CES 2015

If you have a home, then you probably have a lawn. And if you have a lawn then you probably have an irrigation system. Even with programming and some crude scheduling, these are dumb devices that essentially haven't been changed or seen any real technological updates in years and just run until you remember to tell them to stop. I can’t tell you how many times I wake up to hear my sprinkler system running as it competes with a massive South Carolina rainstorm. Or how I try and remind myself to turn the system off for winter – and back on for summer – but inevitably forget to do it until multiple cycles into the new season. Fortunately, technology in the form of Skydrop is coming to bring some intelligence and Internet control to irrigation controllers.

If beauty is only skin deep, it runs awful thick in the new Soledge Canto range of wireless audio components. All of the components are covered in a thick layer of eye-catching, bright white Corian, making for stunning components that look every bit as beautiful as they sound. I couldn’t resist running my hands across the tops of the components, reveling in the feel of ultra-high-end build quality.

Sony announced that all of its 2015 Sony smart TVs will run the Android TV platform and it has partnered with Netflix to improve 4K streaming.

Soundwall calls its flat-panel, on-wall, wireless, stereo speaker system a “connected canvas” because it’s both a connected speaker capable of streaming audio from internet music services or from your mobile device and...

Ultra-D is a development of Stream TV Networks, in conjunction with partnering companies, to offer glasses free 3D. Their press event was a less elaborate affair than the usual CES press event (though the awful photograph shown here is largely my fault!).

Think home automation and lighting control shouldn’t cost thousands of dollars and take a team of programmers days to install and set up? Then you are of like mind with SwitchBee, a company looking to bring simplified lighting control to the masses and bring “a quick switch to a smart home” with a one switch, one screwdriver, two minutes, $50 philosophy.

There were no big surprises in streaming announcements at this year’s CES.  Few new media players were shown, as the Fire TV and Nexus Android TV were released in November. Streaming 4K and HiRes Audio became a reality in 2014. Instead, it was the trends and the new technologies that will move online streaming to the next level that were the news at CES 2015.