WIRED Staff
Gear

Slideshow: Expo Tries to Whet Geek Appetites

New laptops, games and even Google applications share the spotlight at DigitalLife2004, a show designed to tempt consumers to pry open their wallets. Michael Myser reports from New York.
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. With infrared and other sensor technologies, the game lets players swing a bat to interact with the on-screen action.Michael Myser

See related story: Expo Tries to Whet Geek Appetites

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. The first edition is the company's most popular online title.

Michael Myser
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Intel's afternoon keynote speech from Rob Crooke, vice president of the desktop platform group (not pictured), featured a performance from the Blue Man Group. Blue Man's ties to "digital device convergence" may be loose, but the crowd loved the inexplicably entertaining show.

Michael Myser
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The GameOn NY Pavilion is 40,000 square feet of gamers' paradise. This GameOn arcade alone has 50 XBox consoles, all hooked up to flat-screen displays and sporting the latest games.

Michael Myser
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DigitalLife envisions at least three different versions of the "digital home," including this kitchen imagined and designed by AOL for Broadband.

Michael Myser
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Toshiba this week introduced a batch of four-in-one notebooks. This Qosmio G15-AV501 with a 17-inch display wraps in DVD, personal video recorder, TV and stereo functionality.

Michael Myser
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From the "this will never work" file, the Eyetop DVD is a "portable home theater" for one eye. It allows users to watch movies with their right eye while the left eye checks out their surroundings.

Michael Myser
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competition, which will likely draw a crowd throughout the weekend. More than 100 of the nation's best video dancers will compete for prizes in the National DDR Championships on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Michael Myser
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Just in case attendees didn't bring a notepad to compose an updated holiday shopping list, Santa is making appearances all weekend at DigitalLife.

Michael Myser
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Logitech moved out of the office and into the PC-based living room this week. It unveiled this Harmony 680 remote, designed to control a PC running on Microsoft Windows XP Media Center Edition -- and any devices connected to it, such as a television, a home theater stereo receiver or a DVD player.

Michael Myser
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Promises, promises. A video phone that actually works? The broadband Packet8 VideoPhone from 8x8 is featured in the DigitalLife 2004 living room. Delivering video at 30 frames per second, the VideoPhone might have succeeded.

8x8
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Creative Labs unveiled its Zen Micro 5-GB audio player, a small (3.3 inch by 2 inch), colorful piece of hardware that plays MP3 and WMA files. Designed for the PC, it stores up to 2,500 songs and features voice recording, FM radio and an address book.

Michael Myser
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BlackBerry shows off its 7100T at DigitalLife. Available this month for $200, it includes an overhauled keyboard, e-mail, IM, web access and Bluetooth.

Michael Myser
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XM Satellite Radio, which announced its new streaming music service for PCs this month, shows off a range of home audio products, including the first XM component for home stereos. This item (top shelf), now available from Polk Audio, displays song information on the TV screen.

Michael Myser