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Posh tech
By Sheri Zorzi, APCUG Advisor
Do you remember when owning a home computer or a cell phone was a luxury? Those days are gone and now such technology is considered a standard necessity families rather than a luxury in most. There is still room for luxury in technology, though, as I saw at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas last month.
Perhaps the biggest-selling luxury tech item these days is plasma TV. You can have your big picture without filling the living room with a huge piece of ugly equipment. These babies are only inches thick! Samsung showed an 80-inch plasma that is guaranteed to impress, with a price tag rumored to be $45,000. A status symbol if I ever saw one.
Such large, thin screens make the idea of a true home theater experience ever more enticing. You can build a home theater with a wide screen, surround-sound, and tiered theater-style chairs with cup holders. I sat in one such chair equipped with (no kidding!) ButtKicker® technology, a silent subwoofer that allows you to feel powerful bass without excessive volume. Home automation technology can even be programmed to have the house light slowly dim out as the movie starts and then slowly come back up as the movie ends.
For much more affordable luxury entertainment, there are MP3 players. Apple’s iPod is the best-known but there are literally hundreds of brands of these tiny personal digital music players. You can add fancy cases, docking stations with speakers, or car adaptors that allow you to play through the car’s stereo speakers and switch playlists using your CD changer’s controls.
Satellite radio is not new, but it’s going portable now. XM Satellite Radio has several models of its XM2GO coming out this spring at about $350. It’s only a matter of time, I think, before someone combines the portable satellite radio receiver with an MP3 player, putting all 200 channels of streaming radio plus every song you’ve ripped from every CD you own right in your hand or pocket.
Even the kitchen has gone high-tech. Tonight’s Menu Intelligent Oven by TMIO, Inc. is a refrigerator-oven combination that can be controlled over the Internet or any web-enabled device such as a handheld PDA or cell phone. You can put the casserole or roast in the oven on the refrigerator setting when you leave for work and have the conventional or convection oven preheat itself at a preset time, cook the meal, and then keep it warm until you are ready to serve. If you are delayed you can adjust the refrigerator-oven settings from any web connection. It comes in double-oven model only and costs $7,500.
Do you strain to hear the Weather Channel’s forecast from the bathroom every morning while you brush your teeth? You might enjoy a Mirror TV from Phillips. It’s a two-way mirror with an LCD screen behind it. When the LCD is activated you see the TV picture; when it’s turned off you see your reflection. One model has the TV part in the lower half while the upper half remains mirror. Phillips estimates the price for a 17-inch Mirror TV will be around $2,500.
Making all this technology stylish is another new luxury niche for technology manufacturers. Textra and Inclosia both showed molded accessories and cases for cell phones, PDAs, MP3 players and notebook computers that include leather, wood and other luxury materials molded right into the device. Today a laptop computer can look like a dreamy designer handbag.
Whoever imagined that someday geeks could be trendy, stylish, and posh?!
Sherry Zorzi is a Director of Cajun Clickers Computer Club and host of The Cajun Clickers Computer Show heard every Saturday morning at 9 a.m. on WJBO Radio. Her consulting company, Zorzi Consulting, provides technology training and technology consulting to businesses and individuals. You can reach her at 225-658-8100 or
There is no restriction against any non-profit group using this article as long as it is kept in context with proper credit given the author. The Editorial Committee of the Association of Personal Computer User Groups (APCUG), an international organization of which this group is a member, brings this article to you.