- It's been a few years since we've been to CES,
but the big tech convention is back,
so we spent the last week doing CES things.
We played with new gadgets,
saw some truly overpowered drones and colorful cars.
We shook hands with robots, tested our urine.
Monica almost ate it while rollerblading
with electric skates.
And then we saw many, many monitors and even more TVs,
like lots and lots of TVs.
But what products actually stood out in this year's show?
Here's our picks for the best of CES.
(whistling)
(gentle music playing)
- [Chris] Coming out of the show,
my favorite TV bar none is Samsung's S95C QD OLED.
So the cool thing about this TV is that it uses
the second generation of Samsung's QD OLED display panels.
They're even brighter than last year and more durable,
and power efficient too, so we're told.
QD OLED, QD stands for quantum dot
can produce richer colors at higher brightness levels
than normal OLEDs like those from LG.
It's not a big difference, but it is the kind
of thing that home theater nerds like me and many of you
do notice.
This year that panel can hit up to 2000 knits of brightness
that's right up there with the very best many LED TVs
on the market today.
It's got VRR gaming up to 144 hertz Dolby atmos
speakers built right in, but still no Dolby vision, which.
Even so I think Samsung learned a lot last year
with the S95B and this model should be even better.
It's destined to be a fantastic TV in 2023.
But what about the future?
That's where LG's signature OLED comes in.
It's a giant 97 inch 4K OLED TV that gets all of its audio
and video wirelessly from a small black box
called the zero connect box.
That box is where you plug in all your gizmos,
and gaming consoles and Blu-ray players and stuff like that,
and all of it gets beamed over to the big screen TV
at up to 4K 120 hertz or so LG claims at least.
So then the only cord you have to worry about is power.
That gives you a lot more flexibility,
and freedom about where the TV goes, where you mount it,
and much fewer cables to have to worry about.
But there are a lot of unknowns.
For one, this TV is going to be super expensive.
I don't know how much, but it's going to be up there.
Second, all the wireless tech making this happen
is LGs own proprietary stuff, which is never great.
And third, I'm more than a little concerned
about latency for you gamers out there.
Wireless could be risky, but more than this TV itself
the most exciting part is that wireless concept.
Someday this will trickle down to TVs that you and I can buy
and that's going to be awesome.
When? Probably long after people are driving their Sony cars
on the road.
So, it's going to be a while,
but this is a glimpse of the future,
and at the end of the day, that's what CES is all about.
- [Andrew] So our award for best evolution of a concept
goes to the BMW i VISION Dee.
Last year BMW showed off an EV concept
that could literally change color
thanks to an exterior surface that was powered by E-ink.
We loved it but the monochromatic look
could basically just shift between black, white, and grey
left a lot to be desired.
So it was very cool to see BMW come back this year
with a similar concept that adds a whole rainbow
of color options.
The i VISION Dee can shift between 32 different color
options thanks to its E-ink surface.
And each segment can be individually controlled
to present a different color.
There's also an AR windshield and a talking
digital assistant that can express different moods.
Will any of this tech make it into a production vehicle?
Probably not anytime soon,
but in the future, it's anyone's guess.
So our award for best car at CES is the Sony Afeela.
Sony promised that it was going to bring an electric car
to CES this year, and it did,
but I don't think any of us were really prepared
for what we saw, Afeela.
Yeah, that's right.
Afeela is the name that Sony is giving to its lineup
of electric vehicles that it plans to make with Honda.
Really rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?
Afeela.
The silly brand names aside,
the car itself looks legit.
It basically presents as a cross
between a Porsche 911 and a Lucid Air.
Not the most unique design we've ever seen, but very sleek,
very shiny and positively brimming with tech.
Sony name checked a bunch of big names
during his presentation, including Epic's unreal Engine,
and Qualcomm, and they promised that 45 cameras,
and sensors affixed to the outside of the vehicle
will help with autonomous driving.
It may even have a built-in PS five at some point.
Why not? Dream big Sony.
- [Monica] So I'm giving the best laptop
of CES Award to Lenovo's dual screen yoga book 9i.
Now, when I first saw this announced
at Lenovo's presentation, I had a ton of questions
such as why are we losing another dual screen device,
and where is the touch pad?
But I actually got to try the thing for myself in Vegas
this week and it's really fun to use.
So there are all kinds of gestures.
You can flick the windows between the two screens,
you can maximize the window to fill the two screens,
and it's like a waterfall when you scroll,
there's a stylist in the back,
there's a virtual touch pad, there's a haptic keyboard.
It's really fun to use.
There are tons of tips and tricks,
and I think Lenovo has really done a lot of work
to make sure that the software makes this computer actually
usable and useful.
So we will not know for sure how useful,
and usable this device actually is until we have a full
production unit in our hands.
But so far I haven't seen any glitches.
I didn't get any blue screens.
The gestures all worked really well,
and I'm sure there are a lot more
that we didn't even learn about in our brief demo period.
So, I'm really excited to review this,
and it's looking really good so far.
- [Cameron] Deciding on the best monitor at CES 2023
was really tough, but my pick for the best one
goes to Samsung's curved 49 inch QD OLED gaming monitor,
mostly because it delivers QD OLED in a wacky new size.
This monitor has an ultra wide 32 by nine aspect ratio
with a 5120 by 1440 resolution.
Games that support this aspect ratio should look awesome.
I'm also excited because this is one of the few OLED
monitors announced in CES that has a glossy screen
instead of an anti-glare coating.
So colors and contrast should really pop.
It also has Samsung's gaming hub interface
allowing you to connect a controller,
so you can stream cloud games
through Xbox Cloud gaming and Nvidia GeForce Now.
If you aren't a gamer,
Samsung's ViewFinity S9 may be an alluring choice
especially if you're a creator.
It's 27 inch size and 5K resolution is a match for Apple's
own studio display.
We don't know the price yet,
but my guess is that Samsung wants to undercut Apple's 1599
starting price point.
This one's flooded with ports including one thunderbolt four
port, three USBC ports and display port.
Not to mention it can charge laptops at up to 96 watts.
- All right, so this next gadget might seem a little weird,
but the best health tech award
is going to go to the Withings U-Scan.
It's an at home, hands free, urinary scanner
that you just basically stick in your toilet bowl,
and pee on.
The reason why this is cool is that you're going to pee
every day anyway.
And so when you take a tinkle, the reader collects a small
sample and basically runs a bunch of tests depending
on which cartridge you get.
And you don't have to do anything to activate it.
You can just pee as you normally would,
and the reader will be able to tell the difference between
water and urine as well as who's actually doing the peeing.
So if you have a chronic metabolic condition
this can be really helpful and convenient.
You can just pee like normal in the comfort of your own home
and then get the results immediately on an app
on your phone.
That's huge.
It'll release in Europe sometime in 2023,
but it's still pending FDA clearance here in the US.
That said, it's already being used in clinical research.
I mean that's pretty cool.
For pee.
- AMD's new X3D desktop chips for PC gaming
were a super exciting announcement at CES this year.
But it was Sony's new accessibility controller that really
impressed me.
Codename project Leonardo.
The PS five accessibility controller will work
with third party accessories to bring even greater
PlayStation support for gamers with disabilities.
Sony's first party games have been really good at offering
up robust accessibility options already,
but this new controller can adapt to a range of needs
thanks to customizable buttons, joystick tops,
and the ability to integrate specialty switches, buttons,
and analog sticks.
Sadly, we didn't get to film Project Leonardo at CES,
and there's no word on exactly when Sony is planning
to launch this, but I'm still super happy to see big names
like Sony and Microsoft deliver accessibility
controllers that really help more people play.
- My pick for the best smart home device at CES.
The Aqara FP2 is a presence sensor.
It can detect movement in a room as small as you breathing
which means it's not going to turn off the lights on you
because you were sitting too still while you were reading
your book.
It can also detect multiple people,
and it can actually monitor different spaces in your room.
So you can set up automations as fine tuned
as when I get out of bed in the morning, turn on the lights
but don't do it if there's someone else in the room.
The sensor uses Wi-Fi and it's powered by USBC,
and it will cost $60.
It will work with Apple Home, Amazon Alexa,
Samsung Smart Things,
and eventually it will be upgraded to support Matter.
It doesn't need a smart home hub,
and it can do automations locally.
This type of intelligent motion detection
will help provide the smart home
the context its solely needs
enabling really specific automations,
such as turn on the light to read mode
when I sit in this chair after 7:00 PM.
It's going to work with Apple Home,
Samsung Smart Things, Amazon Alexa, and eventually Matter.
This year, the smart home at CES was bigger, bolder
and brighter with a huge presence on the show floor.
And one really hot topic, Matter.
Matter is a new smart home standard,
and it is our pick for best in show CES 2023.
Yes, that's right.
Not a laptop, not a computer,
not a giant TV, but a protocol.
And this protocol might just help bring the smart home
to life.
Announced at CES in 2019.
Matter is actually a partnership between Apple, Google,
Samsung, Amazon and a whole host of companies
in the smart home.
Just over three years later,
the standard is here and those big players,
they're all still working together to bring it to your home.
Not all the chatter on the show floor
has been totally positive.
There's a lot of concern about backward compatibility,
and for standard that's designed to make things easier
it's currently confoundedly complicated.
But one thing was clear, every company with a tow
in the smart home was talking about Matter.
The challenge will be continuing Matter's momentum
to get it to a place where it's as recognizable
as other protocols like Wi-Fi or Bluetooth.
For that to happen, Matter is going to have to deliver
on some of its promises pretty quickly.
And all those competitors will have to continue playing
nicely together for a lot longer.
- CES really felt like it was back this year,
and that is incredibly exciting to me
as someone who likes to nerd out about tech.
So, what did you see that you don't have the money
to spend on but you'd probably spend the money on?
Drop it down below.
For me, electric roller blades would be really cool,
and pretty dangerous.
I want it.
New year, new merch.
What's up?
It's super cool.
I don't actually wear a lot of black, but this,
this is sweet.
That's down below as well.
I hope you're well, bud.
Happy New Year.