Although this year’s CES has turned from a strenuous Las Vegas fair into an endless series of live broadcasts to be enjoyed in the comfort of your home, there were certainly plenty of weird and wonderful technology ads – alongside more sober company presentations. like Intel, AMD and Nvidia that just announced boring things like video cards and processors.
We are writing down the coolest thing to get our attention and, at the end of Wednesday, we think we have the definitive list. Without further ado, here are the 10 most interesting technology bits announced at CES 2021.
1. Asus ROG Flow X13 convertible gaming laptop
Asus brought fire for this year’s show, with a seemingly endless ride of laptops, monitors, motherboards and gaming peripherals. For me, however, the highlight of its offerings was the ROG Flow X13, a tiny 13-inch gaming laptop with three (!!) graphics cards. You can choose between the integrated Vega graphics of the Ryzen 5980HS processor, a discrete GTX 1650 GPU and a tiny RTX 3080 external graphics card.
This last option is only available if you choose the 2021 ROG XG Mobile case, doubling the price, but it should unlock an absurd amount of gaming performance in an incredibly compact design – and the case also powers the laptop and provides a ton of extra ports USB for peripherals while it is connected. Not bad for anything smaller than the power brick of a gaming laptop.
There’s a lot more to love on the ROG Flow X13 itself too, including a 360 ° hinge, a choice of 4K or 1080p 120Hz 16:10 screens, high-performance LPDDR4X-4266 memory and 100W USB-C fast charging. Of course, all of this doesn’t come cheap, but the Flow X13 is still an immensely exciting laptop that is worth knowing.
If you’re looking for something a little more traditional, Asus has updated its popular Zephyrus G14 laptop with a Ryzen 5900HS CPU and RTX 3060 graphics; there is also a new 15-inch G15 that even has an RTX 3080 and a more affordable Tuf F15 with an 11th generation Intel processor and even an RTX 3070.
2. Razer Project Hazel smart face mask
Razer is known for making prospective, though somewhat unrealistic, concept ads at CES, and in 2021 it is no different. The Hazel Project is classified as ‘the smartest face mask in the world’, an N95 surgical respirator, active ventilation, UV cleaning and a voice amplifier. The design is also fantastic, with a clear section around your mouth for people to read your lips or understand your expression; there’s even a built-in light so people can still see your face at night. Oh, and there is RGB lighting, because we would be disappointed if there were not.
Few products were announced at CES where I immediately said, “Wow, I want one of these” and I really meant it, but for Project Hazel I am 100 percent on board. If we’re going to fight COVID for weeks and months, then I won’t care if I run out of a rechargeable mask that blows hot air, lights up in millions of colors and gives me a booming voice. Razer, take my money.
3. Monitor LG LG27GP950 4K 160Hz HDMI 2.1
“What is the best HDMI 2.1 monitor?”
This is a question I received a lot last year with the launch of the Xbox Series X and PS5, and the only real answer was that there were none – unless you counted LG’s 48-inch OLED CX as a monitor. Now, however, HDMI 2.1 screens seem to finally hit the market, and the most exciting I’ve seen so far is LG’s LG27GP950.
This screen with a catchy title has a resolution of 4K and can be overclocked from its native refresh rate of 144 Hz to 160 Hz, a new high for a 4K monitor. Via HDMI, you’ll be limited to 4K 120 Hz, but you’ll also have all the usual HDMI 2.1 features, including Auto Low Latency Mode and HDMI Forum VRR, compatible with the Xbox Series X / S. There’s also G-Sync and FreeSync for use the monitor with AMD or Nvidia video cards. Finally, the used Nano IPS panel meets the very strict requirements of the DisplayHDR 600, which means it can achieve 600 nits of brightness for really outstanding HDR highlights.
Of course, the LG27GP950 will not be the only HDMI 2.1 monitor on the market this year. There is the Eve Spectrum, which I recently had the chance to test (unfortunately without support for functional HDMI 2.1) and other recent announcements like the Asus PG32UQ, a 32 inch HDMI 2.1 monitor that could be a better choice for those with bigger and bigger budgets spaces. I’m sure we’ll see other options as well, which is great news for anyone looking for the best monitor for their PS5 or X Series.
4. Strange LaVie Mini laptops (and Lenovo ThinBook Plus Gen 2)
Lenovo brought a cool Switch-like gaming PC concept to the show in cooperation with NEC, the LaVie Mini. It has an 8-inch 1080p touchscreen and 11th generation Intel processor with Iris XE graphics, but the interesting part is how it works – it can be used as a portable device or placed on a dock to function more like a super tiny laptop . It looks like an experience similar to GDP Win Max, a fixed-format laptop with an integrated gamepad. I have been testing one of these recently and hope to share my ideas soon.
Lenovo also announced a bunch of slightly more traditional laptops, including one that caught my eye: the ThinBook Plus Gen 2, a laptop with a 12-inch e-ink touchscreen on the back of the standard screen. The e-ink part is larger, has a higher resolution and has a higher refresh rate than the original model that appeared at last year’s show, making it more useful for notes, task list markings and calendar checking . E-ink seems perennially like it’s about to step out of the e-reader category, so maybe this is the big hit that makes e-ink laptops viable?
5. LG A1 – the first affordable OLED?
In the past two years, LG has made our best 4K TVs for gaming, thanks to its incredible OLED panels and the willingness to include future-oriented gaming features like 120 Hz panels, variable refresh rate support and HDMI 2.1 ports . The recently announced A1 OLED flies against all of this, maintaining a 60 Hz panel, not supporting variable refresh rate and maintaining the old HDMI 2.0 standard.
This sounds very annoying, but the mere existence of the A1 suggests that this OLED TV will be significantly more affordable than its predecessor BX, thus allowing an entire new population to experience the benefits of OLED – almost infinite contrast, wide viewing angles, viewing time. perfect pixel response and so on. All of this can really bring games to life, not to mention movies and TV, so the prospect of an OLED below £ 1,000 / $ 1,000 is exciting.
6. HyperX Alloy Origins 60 mechanical keyboard
Yes the HyperX Alloy Origins 60 it’s just a small keyboard – and it’s incredible. 60 percent of the designs have been in vogue among mechanical keyboard enthusiasts for some time, and in late 2020 and early 2021, we saw the mainstream slowly catch up with this craze. The idea here is that the compact design allows for much more space for the mouse and even includes all the essential gaming keys, with the rest accessible through a function layer.
The Alloy Origins 60 comes with PBT keycaps, usually a premium aftermarket upgrade, HyperX red linear switches, a detachable USB-C cable and reprogrammable keys. HyperX is offering the Alloy Origins 60 for $ 100, a lower price than the Fnatic Streak 65 ($ 110) or the Razer Huntsman Mini ($ 120), so if the quality is there, then this could be an excellent introduction to the new smaller size.
7. LG UltraFine OLED Pro 4K monitor for PC
OLED is the future. Sure, there are still problems around burn-in, and Mini LED TVs are really cool, but after trying out an OLED screen for games and movies – those shades of black, the almost instantaneous pixel response time, the angle of vision, vibration – it’s hard to get back to an old school LCD. That’s why I’m very happy to see LG’s UltraFine OLED Pro, a 32-inch 4K monitor with a suitable OLED screen. It’s a more manageable size than the best previous OLED monitor for content creators, the LG CX 48-inch TV, and comes with more useful inputs like DisplayPort and USB-C with 90W power delivery.
It won’t be accessible – UltraFine displays never are – but it marks an important first step towards making OLED screens viable on the desktop. This should be an incredible choice for designers and content creators, who will be able to make use of this high pixel density and excellent color accuracy, and it gives companies like LG the opportunity to discover the best way to adapt OLED for use in desktop. LG Display, part of it Chaebol like LG Electronics, is making a lot of 20-32 inch screens next year and I pray that as many monitors as this can be possible – except, you know, cheaper.
8. Chewing gum with XPG Mana caffeine
XPG has announced several internal and external SSDs – including PCIe 4.0 models that should be fast enough to function as expandable storage on the PS5 – but we are not interested in them. Instead, we’re talking about your gum, which is packed with interesting ingredients like caffeine (for attention), lutein (for eye health) and mint (for flavor). While Razer was technically the first tech company to offer chewing gum for games, and Acer has been making Predator Shot energy drinks for some time, the endless CES 2021 items make the prospect of chewing gum with caffeine very tempting .
9. Razer Project Brooklyn – the ultimate gaming chair
Yes, Razer made this list twice. In addition to creating the ultimate COVID protective accessory, the company known as the ‘Lightning Snake’ in China also unveiled its Project Brooklyn gaming chair concept at this year’s fair.
The chair looks quite common at first, but then you notice that it has a table built into the armrests for your keyboard and mouse … and a 60-inch scrollable OLED screen (!!) that opens behind your head. Oh, and there’s RGB lighting, haptic motors for insane vibrations, a carbon fiber seat and cable routing for your peripherals. In a calmer year, this insane combination could very well have taken first place without contest, so it shows how 2021 is going now that Project Brooklyn only gets a mention on this list.
10. Line of all TCL 8K 2021 6 series
I knew I wanted to include one of TCL’s CES 2021 ads in this round, but I couldn’t decide between them scroll-like scrollable screens and your next 6-series TVs … but, ultimately, it’s the TVs that need to be approved when they’re really hitting the market and worth knowing about. In short, each of the company’s mid-range 6-series TVs will have 8K models, substantially reducing the entry point for 8K screens – although we only have historical prices as a guide here, since TCL has not announced final prices yet . These models will also include TCL’s second-generation Mini LED backlight, something that giants LG and Samsung are adopting for the first time on some of their 2021 TVs.
8K games are technically possible today in some games with DLSS and a high-end graphics card – even if it doesn’t really make sense – so there is an argument to be made that getting an 8K TV offers a small degree of future-review. as long as you don’t intend to update again for another five or ten years. Regardless, it is an interesting development that could spur the start of adoption of conventional 8K.
Packing
Phew, that’s enough! It was a lot of fun to cover all these new products and concepts, and it was announced a long time ago that it didn’t make the cut – Dell 40 ”curved 5120×2160 monitor, WD 4 TB external SSD, new laptops from Acer, Razer, Lenovo and Asus, the list is endless.
What did you find most exciting at CES this year? Let us know in the comments or write to us on Twitter @wsjudd or @digitalfoundry!