As this is my first time visiting Computex I was anxious to see how the emerging trends from CES earlier this year have been adapted and regionalized for the local market. At CES we saw a new era of connected devices, great 3D stereoscopic and UI experiences all implemented in energy efficient CE platforms. So what trends will we take from this year's Computex into CES next year? Read more to get a quick preview.....
Connected TVs are still the trend to follow in the connected home; there are several that come to mind from Google's latest SmartTV announcement at the GoogeIO event last week to Microsoft's Mediaroom, Yahoo or Samsung's Internet@TV.
Microsoft has been in the Smart TV space for a number of years and has strong partnerships with a number of operators, OEMs and content partners across the industry and around the world.
Yahoo!'s Connected TV widgets launched almost 2 years ago at CES 2009 on a Samsung ARM Powered DTV and is now available across a whole range of leading DTV from Sony, LG and Vizio.
Additionally DTV OEMS such as, the People of Lava announced the first Connected Android TV a few months back and this will go on sale later this year, well ahead of Sony's Google TV with a wide range of applications as well as their own Apps store. It will be interesting to watch how Google's two technologies Android and GoogleTV square up against each other in the connected TV space and which one will win wider consumer appeal.
Android was front and centre at last week's Google IO event and from what is on display at the OESF booth at Computex, Android has found its way beyond mobile phones and tablets to the more traditional Digital Media Adapters (DMA) using reference design from the likes of Skyviia.
If you get a chance to stop by the booth and check out gaming on the SmartQ V5, the Spring Design Alex eReader, and the NEC Medality device which is a reference platform for OESF development.
The OESF booth is located at TWTC Hall One - Area C636, 638, 735, 737) and at the OESF conference (TICC, 201A).
ARM had a number of great Android devices on display today at the ARM demo suite (Grant Hyatt Suite 1019). See some photos from Engagdet here.
Some of my favourites include the Hardkernel Tablet using Samsung's S5PC110 with a 1GHz Cortex A8 processor, a Compal Android tablet featuring the Tegra processor which uses a dual Cortex-A9 processor, and a great adaption of the Android user experience by a company called Ubiquitous. Their Quick Boot solution can boot Android to a home screen in under one second!
Check out all of the ARM based demos from our Partners' booths at Computex and/or find out more about the Android support on the ARM architecture from our Solution Center for Android. All in all it was a great day for media rich connected devices and a strong showing for Android across a wide set of products. I'm looking forward to day 2.
Jim Wallace, Director Segment Marketing - Home, ARM, Jim has over 25 years of managing consumer marketing and business development, engineering and business units across a number of hi-tech semiconductor companies, including GEC Plessey Semiconductors, Mitel, Philips and Zarlink. Jim joined ARM in 2006 and leads development of the Consumer market segment. ARM is the world leader in semiconductor IP, with its technology powering over a quarter of all smart electronic devices. His special expertise is in the enablement of digital content delivery across multiple platforms. He began his career as an analog design engineer in Eindhoven after earning a BEng from the University of Limerick.