The Consumer Electronics Show happens once every year and its almost always in the first week. It is a fun time to get a glimpse of the products to be launched through the year, by your favourite brands, but it also sets the tone for the trends to follow. Some of these products are set to launch weeks from now, some later. We looked at the latest announcements and listed some of the products that we think are exciting and we might see in some form or the other in the Indian market.
NVIDIA’s GeForce RTX 3000 series
NVIDIA’s announcements and launches affect a lot of people, but none more than PC, laptop gamers and content creators. NVIDIA’s latest generation of graphics solutions are called the GeForce RTX 3000 series, that include prominent graphics solutions. They have been around for a while. There were additions to that line-up.
The GeForce RTX 3050 has been around on the laptops for a short while now, and if you are considering a budget gaming laptop, you can check out our assortment of gaming laptops. The same graphics card will soon be available for desktop users as well, at an estimated price of $250. The desktop version of the graphics card ships with 8GB of GDDR6 RAM, and NVIDIA says it will be a major step up from the GeForce GTX 1650 and 1050 Ti graphics cards of the past. The same goes for the mobile implementation of the GPU.
NVIDIA also announced two ultra-high performance graphics cards for laptops – namely the GeForce RTX 3080 Ti and the 3070 Ti. This should be good news for premium gaming laptops. There are a range of advancements including the fourth generation of Max-Q designs, which helps NVIDIA make slim graphics solutions for laptops that are slim, but also performant. Battery performance has also been improved with the help of the Battery Boost 2.0 feature, and there are features that help the graphics processors, control, and make effective use of the CPU. NVIDIA claims there will be benefits seen in the temperature, throughput, and power usage of the products.
AMD Ryzen 6000 series processors for laptops
AMD had a range for announcements, which included a tease of the upcoming desktop processors, the next-generation Ryzen 7000 series. There were few details given, except that were expected sometime in the second half of 2022, and that were to be based on a 5nm fabrication process and a new AM5 socket.
The more immediate interest ought to be in the new upcoming 6000 series processors for laptops. The new processors will be based on the new Zen 3+ architecture, and one of the benefits is being able to offer more performance per watt used. AMD claims the processors can be clocked up to 5 GHz clock speeds and they can be up to 1.3 times faster at software processing, and up to 2.1 times faster in graphics performance. The new platform will also use faster DDR5 memory and include features such as PCIe 4.0 which is great news for other components. USB 4 also makes an appearance, along with Wi-Fi 6e solutions. Of course, all of these depend on the laptop you purchase, but it is a good thing to know there is a lot to look forward to, in the laptop of the future.
Intel 12th generation Alder Lake processors for laptops
Intel too announced a range of processors, code-named Alder Lake. They are Intel’s 12 generation processors, limited to 45W TDP meant for mobile devices such as laptops. There were a wide range of desktop processors announced too. The Alder Lake-H series of processors for laptops use hybrid core designs, which include performance and efficiency cores, so you get the best of both worlds – performance but also reliable battery life. Depending on the mobile you chose, you could see a combination of 4 + 4 performance and efficiency cores, and as you go up the price range, even see six performance cores coupled with eight efficiency cores. The performance cores can be clocked as high as 5 GHz, when the need for performance arises, and the power consumption under these modes can be as low as 95 W and as high as 115 W.
Lenovo ThinkPad Z Series
Lenovo’s ThinkPad line-up have been a no-nonsense one. This has resulted in a robust, reliable, and performance-oriented setup for serious officegoers and enthusiasts. This means, the ThinkPad has never been meant to be stylish. Lenovo intends to correct this with their new Z Series of laptops and there are two models to kick off this motion – the ThinkPad Z13 and Z16.
Both the models are powered by AMD’s Ryzen Pro series of processors, and you can have them from models going all the way up to 32 GB of DDR5 RAM. The Z13 model runs AMD’s Ryzen PRO and PRO U-Series processors, while the more expensive model, the Z16 runs the AMD Ryzen PRO-H series. The choice of colours is different too, with bronze and arctic grey accents. Thy are noticeably different from the usual black we are used to seeing on most ThinkPads for decades. The packaging and as well as part of the components are made of recycled aluminium and vegan leather. The packaging comes from compostable bamboo and sugarcane, so not only are the new ThinkPads bolder, but they are also friendly to the environment. The other impressive bit is the display that offers users OLED panels running 2.8K and 4K displays. Even the bezels have been shrunk down, so these look any modern laptop ought to, in 2022.
Sony PlayStation VR2
Sony is best known for its PlayStation range of gaming consoles and the new PlayStation V still is one of the most demanded ones around. The sheer features and performances are things we have explored several times here at Reliance Digital. Sony announced something that made us excited. It is called the PlayStation VR2, and it is a virtual-reality headset unlike any other. Sony says that the display runs a 2000 x 2040 resolution, higher than a lot of the phones and TVs in the market. The PlayStation VR2 should offer 4K HDR, and up to 100 degrees of field of view. The display is OLED, so you can also extent some flawless visuals and contrast ratios. The headset even tracks your eyes, that makes interacting with things in the games a lot easier. The VR2 headset even ships with the new Sense controllers that are designed to help you interact with in-game objects better and for navigating. If you thought VR was dead, you are wrong. Regardless, these are still early days, and we must wait for more concrete details and release dates to be announced.
Samsung Eco remotes
While the entire world gets excited about bigger screens, better panels, and more smart features on TVs, we are more curious about the remotes that Samsung plans on shipping with some of their upcoming TVs. They are called the new Eco Remotes, and here is the kicker – you can place the remote near anything that gives out radio waves and the remote should charge itself, using something called radio frequency harvesting. Samsung says you can recharge the remote using the USB Type-C port as well, although. Imagine never having to charge or replace batteries on your remote. If you are looking at CES 2022 for future of quality-of-life improvements, this should be an absolute must in every wireless remote across all products.
ASUS ROG Strix Flare II Animate
We like gaming keyboards, and you can find a wide range of them here at Reliance Digital, but our eyes for now are also on ASUS’ new ROG Strix Flare II. Like any capable gaming keyboard, it is based on mechanical switches, but more impressive is its 320-LED line-up that sits on one corner of the keyboard. It can show all kinds of low-resolution logos and information. They can be animated as well, so those streaming on Twitch and YouTube could have cute emojis animated there, or you could display key stats from the system or audio effects, even notifications and the time and date. The possibilities are endless and up to your imagination. The keyboard also boasts of a blistering 8000Hz refresh rate, and the keys on the keyboard can be swapped. You can choose between ASUS’ ROG NX range of switches for different feels and sounds. The keyboard also has dedicated physical metal volume and media controls, so you do not need to fumble with complex key-combos to basic tasks. We like the places keyboards are headed.
TP-Link Archer AXE200 Omni router
Routers on any day may seem like boring products. They do after all, sit around in your home or work, unsuspecting. There is a lot of chatter around the performance, and how antennas can affect it. TP-Link’s new router looks unlike any other, but a closer look and it becomes apparent that this is a router with moving parts, moving antennas to be precise. it’s called the TP-Link Archer AXE200 Omni. At its heart is a 2 GHz quad-core processor, and it supports speeds over 10 Gbps all with the help of the new 6 GHz band that is rarely seen on routers till now. The use of the motorized antennas is to identify in which direction the devices you are using are and automatically rotate accordingly to offer the best wireless network speeds imaginable. The performance is not only channeled wirelessly, but you can also use 2.5G ports in addition to the massively fast 10G port on the router. We are not saying motorized antennas are necessary on every router, but the design and speeds sure have made us dizzyingly excited.
These were only some of the interesting products. Reliance Digital is among the first to bring you the coolest products in India, as they come. We’re hoping for them to show up here. If you like reading about the latest technology space and what’s to come, bookmark reliancedigital.in and keep checking this space. If checking things out first-hand is more your thing, just head over to your nearest Reliance Digital store. There is a ton of cool stuff in store!
