What's Hot, What's Not At CES

AMD's SmartHouse 'dad' Brian Taylor demonstrates the features of the new AMD LIVE!-powered home entertainment system unveiled at CES on Monday. Powered by AMD's quad-core Phenom desktop processors and forthcoming multi-core Turion notebook chips, the system is built around a newly branded PC called AMD LIVE! Ultra.

The desktop version takes AMD's Spider CPU-GPU-chipset platform and tweaks it for home entertainment with the new AMD LIVE! Explorer application for dynamic, split-screen multimedia tasks. Discrete graphics from the chipmaker's ATI division pack the system with extra visual punch. AMD says OEMs and system builders should be rolling out AMD LIVE! Ultra desktops during the first half of the year, while the Turion-based laptop version is expected to start shipping in the second half.

Here's a sneak peek at AMD's next-generation R680 enthusiast graphics processor. Based on the 55nm process which AMD's ATI division recently introduced, this top-of-the-line graphics card features two GPUs for some serious 3D number-crunching. It's expected to be available early this quarter and will tack on a high-end version to the initial mid-priced Spider enthusiast CPU-GPU-chipset platform AMD launched late last year.

Mix equal parts soccer mom, gourmand and geek, and what have you got? Whirlpool's centralpark plug-and-play digital platform for refrigerators, with four new gadgets for the system unveiled Monday at CES in Las Vegas.

The centralpark-compatible CEIVA Digital Photo Frame is already on retail shelves, while new fridge door gadgets and interfaces revealed at CES include the Clio Vu web tablet, Cozi family organizational software, the Brandmotion iPod speaker system and the Quartet Qnote Message Center (pictured). Whirlpool's centralpark connection costs about $2,000 at Best Buy, while CEIVA's Digital Photo Frames cost $249.

Human statuary was a central theme at CES Unveiled, a pre-show teaser held Saturday in Las Vegas at the Sands Expo Center. TV crews flocked to the various whirly-gigs and doodads on offer. Print media mostly stuck to the free food and booze.

The great thing about this handset holder from Zivio is that it's got coils. Coils, I tell ya! Who doesn't love a coil?

A gamer at Sunday's Digital Experience pre-CES event gets intense on an Alienware rig.

Passersby on Monday were thrilled to find one woman at the Las Vegas Convention Center who encouraged looking at her chest. Who knew IBM had it in them?

Toshiba's TDP-TW100U digital light-processing mobile projector features wireless networking capabilities in a portable form factor. With image quality measuring in at 2,700 ANSI lumens, the TDP-TW100U weighs 6.8 lbs., offers a 2000:1 contrast ratio, features XGA 1024x768 native resolution and boasts Toshiba's proprietary Natural Color Enhancer2. For the low, low price of $1,699, it's all yours.

Lexmark's Professional X6575 business-class inkjet printer is all wireless, all the time. Print speeds spit out 28 black pages per minute and 24 colors, and the X6575 also has a 48-bit flatbed color scanner and a stand-alone fax that can store 99 speed dial numbers.

Thomson Consumer Network Solutions has a new line of GE-branded telephones for the hearing impaired tagged "See and Hear, Loud and Clear.' The phones feature something called DECT 6.0 Interference Free technology, which Thomson says enables users to customize the phone sound to their specific hearing loss frequencies. The corded phone pictured has a three-band equalizer for tone control and volume controls that permit up to a 40 decibel gain and up to a maximum 104 dB sound pressure level. The ringer can get as loud as 90dB, and it retails for $149.95.

If other people's earwax bothers you, never fear. With Belkin's new RockStar iPod hub you can share your tunes with up to five pals without ever letting your headphones enter another ear. The RockStar is priced at $19.99 and will be available in the U.S. in March.

Another curvaceous gizmo from Belkin by way of gaming KVM specialists Razer is the n52te SpeedPad. This hybrid gaming keyboard has a backlit keypad and scroll wheel, enhanced and button responsiveness, 15 programmable keys and a programmable eight-way thumb pad with removable joystick, and an adjustable soft-touch wrist pad. Gamers, no doubt, will be most attracted to the SpeedPad's non-slip rubber surfaces, which Belkin claims 'grip in place for excessive fragging.' Priced at $69.99, the SpeedPad is already available in the U.S.