Five things I look forward to seeing at CES 2012

Thanks to the generous support of my employer, i/oTrak's E-Z Photo Scan, this will be my first year attending the International Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas. This year, the Photo Marketing Association (PMA) has joined forces with CES for a co-located portion of the show that they are calling PMA@CES.

So right now, I am double geeking that I am about to experience both.

I thought it would be particularly appropriate to go over a few of the things that I am most looking forward to seeing at the show to see if there is some substance to the hype.


#1 - The Fujifilm X-Pro1

The logical follow-up to the Fujifilm FinePix X100 is here, with a nice set of interchangeable prime lenses, a promised Leica M-Mount adaptor, and a luscious-sounding 16MP APS-C sensor.

This could be the future of prosumer photography. With a body-only pricetag of around $1600, it may not be in my future anytime soon. Nevertheless, this has the makings of the mirrorless camera that will set the standard for this genre in the foreseeable future. This camera could very well be the photographic highlight of the show for me. It has the makings of a wonderful travel and street photography camera.

#2 - LG's new Blast Chiller Refridgerator

With a special door that can cool a soda, beer, or bottle of wine in 5 minutes, need I say more?


#3 - Victorinox Swiss Army's 1TB USB/eSATA Pocket Knife

No. Really. 1TB. In a pocket knife. With blazing fast data speeds. It wasn't a typo.

A pocketknife like this could make the small SSDs in a MacBook Air seem like much less of a dealbreaker in my next laptop purchase.

#4 - LG's 55-inch, pencil-thin, OLED TV

A perfect companion to their instant beer-chilling fridge, this TV could be the talk of the show.

I am not much of a TV guy. In fact, I don't even own one right now. Displays like this could end up changing my mind at some point in the future, especially with the growing popularity of Google TV among manufacturers at the show.

I would need a much, much bigger house to put this in, though.

#5 - Nokia's Lumia 900 Windows Phone

I am curious to see the first U.S. offspring of the Microsoft and Nokia coupling. Microsoft has put together a decent user interface in Metro. While I am not into locked-down phones tied to only one app market, I look forward to seeing if this phone lives up to Microsoft's hype.

So those are my top five. What are yours? Any special requests of gadgets or gizmos that you'd like to see from the showroom floor? I'm interested to hear your thoughts in the comments below.