Expanding boundaries: a review of new products and technologies of Samsung at CES 2012

On the first post-holiday Friday, habrovchane! We hope everyone was able to survive working days and recover.

For us, at Samsung, the end of the New Year's holidays already every year means only one thing - the beginning of the long-awaited exhibition (or as it is rightly called - the show) of consumer electronics CES in Las Vegas. It is to her, and to be more specific, the innovations and technologies presented by Samsung in the framework of CES 2012 , and will be devoted to our review.

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Traditionally, for all manufacturers of electronics (and we are not an exception), CES serves as a kind of mouthpiece that allows us to tell consumers about the direction of the company's activities in the coming year. Samsung’s plans were succinctly and at the same time multifaceted to describe with the motto “Expanding boundaries”, with which the company spoke at the exhibition this time. This motto implies not only the traditional “faster, higher, stronger”, but also the fact that the new Samsung devices have become an order of magnitude smarter, and also have learned to interact better with each other, with other devices, with a variety of content and, most importantly , with a person.



However, let's move on to the new ones themselves.
CES 2012 for Samsung began with a special press conference, which was moderated by Tim Baxter, the president of Samsung Electronics’s US headquarters. Broadcast from the event was conducted around the world live on the official pages of Samsung Electronics in the social network "Facebook".



It was at this conference that Samsung first talked about its new products of the 2012 model year, among which there are two real show-stoppers - the flagship Smart-TV ES8000 and the first Super OLED TV, also belonging to the Smart TV cohort.

Without too much pathos, it’s hard to say that these devices are simply “smart” TVs: the abundance of new technologies and capabilities allows them to occupy a central place in the home of the digital age. It seems that these devices are sharpened almost under everything that a modern person needs: Internet, communication, games, entertainment and family vacations, health, news, YouTube with cute cats and other streaming services, information retrieval, content sharing and as a nice addition - an opportunity Watch your favorite Futurama 2x2 or a new action movie from a connected Blu-ray player :)



The Samsung ES8000 LED TV, among other delights in the form of a traditionally high-quality screen and wide multimedia capabilities, has a pleasant, slightly futuristic appearance, and, most importantly, a dual-core processor that provides full multi-tasking.

“Multitasking on TV” - just think about these words, for which ten years ago you would have been looked upon as a person who celebrated the New Year too well.



Samsung's second “new year”, an advanced 55-inch Super OLED TV launched into serial production, opens up a completely new category of devices. Introducing it, Tim Baxter said the following words: “We were one of the first companies that switched from tube televisions to flat, from analog to digital, from conventional to Smart TV. Now we do it again, introducing a new television set that has made a huge technological breakthrough in the television industry. ”

The fact that users were so pleased with the high image quality on mobile devices now comes out on large screens: Samsung's proprietary technology, OLED based on organic LEDs, eliminates the need for color filters, since the OLED TV uses RGB subpixels located directly on the display , each of which emits its own light. In terms of color accuracy and response time, Super OLED significantly surpasses traditional LED TVs. According to the last indicator - 1000 times. In addition, the use of this technology has led to record levels of weight and thickness of the device - only 7.6 (!) Mm. In one article on this Super OLED TV, it was said that it is less than the thickness of the Galaxy S II.



In general, all the new Smart TV devices presented by Samsung this year will correspond to three basic directions of the Smarter Life concept: Smart Interaction, Smart Content and Smart Evolution. .

Let's take a closer look at them:
Smart Interaction - The fact that 20 years ago it was possible to meet only in science fiction films, and what is today considered a trend for mobile devices, came to the TV market with a light hand of Samsung. Smart Interaction technology allows smart TV owners to interact with a TV using voice control, motion control and face recognition. Thanks to the built-in HD camera and dual directional microphones, the user simply needs to say: “Hi TV” to activate the voice control function, for example, to say “Browser” to go to your favorite Habrahabr and then scroll through the tape of posts with a simple hand movement in the air.



Smart Content - this direction, as the name implies, is responsible for providing users with first-class content, due to the work of services such as Samsung Apps or Allshare.
In the app store for smart TVs, Samsung Apps is now available for more than 1,400 different applications and games, and the number of daily downloads exceeds 50,000. And undoubtedly, the best seller of the 2012 season will be Angry Birds, adapted by Rovio and Samsung specifically for the new Smart TV features.



Enhanced AllShare service, called AllShare Play, allows users to access personal content, regardless of their (user) location, the main thing is to have a compatible device at hand.

Smart Evolution is a real delight for lovers of the upgrade, as well as for prudent buyers who want their device to remain relevant time as long as possible. The first-of-its-kind Samsung Evolution Kit, which consists of hardware and software, thanks to Samsung's system-on-chip technology, will improve the performance of your TV, just like we do with our personal computers. Even easier: it is enough to replace a special board in the slot on the rear panel, for example, to turn your TV from a dual-core into a quad-core one.



From mobile innovations, at CES 2012, Samsung introduced the well-known Galaxy Note-tablet in Russia ...



... and Galaxy Tab 7.7 with support for Verizon's LTE wireless networks. Today it is one of the thinnest, lightest, and portable tablets on the Android Honeycomb platform. The device has similar characteristics and performance, like the recently released and well-received critically acclaimed Galaxy Tab 7.0 Plus tablet (release link), featuring a high-quality screen created using Super AMOLED Plus technology and support for 4-generation networks.



The main IT-novelty was a new generation of premium laptops 9 series. The device is 21% thinner and 28% smaller than its predecessor. Designed for connoisseurs of premium products, the 9-series laptop with a unique case design will be available in versions with a 13.3-inch and 15-inch SuperBright Plus screen. Both laptops will be equipped with second-generation Intel Core processors and solid-state drives.



Also at CES 2012, Samsung unveiled its first ultrabooks - the 5 Ultra series. Enclosed in a slim and lightweight case with an Intel Core i5 processor, these ultrabooks should appeal to those who don’t want to choose between performance and mobility. The ultrabook lineup includes models with 13.3 and 14 inches diagonals, the latter of which has a built-in DVD-drive. Laptops are equipped with a unique 500GB hard drive for this category of devices, which is complemented by a 16 GB SSD ExpressCache system, for quick access to data.



But among the “desktop” solutions, the undisputed flagships are the new 27 ”9 Series monitor and the all-in-one monoblock Samsung Series 9.

Monitor 9 Series boasts a proprietary professional-grade matrix created using PLS technology (Plane Line Switching). In combination with the Natural Color Expert technology, it provides accurate color reproduction of over a billion shades, a rich palette and wide vertical and horizontal viewing angles. The monitor has an ultra-high resolution QHD (2560 x 1440), four times the performance of an ordinary HD-monitor. Agree, this is more than just a good mix for working with graphic programs. On the back of the monitor are interface connectors Display Port, Dual Link-DVI and HDMI. It also features 7-watt stereo speakers and a Mobile High Definition Link (MHL) port for connecting smartphones and tablet PCs.

From traditional professional monitors, the 9th series is favorably distinguished by the “expensive” minimalist design of the case, the design of which uses aluminum and glass.



Add to this the second-generation Intel Core processor, AMD graphics, 3D support, plus an even more non-standard asymmetrical design, but take away a professional PLS matrix, and in the end you will get the Samsung Series 9 All-in-one computer in a monoblock form factor able to compete for the love of customers with more "experienced" competitors.



Due to the ever-growing popularity of social networks and the associated increase in demand for cameras with built-in Wi-Fi module, a large portfolio of Samsung cameras presented at CES 2012 was created with an emphasis on supporting wireless networks. Such devices, for example, allow users to post newly captured photos on Facebook or Picasa, or save them in a cloud service.

In particular, the company introduced the WB850F - a camera with a long-focus lens, Wi-Fi support and 21x zoom, the best for Samsung today. The advanced BSI CMOS 16Mpix matrix reduces noise and distortion in images even in low light conditions. The camera guarantees high-quality photography that can be viewed on a bright and clear 3.0-inch VGA AMOLED screen. Additional features, such as GPS and Live Landmark, make the camera a must-have travel companion, providing the user with maps and terrain information at the touch of a button.



And finally ... Perhaps one of the most interesting combinations of the exhibition is the WF457 washing machine with Wi-Fi support. You are unlikely to be able to connect it to a torrent tracker (although we are waiting for bold experiments in the DIY section), but thanks to the Smart Control system and a special smartphone application you will be able to monitor the current operation mode of the machine and the remaining time, as well as receive notifications about the end of the wash.



Thanks for attention.