From the show floor of CES

...Johnson Controls will utilize a control system for commercial buildings below 100,000 sq. ft. called Touch 4 that will be supplied by Control 4. Johnson Controls estimates the smaller commercial building market at $55 to $65 billion internationally. The Control 4 system usees the Zigbee standard to control security, HVAC and other building systems.

 

...A new flat-panel display technology called OLED that has been in development for years was shown at the Consumer Electronics Show last week in Las Vegas. Sony is selling in its Sony Style stores an OLED television with a screen that measures 11 in. diagonally for $2,500. This is believed to be the first OLED television offered widely to consumers. OLEDs are used in smaller sizes in flip cell phones and other personal electronic items.

 

...Samsung showed a prototype of a larger OLED television with a screen measuring 31 in. diagonally and less than one in. thick. OLED technology is being developed for flexible substrates, but these televisions use fixed glass. OLED technology promises thinner panels with high resolution, no latency and power requirements estimated at half those of other LCD or plasma flat panels. They provide their own illumination and so need no bulbs.

 

...Front projection technology is getting a boost from portable, short-throw front-projection DVD players with speakers designed to be placed on a coffee table in front of people. The machines can throw large projections on walls or screens from those distances. One popular use is for interactive video games that players can move around the house or take to friends' houses. One such projector shown at the Consumer Electronics Show last week was designed for multi-purpose use -- it has an iPod dock -- and is a convincing replica of R2D2, the robot from the Star Wars movies. Another extreme short-throw projector designed for mounting from Sanyo can produce a picture measuring 80 in. from a distance of 3 ft.