Apple reportedly met with the suppliers of augmented reality glasses components at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week.
The company made a significant push into AR with the launch of its ARKit framework in iOS 11, while rumors surrounding its own wearable AR hardware have been circling for years.
When lens maker ZEISS partnered with ExoLens to bring pro optics to the iPhone, mobile photographers had to make a choice between having great lenses or a protective case for the phone.
Now ExoLens has solved that, at least for the iPhone 7, with a protective case that will accommodate the ZEISS line of lenses. The new ExoLens Case will be on display at CES in Las Vegas this week and will be available for purchase within the next couple of months.
It’s been a busy week here at Cult of Mac as we all scrambled to get as much news as possible out of CES, the big electronics show that’s been chugging right along in Las Vegas. It’s one of the biggest trade shows in the world, so we had plenty of news to go around.
We had people on the show floor discussing everything gadgety — including the finer points of rejuvenating one’s vagina — and we had people at home trying to ignore how hilarious that was for long enough to crank out the rest of the news. While the stories were plentiful, our handy hub here ensures you don’t have to click around too much to get everything worth knowing from the show.
Here’s the huge collection of all of our coverage from CES 2016.
The iPhone camera is great at photos and videos, but if you want to take your shots to the next level, you need some extra gear. BeastGrip is the easy-to-use solution that enables photogs to attach all sorts of components like stabilizers, mics, lights, and DSLR lenses to the iPhone to make a custom, pro-quality camera rig.
Every aspect of BeastGrip’s modular system can be expanded to fit practically any piece of photography hardware you throw at it. Whether you’re shooting on an iPhone, Android, or Windows device, simply loosen some screws, slide in a new segment, and you’re ready to capture professional quality video from your smartphone.
Flexibility is BeatGrip’s biggest selling point. The body alone costs $115, but you can also buy a kit with the company’s DOF adapter that lets you mount Canon or Nikon DSLR lenses to your iPhone, giving you much better depth-of-field for really unique camera phone shots.
You can warn your kid about too much screen time until you’re blue in the face. They’re too absorbed to listen. You need an enforcer or, better yet, an EyeForcer.
It’s another gadget for your kid, but this one works with you. Looking like eyeglass frames without lenses, the EyeForcer shuts down your child’s device when it senses he or she has been on it too long. It promotes good posture by switching the device off when the young user begins to slouch.
LAS VEGAS — Learning how to fly a drone isn’t easy, and accidents happen all the time. Wouldn’t it be great if your drone could just fly itself?
AirDog does just that. In fact, the only way to fly AirDog is to use its incredible auto-following technology that keeps the camera aimed at you during the entire flight Cult of Mac met up with the makers of AirDog at CES 2016 for a mountain-biking demo in the desert to see how the drone uses LiDAR and other tech to capture spectacular aerial footage on the fly without any human intervention. We came away ridiculously impressed.
If music is one of the lights of your life, then shouldn’t your speakers shine, too?
Acoustic Research introduced a new line of wireless speakers that offer quality sound, a design attractive indoors and out and a customizable, multi-color LED light to fit the mood of your music and social scene.
Your god gave you athletic gifts, or so you believe. But don’t listen to yourself or buddies who play alongside you and talk trash about your skills.
PIQ, a multi-sport sensor, can quickly tease out the divine delusion with Earthly performance metrics that, if you’re honest with yourself, can help you improve your game, whether its golf, tennis, skiing or 21 other sports.
You now have a new buddy to enable you to binge watch TV like never before.
DishTV just rolled out the Hopper 3 DVR, which lets you record up to 16 programs at once. Sixteen! Consider that the first DVR player in 1999 only let you record one show at a time.
It seems like DishTV is putting its eggs in a basket that contrasts nicely with the Apple TV streaming model; the Hopper 3 will store all your shows for you and not have an effect on your bandwidth bottom line.
Consumer electronics company Netatmo has made a camera that is easily overlooked as it keeps a lookout outside your door.
The outdoor surveillance camera Netatmo named Presence uses an algorithm to detect whether something in its view is a person, car or animal. It then immediately sends a notification through a companion iPhone or Android app along with an option to see what the camera recorded.
If you’re like the rest of us, you’ve got a nice Mac with plenty of video, photos, and apps on it. Time Machine is a fantastic way to keep your stuff all backed up and safe, so you’ll need a high-capacity drive to do that with.
Samsung’s new external solid state drive (SSD), called the T3, has the capacity of multiple terabytes to keep more of your data backed up and the speed to make it easy.
“Following the successful worldwide launch of the Portable SSD T1 in 2015, we made several significant upgrades to the T3 based on the feedback and needs of our customers, which included content creators and business professionals in particular,” said Samsung’s Un-Soo Kim in a statement.
The folks at HairMax are at CES 2016 to show that yes, it is totally possible to stimulate hair follicles to regrow your skimpy, thinning head of hair into a thick, furry mane. However, there is a catch: You have to have the right type of baldness.
The LaserBand 82 brings laser revitalization to the home with its 82 medical-grade lasers that provide a full treatment for hair loss in 90 seconds. Cult of Mac caught up with HairMax at CES, the largest orgy of tech gadgetry in the world, to get a heads-on look at the funky futuristic headgear.
Sleep Number is perhaps one of the very few companies at CES that actually wants to put us to sleep instead of keep us awake with bright screens and games all night. It’s very latest method for accomplishing that goal is the It bed: a bed that will track different aspects of your sleep patterns during the night to inform you on just how well you’re sleeping at night. Plus, it’ll integrate with its own app and other third-party apps to do that.
Griffin Technology introduced several new products ahead of CES 2016 that aim to improve the way you charge your Apple devices. A prominent pick is a tiny portable battery called the Travel Power Bank that delivers much needed on-the-go power to the often inadequate Apple Watch.
“With our compact, all-in-one battery and charging cable on hand, users can leave their Apple Watch charging cable safe at home with no worries about running out of power,” said Andrew Biddle, Category Manager of Power Products at Griffin Technology.
2016 is here and that can only mean one thing: It’s time for CES.
The world’s biggest consumer electronics show, CES 2016, is getting underway this week in Las Vegas, which means nerds and all the companies that make the gadgets they love are instinctively flocking to the desert oasis like the salmon of Capistrano.
This year’s show promises to be bigger than ever, with all the latest tech trends on full display. Cult of Mac will be on the scene all week long bring hands-on looks at the coolest and weirdest gadgets CES has to offer.
LAS VEGAS — Hearing aids aren’t sexy, so a lot of journalists here at International CES breezed right by ReSound’s booth.
The Danish company has been in the hearing aid business for 75 years, and launched the first iPhone-connected hearing aid at CES last year. Now the company is a back with a full lineup of iPhone-compatible LiNX hearing aids. The devices address the whole range of hearing loss, from the mild to severe.
As I approach 50, I’m wondering if I need a pair myself, so I went to check them out. I was impressed. Connecting a hearing aid to an iPhone adds a lot of very useful functionality.
LAS VEGAS — Of all the amazing technology on show here at International CES, the most surprising so far is Hewlett-Packard’s weird Sprout, a multitalented Franken-puter that looks like a ton of fun.
The HP Sprout is a touchscreen computer married to a multitouch pad, with a projector/camera/3-D scanner peering overhead. It looks like a bad prop from a Lego version of War of the Worlds.
I’d seen the press releases when it launched last October and had pretty low expectations. It just looked too weird. But I was genuinely delighted to see it in action.
LAS VEGAS — Bryan Chaffin loves his Casper mattress.
“I don’t even know where to start,” effused the Mac Observer executive vice president. “It’s the most comfortable mattress I’ve ever slept on. It was dead-easy to set up. It’s just incredibly comfortable.”
Chaffin is a satisfied customer of Casper, a New York startup shaking up the tired old mattress industry. Casper is doing everything differently, from the design of its all-foam mattress to the way it sells and ships direct to customers.
LAS VEGAS — When Garmin launches a $600 smartwatch just a few weeks before Apple is about to introduce its category killer, the company must be pretty confident.
Here at International CES, Garmin is showing off its new line of Fenix 3 Sports Watches — multisport fitness trackers with built-in GPS that can pair with a smartphone to show various alerts and notifications. It comes in three models, including the handsome Sapphire, which has a hard sapphire crystal face. It’s a beauty, but surely doomed, right?
When asked if Garmin was worried about the Apple Watch, due to be launched sometime this spring, a spokeswoman confidently said absolutely not. She explained that Garmin’s watches are unapologetically outdoor fitness devices built for sportspeople who want a watch to do very specific things — track workouts – and aren’t interested in beaming heartbeats or sending emojis.
“They are purpose-built,” she said, gesturing at the display. “They’re built for hiking, biking and running. Garmin has been in the wearables market for 10 years. We’re not worried at all.”
LAS VEGAS — For eight years, Paul Chavand been working hard to bring the world a pair of motorized skates. Why? To revolutionize the simple act of walking. Chavand’s dream is turn a simple stroll into an effortless glide on motorized wheels.
But don’t call them skates. Chavand, a mathematics teacher from France’s Burgundy region, gets rather upset at that. Skates imply imbalance, falling over and wildly flailing arms. Chavand’s Rollkers require no “skating.” You just stand still and the motorized wheels zip you along. Balancing is as simple as standing up, the inventor says.
So instead of “skates,” he calls his invention, rather comically, “under shoes.”
LAS VEGAS — The small but humbling act of loosening your belt after a big meal is finally over!
Inventor Bertrand Duplat has developed a motorized belt that automatically loosens its grip when your gut bulges.
“The experience of the belt hasn’t changed in centuries,” Duplat told Cult of Mac at CES International. He calls his invention, which certainly will change your belt experience, Belty.
“When you sit down and eat a long dinner, it loosens automatically. It tightens up when you stand up,” he said.
Although the Apple Watch isn’t out yet, mobile-marketing firm TapSense is taking advantage of CES mania to unveil its plans to release an Apple Watch ad-buying service, aimed at developers. This service will let businesses create ads targeted at individual users of Apple’s upcoming wearables device.
These ads would use “push notifications” to alert customers of specific deals they may be interested in, although only inside apps that have already been opened.
While Korean electronics giants like Samsung will dominate the show floor, Apple is laying the future path for the entire tech industry.
In the coming year, the tech industry’s big battlegrounds will be your body, your home and your car. At CES, thousands of companies will showing off new and prototype products to do battle in these arenas. But Apple is the company to beat. With the upcoming Apple Watch, in addition to HealthKit, HomeKit and CarPlay, Apple is setting the agenda for the entire tech industry, and it’s not even there.
This time on The CultCast: we’re live from Las Vegas and ready to report the best and worst tech from the 2014 Consumer Electronics Show! We’ll call out some of our favorite Apple accessories too, and some will surprise you. Plus, did you hear about the Michael Bay meltdown at the Samsung keynote? Well we were in the room when things got weird… let us regale you with the whole story.
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