SLEEPLESS in Las Vegas will be the theme for gizmo lovers in the desert city this week.
Sleepless in hospitals would, possibly, be the continuing nightmare of patients who have to endure batteries of test via medical monstrosities.
But more on that later. For now, the fun tech stuff.
Over 110,000 people from 140 countries will descend on venues like the Hilton hotel and the city’s Convention Centre. They will gawk at 1,000s of gadgets at CES, short for Consumer Electronics Show - the mother of all gadget and home appliance events - that runs from tomorrow to Sunday.
Digital Life will, of course, track what’s trotted out at the show. (Read it in our Jan 13 issue.)
For now, just going by the list of what organisers call Best of Innovation Honorees, makes you wish you were there trawling the halls, checking out the cool gear – the way you unwrap presents as a child on Boxing Day.
The first present I’d get my hands on is Nikon’s CoolPix S1000pj. The world’s first digicam with a built-in projector, this little guy lets you throw 40-inch images on the wall.
Also drool-worthy is Genesis’ home theatre speakers, the G7.1f – meant to make audio worthy of eye-popping visuals in TV programmes and in games.
But the one thing that really tickles my fancy is a ring to rule them all - communications, that is. Hail the O.R.B.
Made by Michigan-based Hybra Advance Technology, it’s really a Bluetooth headset that folds into a ring.
It vibrates to show the caller ID, text messages and appointment reminders, using electronic ink to show these details. To turn it to a headset, simply twist it out to fit the ear.
Med tech malady
So much has changed in the tech space – influencing everything from car tech to home theatre – to make things smaller, smarter and cosier to use.
You wonder why medical machines have been left trailing in the dust.
The point hit painfully home when my father was hospitalised the week before Christmas. Before the diagnosis came - pneumonia - he had to go through a series of uncomfortable tests.
One of it was an MRI or Magnetic Resonance Imaging scan to rule out any serious brain condition because of high fever and the severe pain in his head.
Kudos to Patient who survived the 40-minute ordeal. I would have died.
Never mind that he had to stay absolutely still in the machine’s claustrophia-inducing tunnel, he also had to endure eardrum-bursting sonics.
"It was like the sound of a motorboat engine at first. Then, it became like piling noises. Very loud," said Patient, shaking his head.
Why do you need a magnet weighing 30, 40 tons to look deep inside the brain? Surely, someone should be able to come up with a helmet-like gear that uses quiet-sound technology to do all that medical peering.
If there is now know-how that allows doctors on one shore to operate on a patient half the globe away, surely it is not too much to ask for good minds to come up with machines that do not intimidate by sheer size alone.
Even X-rays are bulky and blocky by tech’s miniaturiaation standards. And don’t get me started on the Jurassic thing they call a mammogram.