CES 2017
Wednesday, 4 January 2017
Update all the laptops
With new 7th-generation Core chips from Intel landing in the months before CES, it was time for a seemingly every PC manufacturer to update their lineup. In the cards for everybody: thinner, lighter, marginally faster, longer-lasting batteries, Thunderbolt 3 and USB-C, and a notable decrease in bezels.
- Samsung's updated Notebook 9 is the new lightest 13-inch laptop
- Samsung finally makes gaming laptops: this is the Notebook Odyssey
- ASUS announces ZenBook 3 Deluxe and updated ROG gaming laptops
- HP's CES 2017 releases are truly gorgeous PCs
The new BlackBerry that's not made by BlackBerry
BlackBerry's back, alright!
From the looks of the BlackBerry Mercury you'd think that BlackBerry hadn't changed at all. But this is a phone from TCL, the new licensee of the BlackBerry brand, even if it looks and feels every part a BlackBerry. We're still light on practically every detail, from specs to the actual production name, but we're still kind of excited to see that the shifting of the BlackBerry brand doesn't mean the abandonment of the classic keyboard.
- BlackBerry announces the 'Mercury' without actually confirming anything, including its name
- BlackBerry 'Mercury' hands-on: Riding into 2017 on a phone with no name
- Mercury gives us reasons to be hopeful about BlackBerry in 2017
Honor's Magic is a design showcase as a phone
Curved all around, because they can.
Huawei's never been a manufacturer that shied away from making crazy hardware, and their Honor sub-brand has generated a phone that's a truly beautiful piece of design: the Honor Magic. The glass is curved in every direction more substantially than any phone we've seen before, married to a thin metal frame. As Android Central's Andrew Martonik described it, it's similar to the "Galaxy S7 edge, but it's even more impressively thin and compact." More impressive, however, might be the software: Honor baked in artificial intelligence to help the phone predict what you'll want to do, such as dynamically rearranging your home screen.
The first Chromebook designed for Android apps
Google and Samsung partnered up to design an impressive new pair of Chrome OS devices: the Samsung Chromebook Plus and Pro. These convertible Chromebooks are the first designed with running Android apps in mind, and as such they're equipped with full motion sensor suites. Beyond that, Samsung also built in their stylus tech — pop out the docked pen and you'll be able to write and draw to your heart's content on the hi-res 12.3-inch display.
ASUS announces two new phones with four cameras
ASUS took to CES 2017 to unveil their newest ZenFone devices: the ZenFone 3 Zoom and the ZenFone AR. The ZenFone 3 Zoom is the follow-up to the unique if flawed optically-zooming ZenFone Zoom, and its ditching of the mechanical optical zoom is both a disappointment and not a surprise. In its place are a pair of cameras — one standard, one telephoto, not unlike the iPhone 7 Plus. On the flip side is the ZenFone AR, which uses its cameras and sensor array to scan your surroundings in full 3D. It's not the first phone to do this, but it's certainly the most compact Google Tango phone we've yet seen.
- ASUS ZenFone 3 Zoom joins the dual-camera train, adds a 5000 mAh battery for good measure
- ASUS ZenFone 3 Zoom hands-on: Focused on being more than just a camera
- Tango and Daydream finally coexist in a single phone thanks to the ASUS ZenFone AR
NVIDIA's Shield TV box has been something of a sleeper hit — those that know it love it, but it's never really got a heavy push behind it. We don't know if that's going to change with the latest update, but we do know it's an impressive update. Coming to the Android TV party is Google Assistant, Samsung SmartThings integration, HDR video, and a whole bunch of new games.
