By Carolyn Heneghan
This week, CES 2013—or the Consumer Electronics Show—has been going strong in Las Vegas with an extraordinary amount of innovations and presenters all hoping to be the next “it” technology. From 4K and UltraHD TVs to the latest in smartphone, tablet, and mobile technologies, CES is the show for techies and electronics buffs alike. Amidst the more common themes of the show, however, are plenty of new products in the music realm, some of which we’ve introduced below.
Waterproof Phone Cases
Want to continue listening to your music underwater or lounging on a pool raft or river tube? Coupled with water-proof headphones, these waterproof phone pouches make rocking out underwater possible. Several companies offer different models, such as DiCAPac, SEaLABox, AquaPac, and Ecases from Cascade Designs.
Smart Watches
The I’m Watch is a wrist-friendly Android device that, among other things, supports features like cloud connectivity and on-demand music for wrist-held music on-the-go. The Pebble, in addition to being water resistant to five atmospheres and lasting for a full week on one battery charge, can seamlessly control your device’s music player.
Headphones
Rapoo’s H9080 Home Entertainment Wireless Headphones are made of leather and produce deep bass, clean treble, and a pure, mellow sound. There’s a charging cradle that juices up the headphones for 10 hours of use after just three hours.
Speakers
Disco Twin from SuperTooth is a pair of Bluetooth speakers with up to 10 hours of battery life and 16 watts of RMS power coming from each unit. Heavy and durable, the speakers are powerful enough to fill up large, spacious rooms with clear sound at maximum volume.
Pure’s self-powered wireless speaker system Jongo pairs physical connectivity with integrated content via the unlimited jukebox capability that comes with the speaker set. Users can play streaming content from the Internet via Wi-Fi or from a laptop, smartphone, or tablet using Bluetooth, and users can synchronize all speakers in one household using the Pure Connect app. The streaming service is akin to Spotify, Pandora, and the like, but it comes at a $5/month subscription rate for streaming and $10 for downloading.
Retro Music Players
At CES 2013, retro music players made a comeback as well, from suitcase record players and speaker sets to old school phonographs, jukeboxes, and western-style wooden record players with a cabinet-style radio grill.
gTar
We highlighted gTar last year, but the gadget is making more headlines this week at CES.
Remember Guitar Hero? Developer group Incident has taken the power of the virtual guitar to the next level. They’ve created a guitar that hooks up to your iPhone with an actual responsive fret board and strings and that allows you to learn how to play the guitar with the help of the latest app technology.
Watch gTar’s demo video here.
Porsche Music Integration
Through its partnership with Aha, enabled Porsche vehicles will be able to connect to the car company’s new partner through their smart phones, which will allow music streaming from the app. You can listen to a song in the car and then pick it right back up on the phone later. They combine radio stations and Slacker online media service for a fuller music experience.
Dexim Music Stylus
Dexim’s Bluetooth stylus allows you to listen to music while you write, with hi-fi stereo music performance. There’s a 3.5mm audio port for your headphones and even a microphone to act as a pen phone.
And Finally… Music Massages?
Ever feel the bass in your core or chest while you’re listening to music? iMusic BodyRhythm is an iOS-controlled, Bluetooth device that “massages” your shoulders with a series of tiny taps in time with the music that’s playing. The massager itself looks like a leather life jacket, and it allows you to physically feel your music as you listen to it. You can also tap the screen of your iDevice to make your own virtual drumming rhythms.
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