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Comdex was just two months ago but it seems like a year has gone by. First the important stuff: the parties were great but Steve and I have a don't tell all pact. I have to say the food at the 108th floor of the Stratosphere was very disappointing. Geek Fest (again at Studio 54) was a lot of fun. There were clearly fewer people and major vendors present. Devoting large areas of the main floor to food concessions says it all.
In my view, this was the year of wireless. Everyone is looking for ways to connect to everything wirelessly. This dovetails with the advances in PDAs, which were also very evident at this year's Comdex. In fact I am writing this article on a Handspring Prism with a Targus portable keyboard. The keyboard is really a delight to use and is guaranteed to get some stares when you take it out and unfold it. The Prism is Handspring's color unit. It uses the same operating system as a Palm but has an expandability slot for a modem, mp3 player, camera, GPS unit, BlueTooth or other add-on. I really like the color and resolution of the unit. I think PDAs are really here to stay and not just expensive toys.
Another cool toy is the Iomega FotoShow. This 250 meg USB zip drive has the ability to connect directly to your TV (either by RCA or S-video). With this drive you can take the memory card from your digital camera (either compact flash or smart media) and put either directly into a special slot on the unit. The drive will copy the contents of your memory card onto the zip disk AND let you edit (enhance, crop, rotate, eliminate red eye, add special effects, etc.) and organize your photos. What is really cool is that you can do all of this directly on your tv! Everything is operated by the included remote control. Of course you can always hook it into the computer and use it as a normal zip drive. This is really a terrific unit to use at parties since it just plugs into a tv and you can set up a slide show with great transitions in just seconds!(msrp $299.00)
Sony memory sticks -- or rather the form factor for the sticks will soon evolve into mp3 players, gps units, cameras and all sorts of other devices. Very nice but I don't know if anyone other than Sony will be using it.
As I said above, wireless was really big at the show. Home networking is the rage and Bluetooth was talked about but few working examples were seen. Bluetooth is a wireless concept for short range connectivity. Imagine walking through a museum with your PDA and as you approach an exhibit, the explanation would be automatically transmitted to your unit for you to read. Or you could synchronize your PDA to your computer just by having the two in proximity.
Intel showed off the Pentium IV and many game companies showed off some incredible games on the IV. WOW!
MP3 players were everywhere and built into everything. I don't quite get the mp3 and camera combo but several companies are making them so I must be missing something.
The Linux pavilion was dull. The enthusiasm we saw last year was missing. Lots of people were complaining about the different flavors of Linux and the fact that software incompatibilities between Linux variants were becoming an issue. We also heard many people gripe that most software wouldn't be ported to the Linux platform. (Obviously they need to find a Mac support group.) Oh well.
Digital cameras and photo printers are coming down in price and I think the quality is now equal to a regular film camera. In fact, we often couldn't tell the difference. Xerox and Epson printers were particularly impressive and CHEAP!!!
As usual, Creative Labs had a great booth showing off their latest sound and video cards. I can't wait to try out my new 5.1 surround sound card -- blow away stuff.
Steve introduced me to a new restaurant: P.F. Changs. The good news is that there is one in Walnut Creek. Try it!
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