Well it’s Saturday, and the last day of the consumer electronics show here in Las Vegas. It’s been a crazy week with record attendance.

Today we made our way to the Sands convention center, and Eureka Park. This huge space showcases brand-new inventions, some things that have already come to market and are looking for financial backing, and everyone else that wants to be a part of the show but doesn’t know exactly where they fit in.

We saw LaserLite helmets that supposedly help you regrow hair, and many other medically based devices that were mind-boggling. Some look feasible, and others are very far-fetched.

For the first time I saw a 3D hologramatic projection device. It looked quite amazing, with the projection floating in air right in front of you and moving at the same time. I got to try the Occulus 3D virtual reality goggles, and that was an incredible and unique experience. When you wear these you can move your head anywhere at 360° all around up-and-down and it looks like you’re looking at a real world, that of course is totally computer-generated. Add three-dimensional multidirectional sound to this world, and it’s mind blowing. What I found most significant about this is that I had never experienced something like this before, and how quickly my mind, my eyes and my ears adapted to this experience. I felt truly immersed in a world that was computer-generated.

It was fantastic to have the opportunity to see all of these things first-hand, and I can’t wait to go again next year to see what developments are taking place by that time!

Ron Fraser
London Drugs Computer Department Manager – Yates St., Victoria

See previous posts
CES 2016
CES 2016 – Day 2
CES 2016 – Day 3

Good morning from day three at CES2016 in a rather unusually chilly Las Vegas. Still, a beautifully sunny day as we headed down to the convention center. Today we saw a lot of home automation hardware and software from many different companies some of which work together and others which are still relatively proprietary. One thing is for sure, there are a lot of devices in your home that you can control right now with your smartphone, tablet or computer very easily, and in the near future even more so.

After a quick look around the Las Vegas convention Center, we took a shuttle bus that goes to the Sands convention center which houses an area called Eureka Park. Eureka Park is where the newest most successful inventors and inventions reside, also ones that have not yet been discovered or never will be in some cases.  There are  a myriad of different vendors here,  everything from practical and sensible to rather outrageous.  Some items are just in the concept stage, and others have already gone to market and the vendors and the inventors are just looking for distributors. The size of this area has grown exponentially since last year, which is a tribute to the fact that a lot of success is found by inventions that were initiated here in Eureka Park.

Some of the inventions we have seen here include a robotic bartender that can mix many different types of drinks fully automatically, a small baby monitor that measures blood oxygen and pulse  from a specially fitted sock that fits on the baby’s foot and connects wirelessly to a smartphone and an alarm. It’s called the Owlet. We also saw a jaw-dropping 3D hologram attic in the air floating projection from a company called Kino Mo.

This area of the show was easily the most well attended and generated the most interest amongst the attendees. So much that everyone working there is hoping to discover the next most amazing invention amongst the hundreds and hundreds of products being shown this week.

Tomorrow we wrap up an incredibly interesting week with a live two hour show on CFAX about everything that we have found at the show. It will also be our last day to visit the show venues and we will have one more report with what we find there tomorrow.

Ron Fraser
London Drugs Computer Department Manager – Yates St, Victoria

Today, along with my two colleagues Alan Perry from CFAX 1070, and Jennifer Cairns the CEO of Egurus, we covered a lot more of the show and the show floor at the Las Vegas convention Center.

One very large and very busy area visited today was the flying robotic drones. There are drones that are considered toys starting at $29, and then there are drones that run into the many thousands of dollars that are used commercially. They have been around for a while now, but they’re starting to become very intelligent. These drones run longer, and are much smarter about how they fly thanks to Intel Realsense technology built into them. This makes them much safer around any people or operators.

We also saw something called the Daqri smart helmet. This device is worn like a regular helmet, but has a heads up display built into the visor and is connected to a central computer. The wearer of this device can actually see into specially designed display electrical panels that have problems, system pressures that are too high or too low, and the heads up display will warn them in real time if something is wrong. On some of these systems, the heads-up display will display instantly to the user the steps to take to remedy the situation if it is considered dangerous. Again this is all possible based on the Intel Edison processor that was unveiled last year. This device is shipping right now and the helmet cost is several thousands of dollars.

The common theme of so many of the products we’ve seen over the past few days, is that these companies are working hard to develop technology and products to make our lives easier and safer.

Ron Fraser
London Drugs Computer Department Manager – Yates St, Victoria

So, another exciting day at CES 2016 here in Las Vegas. Today we ended up walking almost 18,000 steps or the equivalent of 16 km. That’s not unusual here. Everything is gigantic scale, and the distances between these things looks normal to the untrained eye. To give you an idea how big this event is, the total amount of display space is about 3 1/4 million square feet. Apparently that’s well over 50 football fields worth. And that distance is spread out over several hotels, two convention centers, and all over Las Vegas. Add 170,000 attendees, almost 6000 press members, and then 15,000 presenters and you get the picture. Don’t forget it takes a lot of talented people to also set up, takedown, and maintain a show like this so they are all here as well.

Some of the things we saw today that were notable? Well, we saw a new frontloading washing machine by Samsung that has a second door that will let you add clothing if you forget to put it in initially. That’s very useful. We saw a brand-new Samsung refrigerator that has cameras inside the fridge so wherever you are out shopping you can actually see the contents of the fridge, and know if there’s something you need to purchase before you come home.
This same fridge has a Black glass panel that turns totally translucent so you can see inside the fridge with just a quick knock on the glass. You can also order groceries right on the LCD panel on the refrigerator, have them delivered to you and have the refrigerator pay using your MasterCard Visa or debit card.

The drudgery of home chores is a thing of the past, truly, with some of these new devices.

I will have a lot more for you tomorrow!

Ron Fraser
Computer Department Manager – London Drugs Yates St, Victoria