Things Get Larger, Things Get Smaller

Day one of CES 2025 did not disappoint; in fact quite the opposite. We visited showrooms in several different buildings, ballrooms and suites and were very impressed with what’s coming soon to the sales page on a website near you.

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CES can be a bit of a crap shoot (no Las Vegas pun intended) when it comes to technologies that may or may not actually see the light of day. One of the goals of CES is to determine what will hit store shelves later this year and what will forever remain a flight of fancy. We try to narrow our focus to the first one whenever possible. Sometimes we see updates to an existing product; other times it’s something completely new.

Additionally, we saw an app designed to make you look smaller, which is becoming increasingly important in today’s health-conscious landscape. So, without further ado, here are some of the best technologies we saw on opening day of CES 2025.

Have you ever sat in a restaurant and wondered how many calories you’re going to cram into your face? Yes, you can look at the menu and see if you’re eating at a larger chain, but that’s not always possible in a smaller establishment. Besides, if you’re just enjoying a bowl of chips at a friend’s house, are you really going to ask him to fish the bag out of the trash so you can update your My Fitness Pal?

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Enter Amazfit’s Zepp app and a feature that’s been around for months but wasn’t released until CES 2025. You simply take a photo of the plate in front of you and the app uses artificial intelligence to recognize the type of food. the approximate weight of the food and everything else you need to know, such as approximately how much stored energy can be used up if the plate is finished. We don’t have any word on the accuracy, but it’s a great idea that will get you closer to your diet goal than guessing on your own. Plus it’s free for Android And iPhoneand you don’t even have to have an Amazfit product to use it. So what do you have to lose other than a few extra Christmas pounds?

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One of the strangest, but more interesting events at this year’s CES was the BMW press conference. This happens in a giant version New classor, more precisely, the usual Neue Klasse, where the audience shrinks in size on the way to the hall. Ken Jeong, who plays the doctor, appears via video call (and later in person) and awkwardly handles the situation. He’s not the only famous comedian to appear in the BMW demo.

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Tim Meadows of SNL fame took on most of the hosting duties, although they were split between video segments and comedy Q&A segments featuring various BMW executives. The Germans played straight men in these comedy duos, with Meadows adding joke after joke. However, this can all be a little distracting.

The dashboard itself looks functional without being too new. We’ve seen plenty of panoramic displays like this, the Lincoln Nautilus comes to mind. While BMW puts more widgets on its new display than most, they’re just larger and more broken down into versions of what you’re used to seeing on old-school binnacles. However, it all looks very sophisticated, very beautiful and a little funny. It perfectly matches the vision of the BMW Neue Klasse. Plus, the company has updated its proprietary AI assistant. Now he has a face and a bit of personality.

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One product that really took us by surprise is one that you, unfortunately, will never see here in the US. Asus is a PC and laptop maker that often has a gaming bent, but some of its offerings can be quite practical. But there is practicality, and then there is something else. Unfortunately, this something will only be released in China again, but it’s still pretty neat.

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The Asus Adolbook 14 Air is a pretty standard option in terms of design, except for two things. First, the space says “Live Your Dream.” Secondly, on the lid of the laptop there is an icon with a stylized lowercase letter “a” surrounded by a perforated circle. The reason for this is that this magnetic badge can be removed from the laptop and inside is an incense stone that is activated by heat. Do you know what your computer screen does when it’s on long enough? It heats up, which in turn releases the aroma.

The laptop comes with several flavor tabs (each of which can last up to 90 days, depending on use), as well as a soft carrying case for carrying the laptop. It’s a smart use of the heat a laptop naturally generates, turning something wasteful into something useful.

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Meanwhile, in the laptop market, Lenovo has updated its YogaBook 9i laptop with a new dual-screen laptop. This one is based on last generation in several ways. Most notably, Lenovo has increased the screen size by just over half an inch. Each screen is now a 14-inch display, which is truly ideal for the size of the laptop.

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Like all previous generations, Lenovo uses a separate keyboard as a flip accessory, rather than a keyboard that can be positioned between screens like other competitors. This keyboard is slightly larger, perhaps due to the increased screen size, plus the folio is also slightly longer. The reason for this is that in addition to the origami-style laptop stand that holds both screens at a higher angle, you can also roll the folio to place the laptop at a lower angle, which is convenient for drawing with the included pen.

It also uses the same software tricks, such as eight-finger tap to bring up the keyboard and three-finger tap to open a virtual mouse pad. This time the keyboard is highly customizable in both size, layout and style, with multiple options for each, which is a good way to build software.

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Carrying a separate keyboard case isn’t the best option, but honestly, it’s not that bad either. Whether you like it or not will be a matter of preference.

One of the most important features you can look at when choosing a security camera is the field of view. The wider the field of view, the more of your property you can see at once. However, this comes at a cost because the wider the field of view, the more likely it is to lose resolution in some areas of your camera’s coverage. Images can suffer from fisheye if the software isn’t optimized, plus, like most cameras, image quality degrades when zoomed in.

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TP-Link has a unique solution to this problem – the Tapo Dual Lens Pan Tilt Security Camera, which consists of two cameras in one module. The first is a standard ultra-wide camera that covers the entire field. The second is a pan-tilt camera with a telephoto lens that can zoom in and get more detail in a certain area.

It’s all monitored in the app, so if you notice anything strange, you can zoom in. Both cameras have 4K resolution, and both cameras come with full-color night vision. The bottom camera can rotate 360 ​​degrees. This is a great solution for those who have a larger yard and want to see what’s going on in it.

It seems fitting to end our first day at CES with a review of a device that could save us a lot of pain in the long run. The Strutt ev1 is a personal mobility scooter that’s designed to help you get around the world using lidar detectors, artificial intelligence, and a healthy dose of computing.

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At first glance, the scooter looks like many other personal mobility scooters, with two lidar sensors at the bottom of each leg and a Captain Kirk-style screen on the left arm. The scooter uses data from lidar sensors to help the user maneuver around obstacles, allowing the rider to simply move around without worrying about bumping into people or objects.

One of the key challenges associated with a scooter is trying to avoid obstacles and people who move around you or get in your way. Strutt uses lidar data and artificial intelligence to help you fly where you need to go, either by nudging you left or right to avoid obstacles or simply stopping you in your tracks, but the fun happens when you add the Apple Vision Pro headset.

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The creators of Strutt ev1 have added compatibility with Apple headsets, allowing you to see the world and set waypoints where you want to go, completely hands-free. Basically, if you see that place in your headset, you can go there. For example, if you are in a room with a lot of furniture and want to go to a window, you can look at the floor in front of the window and with a pinch of your fingers set a waypoint of sorts and the scooter will take you there.

The Strutt ev1 will likely arrive in 2026, and if you think adding Apple’s $3,500 headset as an optional accessory is indicative of the final price, you might be right. Strutt is still determining the final price. But the convenience it adds to people with mobility issues may be worth the cost.