Giant leap in the techworld

Consumer Electronics Show, in short CES, has brought us new fascinating innovations this year during the four event days. Unfortunately, due to COVID-19, it was held online this year, unlike the previous years. This did not bring the fun down, many major brands have announced new, innovative products.

Day 1 Highlights:

LG Electronics has announced a new smartphone form factor called ‘rollable’ phones. It is a new type of phone where the phone’s display is able to roll, allowing users to expand or contract the size of their phones.

Similar to the concept of foldable phones introduced by Samsung and Huawei 2 years ago. However, the foldable phone concept has a major drawback which is the lack of durability and water resistance. As the phone has to fold physically, the display remains vulnerable to exterior damages, yet the folding action leaves a gap between the edge of the hinge, allowing water and dust to come in. LG claims to have solved two major issues as having the display rolling inside the frame, not exposing the portion of the display when contracted following with less exposure to water.

Samsung Electronics has announced a new TV lineup with their new display panel called ‘Micro LED’. A quick explanation of TV panels, most of the consumer TVs uses LCD, QLED, and OLED. LCD and QLED are widely used as they are inexpensive but with a great performance with the sacrifice of color contrast. OLED panels have “resolved” the issues with the previous panels but comes at a greater price. No panels are perfect, where OLED panels suffer from color degradation over time and burn-in (permanent image retention on the screen when a static image has been viewed for hours). Samsung claims that their new technology will address the problems that OLED panels suffer at an affordable price.

Following their Micro LED TVs, Samsung has also announced consumer bots called “Samsung Bots”. These bots are designed to do housework such as cleaning, monitoring, etc. Samsung showcased four different types of bots: Bot Air (air purifier), Bot Care (health monitoring system), Bot Retail (used for restaurants and shops), and GEMS (Gait Enhancing and Motivating System; helps people with mobility issues).

Day 2 highlights:

The second day of CES, as known as the “chip wars”, introduced new desktop and laptop chipsets from four major companies: Intel, AMD, and Nvidia.

Lisa Su, the CEO of AMD, introduced new lineups (Ryzen 5000 series) for laptop processors that are based on the third generation of ZEN architecture. She noted that the Ryzen 5000 series will deliver up to 16% in performance boost prior to the last year’s Ryzen 4000 with higher frequency, from 4.2GHz to 4.8GHz. AMD currently has partnered up with Lenovo, HP, and ASUS which will be available in February.

AMD also introduced new high-end versions of chips with the Zen 3 architecture for consumer PCs named “Threadripper PRO 3995WX”, which runs at 4.2Ghz. Though, no other information about this processor has been given yet regarding the price and the release date.

Following AMD’s processor lineups, they also announced new GPUs (Graphics Processing Unit) for laptops named “Big Navi” where further information will be released shortly after.

Last year, Nvidia launched new high and mid-end desktop graphic cards for gamers which are based on the newest Ampere architecture. At CES 2021, the company focused on low-end graphic cards, launching the “RTX 3060” that costs around $330. Despite its low price compared to other models such as RTX 3080s, priced $1400, RTX 3060 still delivers a decent performance in 3D rendering and ray tracing (about 20% less powerful than RTX 3060 Ti, a mid-tier GPU). Still, it is as twice as powerful as its predecessor, RTX 2060 that also costs $330 at launch.

Nvidia is also bringing laptop graphic chips using their Ampere design. Currently, the RTX3080, 3070 and, 3060 have been released on gaming laptops notably. It delivers up to 35% more performance prior to its predecessor with less amount of heat generated, and more energy efficiency.

Intel, the giant chipset maker has been struggling for the past few years implementing their latest technology due to shortages in supply and manufacturing issues. But the problems did not stop Intel from revealing their new processors at CES. Intel expanded their last year’s 11th generation processor called “Core”. This year they focused on adding 11th-gen for powerful gaming laptops and desktops. The “Core S” series is 14% faster than their prior gaming, high-performance desktop chips following with the new versions of the “Core H” series for laptops.

Besides “chip wars”, Razer, well known in the gaming industry has unveiled an interesting prototype, called “the world’s smartest mask” code-named Project Hazel. It is an advanced surgical mask based on the N95 mask, this includes active air ventilation, auto sterilization, and voice amplifier. In addition, user customization is also possible with Razer Chroma™ RGB lighting built-in, capable of lighting up to 16million distinct colors. Although this wild concept is still veiled to the public, the company’s ambitions have gained quite a lot of attraction from the tech reviewers on YouTube.

Day 3 Highlights:

The third day of the CES event mainly focused on smart home gadgets. One received much attention from the audience. MyQ Pet Portal introduced a “smart doggie door” designed to ease pet owners while away from home. Pet owners can control the door remotely, and it includes live video streaming with a two-way audio system on both sides of the door. It is designed to fit animals from 10 pounds to 90 pounds, most importantly, it is equipped with safety sensors so pets will not get stuck midway.

Day 4 highlights:

The most anticipated and awaited Galaxy S21 series has been released by Samsung during the Galaxy Unpacked event. There are three variants: Galaxy S21, Galaxy S21 +, and Galaxy S21 Ultra. All models are equipped with the latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 processors, that is more power-efficient, generates less heat, allows faster and accurate on-screen fingerprint unlock.

This year, Samsung has polished their mobile devices in terms of quality and design. It has improved battery life, the base model, Galaxy S21 has 5,000mah of battery capacity, 1,000mah more than its previous generation. It is proven to last about an hour or an hour and a half more, though, this may depend on the user. Shockingly, the S21 Ultra features with S Pen, a digital pen that was exclusive to the Galaxy Note series.

The CES 2021 unveiled many new innovative products this year despite the current world situation.