At the beginning of the year Philips consolidated their Consumer Electronics and Domestic Appliances & Personal Care divisions into a single unified Consumer Lifestyles group, with a focus on “enabling [consumers] to enjoy a healthier and more rewarding lifestyle”. (source)  The Philips HomeLab I visited is one example of how Philips investigates what products are best suited for satisfying that goal.

Tucked away in the corner of the Philips stand at IFA 2008 was another way that Philips strives to improve their product line.  A pair of computers were running a local demonstration of the Philips Simplicity Labs website, a site touted “as a testing ground for upcoming technologies and applications.”

It’s designed as a collection of interactive experiments and online product demos to help Philips identify product strengths and weaknesses before bringing something to market.  It’s also intended to help them find out what consumers actually want.  For example, the Cooking Stories section simply invites users to share stories about cooking.  Researchers and product designers at Philips will then review all the submitted data to identify common trends across geographic and demographic lines, which will feed into the design and implementation of new products.

The other so-called “experiments” are worth a look, too.  Give it a whirl, and help Philips help you.

Grundig is pitching their Audiorama 900 spherical speaker system at IFA 2008, for all your retro music needs.  These speakers create 360° sound projection and can be either floor mounted or hung from the ceiling.  Available in black or white for swank bachelor pads everywhere.

Several companies — large and small — were demonstrating alternative input technologies at IFA today. Most, like the Pong video above, were exploring how to use motion tracking to control various on-screen elements. More video after the jump.

Toshiba had a nice gesture recognition system, which you can watch in this video. I couldn’t make it work on my own at first, because I didn’t figure out that the fist icon meant that you actually needed to put your hand into a fist. It’s still a little rough around the edges, but it’s nice to see effort to move us beyond the mouse.

DKFI Saarbrücken’s Advanced Tangible Interface Lab had a Wii Balance Board connected via plain old Bluetooth to a PC running custom software that allowed the user to drive through Google Earth by shifting their weight on the board. It’s not an entirely useful solution right now — especially since it was really hard to come to a full stop — but again I’m glad to see people looking at how to advance the state of user input technology.

If you don’t like the idea of shooting your alarm clock, the new version of the Philips Wake-up Light might be for you. Like any other alarm clock, you set the time at which you want to be woken up. 30 minutes before that time arrives, however, the Wake-up Light starts to gently glow. As the minutes pass, the light gets brighter, simulating the rising sun, so that when the designated time arrives you should be roused from slumber by the light. According to research, a gentle waking up process makes one more alert and ready to tackle the day.

Also included in the Wake-up Light is the ability to play a variety of nature sounds, to really make you feel like you’re waking up next to a singing brook, or that there’s a flock of songbirds fluttering around the trees overhead.

The product slogan is catchy, too: “Stop being woken up. Start waking up.”

At IFA today many companies are showing off their attempts at 3D TV. Most of the displays being shown are not yet designed for home use, and instead are being positioned as business applications: in-store signage and advertising, architecture and CAD displays, and prototype user interfaces. Most of the televisions require no glasses, and produce a reasonable 3D display. In the displays I’ve seen, there are a few “sweet spot” viewing angles that produce an acceptable 3D display, and viewing from an angle just a little off from these shows the individual stereoscopic images just slightly off alignment from one another.

There are several competing technologies for displaying 3D images on a 2D surface. The one I learned about at the Philips Research Center is called “2D + depth + occlusion”, and obviously Philips thinks its the best. As these things usually go, it’ll probably be the major Hollywood studios that make the final decision about which format is declared the victor for the entertainment sector.

The Epson booth was sporting a 3D projector, rather than a display. And when I say “projector” I really mean “projectors” because their system uses two projectors to display each of the images necessary. And for this, you still need to wear glasses.

Epson wasn’t alone relying on glasses to provide a 3D experience: Samsung’s also has a display that requires them. The folks below look absolutely thrilled with the technology, as you can see:

It looks like true 3D television is still a couple years away.

IFA 2008 offers the curious spectator an awful lot to look at.  There are hundreds of televisions, computers, projectors, stereos, navigation systems, MP3 players, and all other manner of gadget covered by CrunchGear, from all the brand names you know and love.  But this year’s IFA introduced a new set of products to the show: so-called “white goods”.  Things like refrigerators, washing machines, kitchen appliances, and more.  Read on for a photo safari through the “home appliances” section of IFA.

Huge amounts of floor space were dedicated to coffee, and devices that help you make it.  Most companies producing coffee makers had live product demos with free coffee, so I was plenty juiced up as I walked from brand to brand sampling their wares.

There were more than a few refrigerators on display.

Likewise there were lots of washers and dryers on display.  Most were arranged as you might see them at your local Sears, in bright white with no real pizazz, but there were a few notable exceptions like the Oko_Line from AEG:

And just like Sears, there were plenty of stoves and ranges on display:

The mobile kitchen solutions really caught my attention, in part because I’ve never thought about the need for a portable stove, so I had to think about it for a few minutes, but also because their products look as much like DJ gear as they do cooking solutions!

I wasn’t sure if these two were looking for something they’d dropped, or if one of them was really excited about stove technology.  I felt mildly ashamed after the guy in grey gave me a dirty look, so I didn’t stay to find out.

The kitchen appliance vendors brought out what looked like their entire product line.

DeLonghi had on display a number of interesting garment care solutions, but they weren’t nearly as interesting as this guy ironing shirts.  Had I known he was doing this, I would not have ironed my own shirt this morning, and instead asked him for a real demo.

Valera’s little corner of IFA was among the weirdest I saw: this woman was dutifully styling the mannequin head’s hair.  Again, I don’t think they’re likely to meet much of their target audience at IFA.  Plus, the mannequin heads were a little creepy.

There were lots of little booths I just couldn’t bring myself to photograph: lone representatives surrounded by their products looking either bored, scared, or bewildered.  Some were scarfing down food, or texting on their phones.

The Sony Sountina is another 360° single speaker system.  This one uses a vibrating organic cylinder.  Insert obligatory double-entendre here.  The Sountina also has colorful LEDs to breathe “blue, amber and purple light into the space.”

2008 is the first year that the IFA consumer electronics show in Berlin has included so-called “white goods” in addition to the traditional media and entertainment products on display.  Particularly interesting to me were a collection of high-end wine coolers like those pictured above, and the Philips Perfect Draft beer fridge.  Stick a pony keg inside the Perfect Draft and you can reenact your favorite scenes from Cheers!

In the Home Appliances section of IFA 2008 are dozens of brands of coffee makers, most doling out freshly brewed joe to bleary-eyed conventioneers.  The video above demonstrates one of the larger of such displays.  A small pad on the bottom of the coffee cup contains an icon, which a camera under the table identifies and tracks as it slides around the surface.  When it comes to a full stop for a few seconds, information panels fly out and are then activated by touching the tabletop.  As you can see in the video, I press first one then another widget to get information about the delicious coffee I was enjoying.

Everyone was so engrossed by the novelty of the display mechanism that I don’t think anyone remembered the name of coffee maker (Nespresso) who was running the display.  When the technology used to display your product is way cooler than your product itself, I think you might want to reevaluate your marketing process.

I used to think that my local Best Buy had a lot of televisions on display.  Then I attended IFA.  Each vendor’s stand has dozens — sometimes hundreds — of TVs up and running.  It’s enough to make the eyes glaze over.  Samsung had the largest display of TVs, pictured above.  More Samsung and others after the jump.

After the gigantic display at the entrance to the Samsung stand, their array of options looks almost sedate:

Metz had a tower o’ screens:

Toshiba chose to go horizontal with their display, with a long corridor lined with TVs.

Haier, for some reason, didn’t have many of their sets actually turned on.

As beautiful and eye-catching as most of the displays were, I have to hand it to Beko for their catchy slogan, “Buy it before it becomes famous”!

All of the television manufacturers will have a real challenge differentiating themselves from one another, as they’re all pushing slim, less-power hungry sets with increased speeds.  Will consumers care?

Epson’s EC-01 inkjet printer is the flagship product in their new Environmental Vision 2050 initiative: it’s shipped in an unpainted recycled cardboard box, the manual is printed on recycled paper, and the included driver CD is stored within an envelope made of recycled paper.  But what really sets this printer apart is that you don’t replace the ink: when the cartridge runs out, you replace the whole printer.

The gentleman I spoke to at Epson’s IFA booth explained “When you purchase a Coca-Cola, it’s not the bottle that you want, it’s the Coca-Cola!  Similarly, when you buy a printer, it’s not the printer that you want but the pages that printer can produce.”  So just like you can return a Coca-Cola bottle to reclaim the depost included in the price, so too will you be able to return the EC-01 to Epson to get back 50 euros.  The EC-01 ships with an ink tank that is estimated to yield 8,000 sheets.

The Loewe stand at IFA caught my eye for two reasons.  The image above struck my funny bone, and the image below filled me with deep techno-lust.  At a show filled with televisions that all looked very much alike, Loewe had on display a number of sleek, stylish televisions that really stood out from the crowd.

Like many other companies at IFA, Loewe was touting their own whole-house networked media solution, evidenced by the first photo above.  Their Connect line of televisions include built-in LAN and WLAN, along with the expected USB ports and is positioned to be the display component for the media backend.  The Loewe Reference Mediacenter digital hub contains a hidden Blu-Ray player, iPod dock, and an RS-232 port for connection to home automation systems.  One notable feature of the Reference Mediacenter is that it uses mirrored hard disks to protect your digital media from any single drive failure.  Another benefit is that it speaks UPnP so it can, in theory, integrate with home media devices from other vendors.

The Reference Mediacenter is slated for public availability in summer of 2009.

Finlux unveiled several new televisions and set-top boxes at IFA.  The video they selected to demonstrate the sets at the front of their stand was the most salacious of the whole show (though I never did get to the Penthouse stand), while the rest of the sets on display were showing much more business like sequences.

Many television manufacturers are touting how “green” they are, usually by demonstrating how much less power their sets consume.  Finlux took a slightly different approach, by showcasing a pair of TVs with glossy green bezels.

To be fair, though, Finlux looks to be conscious of the entire manufacturing process when they talk about their environment-friendliness, rather than just focusing on power savings.

Finlux had the usual assortment of TVs, too, ranging from 65″ to 26″, in a variety of thin and thick form factors.

Oh man, who thought this was a good idea? Pretty much all the big companies were handing out goodie bags, so to speak, at IFA. Inside is the usual assortment of swag you’d find at any trade show: pens, buttons, maybe an extraordinarily cheap pair of headphones, etc.

Not Sharp, though. They went above and beyond the call of duty. They were handing out these giant inflatable, I don’t know, floaties or whatever. Who cares, sure, but picture this: ever third person on the crowded show floor—at some point, IFA opened to the public—carrying one of these, blocking walkways, getting in the way of products, etc. Just annoying from soup to nuts.

So to Sharp: let’s kick it down a notch next time, okay? Just a friendly request.

T-Mobile has a rather large booth at IFA this year, and it’s no surprise that the iPhone is front-and-center. It goes even further, though, as the German carrier has a huge touchscreen installed, there for everyone to screw around with. At one point—that video up there—T-Mo turned down the lights, and Mac OS X-esque intro music started playing.

This video is just some guy using the screen. No, doesn’t look too happy that I’m right behind him, capturing his every movement. Calm down, hombre.

These videos are completely unedited, as if you needed to be told that.

First off, Photosynth only works on Windows machines. That includes creating them and merely viewing them. I made this one using Boot Camp on my MacBook.

That out of that way, this is a quick little Photosynth of Samsung’s booth at IFA 2008. Theirs was probably the most visually impressive at the show. More stuff on the way, as I just found out that the video I took with my cellphone is actually watchable. Amazing, this technology.

The Photosnth is HERE!

Large, international tradeshows can showcase the absolute bleeding edge of technology. Sometimes though, said tech was developed with the unknown help of another company, so obviously, this can come to a breaking point at these tradeshows. According to The Register, German Custom agents have been busy this year at IFA. 

A spokesman for German Customs told us: “We’ve raided 69 companies today. We have seized equipment including flat-screen TVs, CD players, set-top boxes and MP3 players.”

Above, these agents are investigating claims that MSI infringement from patent firm Sisvel. And, yes, pics show that these ladies and gents are in fact armed because we all know, us nerds can get a little territorial over our gadgets.

via Reg

From the standard fare of receivers to gaming headsets, Dolby has invaded IFA this year. Harman Kardon is going to launch the first receiver with Dolby’s touted Volume technology that ensures constant volume across all content media. Then there is the Plantronics GameCom 777 headset aimed at gamers with surround sound. PCs are getting a sound upgrade as well with Dolby Home Theater and Dolby Sound Round. Finally, thank goodness, Dolby is taking their experience on the go with Dolby Mobile. Apparently, they feel that they can make that tiny speaker sound so much better. 

Dolby has been around for a while and the label is on just about everything AV, but does it really sway your purchasing decision on outside devices. If product A has Dolby certs on the front bezel that product B doesn’t, which one are you more likely to buy? I totally buy Dolby supported receivers but I really don’t know if seeing their logo on my cell phone will move me to buy one verse another. 

PR

Indiana Jones or Superman prop; classy or just plain tacky? I can’t decide but I’ve to give the boys over at Harman Kardon for suck a clever name: GLA-55. ‘Cause it’s made out of glass. Get it? 

Anyway, getting down to the details. Only two to three thousand are going to be made and priced at £500. Within the crystal speakers lay a 56 watt per speaker digital amplifier, DSP equalization all traveling out to a 3.5mm output. So yes, sadly, these bookshelves will be found on your desk, tied down to your computer or iPod. H/K announced these speakers at IFA, so naturally, there isn’t any mention of a US launch just yet. What does it matter, you’re not going to get ‘em anyways ’cause they would clash with your drinking bird so badly. 

via ShinyShiny