More than 140,000 of us attended
CES 2008, crawling over 40 acres of exhibits, resulting in a human density matched only by a Tokyo subway or perhaps Hugh Heffner’s Jacuzzi. Somewhere in there was embedded system news, and the keynotes of
Microsoft and
Intel were the place to start looking.
Each keynote drew perhaps 5000 attendees. The line to get Microsoft tickets was 4 hours long.These indeed were keynotes of note- The Sunday pre-show keynote was reported to be
Bill Gates’ last public appearance on behalf of Microsoft. In counterpoint, Intel CEO
Paul Otellini's is new at the helm of Intel, and this was where he opened up a bit on Intel's path forward. The two men were interesting contrasts.
Gates took the stage after a hilarious introductory video on the subject of
his last day at Microsoft. Self-deprecating executive humor has been a traditional feature of Gates or Balmer presentations; this was the best. Gates presided over the keynote in his trademark polyester sweater and six dollar haircut letting various MS group managers talk about the c
onsumer
business. The presentations were not techy. Most of the MS keynote highlighted business achievements, which were impressive. For example, Xbox consoles outsold both Playstation and Wii; and Xbox games sales outsold both together!
The crowd at the Gates keynote was tech heavy. Everyone I talked to had Visual Studio 2008 installed
To the extent the presentations were on emerging technologies, Gates spoke to us directly. Everything he chose to highlight himself was ‘embedded’. Specifically, Gates demoed a
UMPC format device with camera that would recognize everyone in your contacts folder, and reference them to any events, notes or journal entries. The same recognizer technology could look at a streetscape and identify any building, and if a theater, show what movies were playing and how to book tickets. It was pretty easy to see how this path forward was a natural extension of the current location-enabled
Windows Mobile Live Search.
The other noteworthy Gates demo was “
Surface Computing”.
Hitachi,
Panasonic and others are also betting on surface computing, but their systems are relitivly primitive- projection TVs on a touch panel or such. The Microsoft offer is some optical/projection hybrid I do not understand, which allows multi-user, multi-touch operation. The HMI of the device is
Silverlight, and this demo, like all MS demos, was not of a device, but of a web-connected database application.
Otellini's Intel demo was even more exciting. In past years, I have always thought Intel management was great because they kept focused on their technology and kept
Moore’s Law running. Now I think Intel’s management is great because they are looking ahead with clarity and meeting the big platform needs. At CES Intel started touting their new semiconductor technology based on
Hafnium doped silicon. If you remember, a few years ago it seemed Moore’s Law might be reaching an asymptote. Otellini feels this Hafnium technology puts those concerns to rest, and Intel is planning for five more cycles- ten years- of Moore’s law evolution.
Otellini also demoed a
UMPC format device (albeit leashed to some quad core Pentiums) with features similar to what Gates demoed earlier. The Intel keynote was conspicuously devoid of any mention of Microsoft, although
Adobe “AIR” was suggested as the HMI technology of the future.
T
he coolest thing Intel did was demo a
virtual band system, where musicians in different locations could collaborate. At first Otellini called up a few musicians on the web, and then added a live singer- Steve Harwell of Smashmouth. Then, using another package, Intel created an animated avatar of Steve, and put the whole band together in a virtual garage. Cool.
Intel brought back Smashmouth for a totally rocking, non virtual party after the KeynoteCPU power will be key to realized Intel’s vision- and they see this in an integrated context- for example a bi-direction multi-lingual translation device that knows the target language by GPS setting. Apart from delivering ten more years of increasing processor power, Otellini promised continued efforts to promote
WiMax to bring fast wireless downloads/uploads to wireless, edge-connected devices. His vision for the internet is not a place you ‘go to’ via a browser. His vision is an internet that finds you, via all the devices in your everyday life, and understands your context and anticipates your needs. It brought to mind the line from Terminator “I will be back”.
So, CES was cool, very cool, but past Intel and Microsoft I have little to say today. Keeping up with the pace was tiring, and it is good to be home. I will update more on later posts- any questions??
Lawrence Ricci
The Embedded Insider
Technology, to stay in sync, may have to move slowly. Perhaps it will move most slowly in the geographically distributed infrastructure. 
