means that while 2007-2008 will be a big years for HDTV's, the looming cut off date close to the end of 2008 will become the tipping point for consumers to really start a serious march to buy HDTV's and push congress to subsidize at least $1 billion of D to A converters for use by consumer who cannot afford a DTV by then.