CES is about to get underway in Las Vegas on January 7, 2008. Last year HDTV displays were the hot items but Apple stole the show with the introduction of the iPhone. The boys must have made a deal this year because the "rumored" new Macbooks built around Intel's new 45 nm Penryn processor will not be revealed until well after CES ends.

Speaking of Penryn, we expect to see many laptop announcements at the show from manufacturers including Sony, Fujitsu, Aser, Dell, and more. Penryn offers a faster front side bus and lower power requirements. We'll be looking for LE  read more »

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This year, the hot new feature in HDTV just might be "motion control motion enhancement," or MEMC. MEMC chips can help reduce blurring in fast-action programming like sports. This has been a differentiation between Plasma TVs and LCD TVs. Plasma TVs have had fewer problems handling fast moving subjects than LCD TVs.  LCD TVs have countered with faster refresh rates (120 Hz) and faster pixel response times (8 ms. and lower).

MEMC promises to narrow the gap further. MEMC has been used for some time in the compression and decompression (CODEC) schemes but is  read more »

I see more and more cars here in the Bay Area with all kinds of devices hanging off the insides of windshields. I just learned that this is actually illegal in California and Minnesota (I'm pretty sure). Some people think there might be an exception for GPS devices but the California code makes it pretty clear there are only a few exceptions for things you can attach to the windshiled like toll tranceivers behind the mirror and stickers in the corners.

My daughter relocated to Austin, Tx recently. She had a webcam, I didn't. After a little research on Retrevo  which indicated that Logitech had the edge over Creative I headed over to Fry's. We have the good fortune (or bad) of having a Fry's five minutes from Retrevo World Headquaters in Sunnyvale , CA . I decided to splurge on the high-end Logitech QuickCam Pro 9000  and boy am I glad I did. Webcams have come a long way in the last few years. Th  read more »

A week later and lines are being drawn on Kindle. I still want one and think it's a revolutionary product albeit 1.0. Professional critics like John Dvork on TWIT had nothing good to say about it. Michael Arrington on a techcrunch video gave it 2 out 10, up from an earlier 0 out of 10. Robert Scoble has an impassioned critique on his site where he says the designers should be  read more »

Amazon's book reader launched last week to mixed reviews but personally, I agree with others who have said Kindle could be the iPod for books (unfortunately, minus the Apple design touch). In case you missed it, the Kindle which has been in development at Amazon for three years went on sale last week and sold out in less then six hours. Like the new Sony reader, it uses electronic paper that basically only uses power when loading a new page so when wireless networking is turned o  read more »

A little before mid-night on Nov 18, Retrevo launched its next big innovation. This innovation dramatically simplifies gadget (electronics) shopping for masses. You see, consumer electronics category is inundated with constant technological innovation, price changes and obsolescence. It is daunting to take the shopping journey even for the tech-savvy consumers. You don't know where to start and when you do manage to start the journey and zoom into a set of products that meet your brand and feature preference, you are never sure which product delivers a good bang for the buck.  read more »

If I was shopping for a reaonably priced HDTV and wanted to get the best bang for the buck, I would seriously consider passing on "Full HD," or 1080p and go for a 42 or 50 inch LCD or Plasma TV. First of all most people can't even see a difference between 1080p and 720p at distances greater than 8 or 9 feet. Secondly most programming coming over the air on cable or satellite is 720p or 1080i. High definition DVDs are the only reason right now to spend the extra bucks for 1080p. Retrevo's new Value Engine scientifically analyzes thousands of products along with features and prices to produce a Value Map that makes it very clear that 720p LCD and Plasma TV sets offer the most bang for the buck.  read more »

A few weeks ago I was on a panel at Investor Business Forum when one of the venture investors attending the session asked "why is it that we see more entrepreneurs and even companies we fund founded by immigrant entrepreneurs"? I answered the question and it is not hard to understand why it is so. From 1513, when the Spanish explorer Ponce De Leon discovered Florida to French and German emigration in mid 19th century to emigration of Russians in late 19th century, Italians in early 20th century and Asians in mid 20th century, America has been the land of opportunity that has attracted talent, labor and intellectual capital from all over the world. And I would argue this has been the major driver behind the growth that has made America the super-power it is today.  read more »

Many of us have still not gotten used to the changed daylight saving time (three weeks earlier in March and one week later in Nov). And those of us who are at least aware have often rationalized the inconvenience by savings in energy cost (myself included). Yes, we will get used to starting work at odd hours and working at odd hours in the evening. But will we really save energy? There was an article in the journal today that covered this topic at length. According to Megan Barnett, the spokeswoman of US Energy Department "The jury is still out on the potential national energy savings". Well, that kills my excitement about the change in daylight saving implemented earlier this year.  read more »