inThirty 74 – CES 2013

CES-2013

The industry trade show we love to hate is back, as are the giant televisions and bizarre fitness gadgets we’ve come to expect. Your trusty co-hosts take a look at some of the more interesting products at this year’s CES and whether any of them will ever see the light of day.

We’re guessing no.

Show Notes
Engadget’s CES 2013 Highlights | Engadget
MyFitnessPal
Fitbit Flex
HapiFork | ABC News
Westinghouse 110-inch TV | Engadget
4K Resolution | Wikipedia
Vuzix Smart Glasses
Pebble Smartwatch Hands-On | Engadget
Hands-On With the Imminently-Shipping Pebble Smart Watch | Daring Fireball
Ouya Gaming System
Steam Box | IGN
Lenovo 27-inch tablet | Cult of Mac

Attack of the Tablets

We wish everyone recovering from Hurricane Sandy well, and episode 65 of inThirty goes out to the team at PSE&G for getting power back to Chaim, Harry, and Justin in time to talk about tablets. Google didn’t fair as well and their scheduled Android event was moved from IRL to online. Chaim managed to collect all of the sweet details about the dot 2 update to Jelly Bean and the hardware that’ll accompany it before he was knocked off the grid but Harry is not impressed. We pit the new Android tablets and the Kindle Fire against the recently announced iPad Mini and discuss price point, features, design, and determine along the way that this holiday season Amazon, Google, and Apple will duke it out in in the less than ten inch category. Chaim and Justin were introduced to a new contender in the ring, the Microsoft Surface, at Microtropolis (go on, Google it), while Harry went undercover at a Microsoft Store to try it. Harry likes its kickstand, Chaim says it’s revolutionary, Justin says it’s mutant disaster of a device. Take some aspirin (that’s a really subtle tablet pun), put on your headphones, and listen up.
Episode 65 Hangout: http://youtu.be/Ik1g2gbYPXg

Coming to the Surface

We’ve all played a little Xbox, but how many of you ever got your hands on a Zune, or a Kin? Microsoft’s getting back into the hardware game with the Surface tablet and on episode 63 of inThirty we get into, about, and under the soon to be released device. We talk pricing, features, make predictions on future market share, and add to the overall confusion about the two different versions of Windows, RT and 8, that’ll run on this new entrant to the tablet market.

Episode 63 Hangout: http://youtu.be/6pxvOYZyAJg?t=5m22s

Show Notes
Microsoft Surface Pricing Goes Toe-to-Toe with Apple iPad | Slashdot
Surface with Windows RT | Microsoft
Surface RT: Pricing details, spec updates...” | PCWorld
Microsoft fails to explain Windows 8 vs. Windows RT…” | The Verge
On the Recent Microsoft Surface Announcements | Curious Rat

Let’s iBook It

You know what students need more of? Time spent staring at a screen!
Apple’s recently announced their push into digital textbooks with iBooks 2.0 and Chaim and Harry have it out over whether students should trade their old, moldy geography books (which still split Germany into East and West) for shiny new iPads (which also play Angry Birds).

Show Notes
iBooks 2.0 / iTunesU | Apple
A Teacher’s Take on iBooks | ChaimTime
“A Teacher’s Take on iBooks 2.0” – Rebuttal | Curious Rat