CES 2021 kicked off online, Intel made an effort, Qualcomm and Lenovo made big moves!

The 2021 International Consumer Electronics Show (hereinafter referred to as CES) kicked off online. The entire exhibition is divided into four major sections: 5G, smart cities, digital healthcare, and smart transportation. Today is the first day of CES. Let Xiaolei take you to review several important products released today.

Samsung Smart Robot

As early as the CES conference in 2020, Samsung put forward its vision for artificial intelligence products. At  CES 2021  , Samsung finally brought a series of personalized robots, which also hinted that artificial intelligence will have an important impact on subsequent Samsung products. The first to appear was a rolling personalized robot named Ballie. Samsung said that Ballie can play the role of a security robot, a fitness assistant, a tool to help the elderly use smart devices at home, and even a friend to children and pets. 

Several subsequent robots were released mainly for cleaning purposes, including the JetBot AI Plus robot vacuum cleaner, the Bot Care personal assistant robot and the Bot Handy robot, which can clear clutter and move things around the room. 

The most futuristic and technologically advanced robots are Bot-Care and Bot-handy. The former will customize reminder services for users based on their daily schedules and habits, and will also use AI technology to respond to users' answers. Another robot, Bot-handy, can help users tidy up messy rooms or tableware after meals. The mechanical arm extending from its left side can complete simple operations such as pouring wine and clearing plates. 

Unfortunately, although Samsung claims that these robots have been running perfectly in the test environment, this does not mean that consumers will be able to buy such home robots soon. Therefore, Samsung did not announce the price and sales time of these robots at the conference.

As a product of artificial intelligence, intelligent robots will be able to provide more convenient life services for humans in the future. Perhaps many difficult jobs will be replaced by robots in the future. 

Qualcomm's new under-screen fingerprint sensor

 Since the outbreak of the epidemic, there are more and more scenes of wearing masks. Since face unlocking requires the recognition of the user's facial contours and features, fingerprint unlocking is more convenient and practical than face unlocking when wearing a mask, and the importance of fingerprint recognition has gradually become apparent. At CES 2021, Qualcomm brought the second-generation ultrasonic under-screen fingerprint reader 3D Sonic Sensor Gen 2. Compared with the previous generation, the main improvements are in recognition speed and recognition area. Officials said that the scanning area of ​​the second-generation ultrasonic under-screen fingerprint reader is 8mm*8mm, while the initial representative area is only 4mm*9mm, an increase of 77%. This technology will allow users to perform fingerprint recognition without having to align their fingers 100% with the recognition area given by the screen. At the same time, the second-generation fingerprint reader will also increase the speed of unlocking the phone by about 50% compared to the first generation. 

Qualcomm also stated that the first batch of Android flagships equipped with Qualcomm's second-generation ultrasonic under-screen fingerprint recognition will be available in early 2021. Industry insiders have previously revealed that the iPhone 13 series will adopt an under-screen fingerprint design, and Qualcomm's newly launched second-generation ultrasonic under-screen fingerprint recognition is likely to become Apple's first choice. 

Intel 11th generation processors

 Intel's 11th-generation Core desktop processors also made their debut at CES 2021. They will be composed of two architectures, Rocket Lake-S and Comet Lake-S. Among them, 6-core/8-core processors above Core i5 will use the Rocket Lake-S architecture, and Core i3/Pentium/Celeron processors will use the Comet Lake-S architecture. 

The highest single-core/turbo frequency of the new i9-11900K has reached 5.3/4.8GHz, and Intel officials also compared the gaming performance with AMD Ryzen 5900X in the video. When using the same RTX 3080 graphics card, the i9-11900k does have an advantage, but the lead is not large. 

The 11th generation Core desktop processors based on the Rocket Lake-S architecture will be available in the first quarter of 2021. As the former leader in mobile and desktop computing, Intel has slowed down significantly in recent years, which has given its rival AMD an excellent opportunity. Although AMD is still not comparable to Intel in terms of market share, Intel is likely to give up the top spot as time goes by.

HP laptops and monitors

 HP brought many products to CES 2021, such as the second-generation Elite Dragonfly series mobile super-powered version of the thin and light notebook HP EliteBook 840 G8 Aero, HP Envy 14 high-performance thin and light notebook, HP M series HD monitor, HP E24u G4, HP E27u G4 USB-C monitor and laptop computer bags. 

The HP Envy 14 high-performance thin and light notebook uses Intel's latest 11th-generation Core Tiger Lake processor, equipped with 16GB DDR4-3200 memory and NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 Ti discrete graphics card. In addition, this notebook supports Thunderbolt 4 interface and starts at US$1,099 (equivalent to RMB 7,103). It will be available for pre-sale on the official website this month. 

HP EliteBook 840 G8 Aero provides users with a better choice of thin and light business notebooks. The whole machine weighs only 1.13 kg, is equipped with Intel's 11th generation Tiger Lake CPU, supports Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.0, and users can also choose a version that supports 5G communication functions. HP said that this product will be available as early as March this year.

HP's intention is very clear. It hopes to grab more market share through high-performance and ultra-light and thin products. Of course, it is not enough to have high product power, the price must also be reasonable. 

Lenovo smart glasses and ThinkPad

 Lenovo will showcase the new ThinkReality A3 glasses at CES 2021, a head-mounted smart device for work scenarios. The ThinkReality A3 is equipped with the Snapdragon XR1 platform and can display five 1080P resolution virtual images at the same time. Both outer corners of the glasses have an 8-megapixel fisheye lens, which can provide users with dual 1080P resolution VR images. 

ThinkReality A3 glasses are divided into PC version and industrial version. The former can be connected to a PC and can be used with software tools and applications on the Windows platform as needed. The industrial version of ThinkReality A3 glasses needs to be connected to some smartphones (such as MOTO). After the connection, the glasses can read barcodes, identify specific objects, recognize images, and respond to user voice or gesture commands. It can be used for work communication guidance and AR remote technical support. 

Lenovo said that this smart glasses can greatly improve the work efficiency of office staff and some industrial workers, and can also meet the working environment and needs of enterprises of different natures. It is reported that Lenovo's two products will start pre-sale in July this year, and the price will be determined before the listing. In the future, smart glasses will combine 5G, artificial intelligence, and the Internet of Everything and other environmental factors to become an integral part of users' daily lives, and there is even a trend of completely banning smartphones.

In addition, Lenovo also brought a number of new laptops including Yoga Slim 7i Pro, ThinkPad X1 Titanium Yoga, ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9, ThinkPad X12, etc.

The most popular one is the ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9, which uses Intel's 11th-generation Tiger Lake Core processor (integrated Iris Xe core graphics), supports Wi-Fi 6 module, and users can also choose LTE/5G mobile network version according to their needs.

The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9 is equipped with a 16:10 aspect ratio screen, which not only provides a wide vertical display area, but also supports HDR400 and covers 100% P3 color gamut. The 1.13kg body weight will also make it an office tool for many business people. The ThinkPad X1 Carbon Gen 9 will meet consumers around February this year, with a starting price of US$1,429 (approximately RMB 9,241).

The ThinkPad X12 Detachable is a detachable keyboard convertible notebook that weighs only 1.1kg and is equipped with a 12.3-inch screen that supports stylus touch. The processor also uses Intel's 11th-generation Tiger Lake Core processor (optional LTE mobile network module). The machine will be available in January with a starting price of US$1,149 (approximately RMB 7,430)

TCL Flexible Screen

 TCL, which is participating in CES 2021, brings its latest printed OLED scroll screen, AMOLED cloud scroll screen, QLED TV, MiniLED TV and TCL 20 series mobile phones. The first product is the 6.7-inch AMOELD cloud scroll screen. Users can "pull" out the flexible screen rolled inside the fuselage by sliding, expanding the 6.7-inch screen to 7.8 inches. Currently, most folding screen mobile phones on the market are more than 14mm thick after folding. The thickness of the TCL cloud scroll screen will not change during the sliding process, and it will be maintained within 10mm, which is lighter and thinner in comparison. TCL said that many terminal manufacturers have begun to contact this product and are in the deep adaptation stage, but the specific manufacturers are still confidential.

Another flexible screen is the world's first 17-inch inkjet-printed flexible display screen launched by TCL Huaxing. Its internal RGB light-emitting components use a high-precision inkjet printing process. Compared with the traditional ordinary flexible screen that still uses the evaporation process, the advantage of this process is that the production cost is lower. 

This is also the world's first printed display technology, which can be applied to flexible TVs, curved and foldable displays, transparent commercial displays, etc., and related products are expected to be launched in 2024. In addition, TCL also announced the latest progress of Mini LED at the exhibition. They have developed OD 0 Mini LED technology. A major feature of this technology is that the panel can be made very thin. OD 0 Mini LED can reduce the distance between the light source and the panel to microns.