All the latest from the 2008 International CES



Intel is bringing its 45nm Penryn processors to Centrino laptops for the first time, the company has announced at CES 2008.

The company has launched five new mobile Penryn processors, although the high-end Extreme Edition chip won't arrive until later this year. The other four should start appearing in laptops by the end of this month.

The new chips will give laptops an immediate performance boost, without adding to the processor's power drain, according to Intel. "You'll see a modest 5-12% improvement in performance," Karen Regis, marketing manager for mobile products at Intel told PC Pro. "We're just at the beginning at the ramp of Penryn."



GestureTek has announced plans to bring its Wii-like motion control to mobile phones in the UK. Unlike Nintendo's technology, which uses an accelerometer to detect motion, GestureTek's EyeMobile is software that uses your phone's existing camera. The background environment is monitored, and any movement by the phone can be translated into movement on the screen. This means no special hardware is required, making for cheaper handsets.
"There's no advantage to using dedicated hardware, and that accelerometers just add cost," said Francis MacDougall, CTO and co-founder of GestureTek. "Our software will run on any current handset and doesn't add to the price of the phone."



Asus has confirmed that its next generation of Eee PC will be available with a 7in, 8in, or 9in screen, and will feature WiMax wireless broadband.

The larger screens will boost the Eee PC's resolution from 800x480 to 1024x600, making the ultra low cost laptops slightly more XP friendly. Reports suggest that this will come in handy, as the WiMax-loaded machines are likely to come preloaded with Microsoft's OS as standard, due to limited driver support for the technology in Linux.

Though the new Eee PC was a no-show at the Asus stall, the company says the new models will adhere to the compact design of their predecessor, though it stopped short of giving out form factor specifications.



The internet should come to us and not the other way round, according to Intel president and CEO Paul Otellini.

The Intel chief, giving his keynote speech at CES 2008, said people shouldn't have to hunt for information on search engines, but let it come to them when relevant.

"Today we live in an era of go-to internet," said Otellini. "The next evolution of the internet changes that model. Instead of going to the internet, the internet comes to us."




Mobile phones with built-in mini projectors will launch later this year, according to 3M, which gave PC Pro a hands-on demonstration of the the technology at CES 2008.

3M's LED illuminated projector is currently a prototype handheld device, that displays photos or films stored on the unit's SD or Mini-SD card.

The projector has a brightness of around 8-10 lumens, and is capable of displaying an image of up to 50in, although 3M's spokesperson Greg Roberts told us that, with perfect lighting conditions, it's possible to squeeze a 60in screen out of the projector.



Microsoft believes that design, rather than specifications, will be big factor in many consumers' buying decisions. With the PC market becoming heavily commoditised, manufacturers are looking for new ways to make their products stick out and increase margins, and design could be a key factor.
"Manufacturers need to find better ways to differentiate," said Nadine Kano, director of experience marketing for Microsoft. "There's now a real focus on style."

The company claimed that the trend for style has really taken off in the last year, with products like ASUS's Lamborghini and Sony's VAIO TZ laptops proving that consumers will pay extra for style.



While most companies are eager to push customers into upgrading, Sonos, the multi-room audio vendor, doesn't believe that it should be like this.

"How long did your last stereo last? 10 years?" said John MacFarlane, CEO of Sonos. "I hope that our products do the same and last 10 to 15 years. Once you've bought the hardware it should just be in and forgotten about."

MacFarlane also believes that the company's product is "done, and you won't see any major changes to the product". The company's aim now is to increase the availability of online content. It recently added Napster to its UK customers, so anyone with an account can choose tracks from millions and stream them live over their broadband connection.




The much-hyped - and extravagantly priced - Art Lebedev keyboard is making its debut at CES 2008, and PC Pro was given a hands-on demonstration of the ultimate typing machine.

Beneath each of the Optimus Maximus's 113 keys is a small OLED screen, which can be tailored to display icons and shortcuts of the user's choice.

Down the left-hand side of the demonstration model, for example, there is a bank of 10 shortcut buttons, displaying the logos of YouTube and Engadget for one-touch access to those websites, or the Firefox symbol to launch the browser.

The shortcut keys can also be dynamically updated - the Gmail logo displays a small number to show you how many unread messages are waiting in your inbox, which handily saves you from having to install a desktop alert.




The technology has been around in a galaxy far, far away for 30 years. But now the ultimate in Star Wars home entertainment has arrived - the R2-D2 DVD Projector.

The DVD playing droid is one of the star attractions at CES 2008, with crowds massing around the two demonstration units that are found on the stands of distributor Nikko and projector manufacturer Texas Instruments.

The battery-operated projector produces a surprisingly good picture - at least as far as we can tell; it was showing the 1977 Star Wars film, of course, which is hardly the pinnacle of high-definition picture sharpness.

The unit comes with built-in 20 Watt speakers and you can make R2 trundle into position with the remote control.