CES 2022 live blog Day 4: All the latest news and biggest announcements

My wife might be keen for me to try out the Motion Pillow 3, which promises to stop people from snoring. This smart pillow has a little sensor and an AI that listens for your snoring patterns, and then inflates four separate airbags inside the pillow to adjust your head, opening up your airway to promote better breathing while you sleep. It also has a sleep tracking system that monitors your sleeping patterns and trends, and analyzes the data in a smartphone app.

The Motion Pillow 3 is the company’s third iteration; pricing has not been announced, but the previous model cost around $400.

Feeling a bit punchy from being cooped up inside? Then you may want to check out Liteboxer VR, a new virtual-reality boxing app coming to the Oculus Quest 2 in March. We had a chance to go hands-on with Liteboxer VR, and found it was a pretty fun workout. It gamifies boxing, letting you rack up points the more often you hit the correct targets. And, when the app is officially released, you’ll be able to spar virtually against others in the metaverse. Ugh, I want to punch myself for saying that.

Want to know what are our favorite gadgets of the show? Wonder no longer, as the Tom’s Guide CES 2022 Awards are now live. We’ve picked out top tech in a variety of categories, from EVs to smart home to TVs to laptops. Congratulations to all the winners!

Gaming laptops never take a back seat at CES. Acer has brought some major heat with its new Acer Predator Triton 500 SE. It’s an updated version of the Acer Predator Triton 500 from last year, this time featuring a 12th gen Intel Core i9 CPU, Nvidia GeForce RTX 3080 Ti laptop graphics and 32GB of LPDDR5 RAM. It’ll ship with Windows 11 too. 

The Triton 500 SE will hit store shelves in March with a starting price of $2,299.

Israel-based company Noveto has unveiled a new smart speaker titled the N1. It has built-in Alexa support and its built-in Smart Beaning tech, which, according to a press release, provides “personal and immersive 3D binaural sound without headphones.”

This smart speaker will use a camera to track a listener’s head and “transmit ultrasound silently through the air, converging in small audible pockets outside the listener’s ears.”

The company claims that a listener can listen to their music, without headphones, while others around them can barely hear a thing. 

CES 2022 is bringing its fair share of futuristic tech, and Portl has something straight out of sci-fi. Portl is a company that creates giant cubes for people to virtually beam into. The company calls these 4K holographic displays, and as you can see in the clip above, the news reporter can have a presence at CES in Las Vegas without ever leaving a studio in Los Angeles. 

If you’re in need of the ultimate productivity companion for the MacBook Pro 2021, then you should check out the Plugable UD-6950PDZ. This is a docking station that lets you connect to three other displays with ease, either with HDMI or DisplayPort connections, making the most of the power of the M1 Pro or M1 Max chips inside the MacBook.

Aside from triple display support, you also get six USB 3 ports for all your accessories, a gigabit ethernet connection for speedy wired internet and 60W USB-C power output to keep your laptop juiced up. Oh, and an audio in/out jack too.

Of course, while this dock seems designed to get the most out of the new MacBook Pros, there’s nothing stopping you from using this with other high-powered laptops capable of outputting to multiple displays. You may even think it’s worth it just for all those USB ports.

Still want more color-changing tech? The BMW iX Flow can do this too. The triangular wrap covering its body panels uses the same e-ink technology that powers e-readers to swap the color of the car between black and white.

While you can make the car switch colors at the touch of a button, this isn’t just a feature for if you’re indecisive about your paintjob. BMW’s pitch says the colors could change to help you find the car in a parking lot, or to communicate diagnostic information about the battery. 

Smartphones aren’t really the focus of CES, but the Vivo V23 is catching a lot of attention for its unique color-changing ability.

The Sunshine Gold version of the phone, when exposed to sunlight, will shift from its basic blue/green to gold. That’s thanks to ultraviolet-sensitive crystal structure within the phone’s body.

Beyond this, there are a few other noteworthy parts of this phone. It has two front-facing cameras in a notch above the screen, something most Android phones have long abandoned, and a huge 108MP main rear camera on the V23 Pro model. It’s just a shame that at the time of writing, there’s no sign they’ll go on sale in the U.K. or the U.S.

Hi there, it’s Richard Priday, staff writer, here again to highlight some of the most interesting things on show at CES.

You probably don’t associate Sony with electric vehicles, but that’s something it wants to change. After showing off the first Vision-S in 2020, it’s returned this year with the Vision-S SUV, a new larger-bodied version of the concept.

Not only does it look suitably futuristic, but the touted safety sensors and in-cabin entertainment system also offer a big leap forward in tech too. Now all Sony has to do is make it…

Whether you have an EV or still burn gas to get around, it’s always a good idea to invest in a dash cam. Because the roads are a dangerous place, and it’s wise to make sure you have evidence of what happens. 

Nextbase, which makes several of the best dash cams, is taking that concept a step further with the AI-powered Nextbase iQ. Not only can it record what’s happening in and around your car, the built-in AI is able to keep tabs on what’s going on around your car and make sure you’re aware of potential dangers. Be they from pedestrians or other vehicles.

On top of that the iQ has built-in cloud connectivity to upload and access footage in real time, lets you track your car’s position with GPS, and includes a ‘Valet Mode’ that notifies you if something’s going wrong when someone else has your car.

Pricing is still to be announced, but the Nextbase iQ is currently scheduled to arrive this fall.

If you’ve got a car with Android Auto but not one that lets you connect your phone wirelessly, a new car adapter is here to make connecting an easier proposition. The $90 Motorola MA1 wireless car adapter for Android Auto plugs into your car infotainment system, letting you access your favorite maps, music and messaging apps on the car’s display.

Not as many cars offer wireless Android Auto support as you might think, so the the Motorola MA1 provides an easy workaround for just getting into your car and connecting automatically. (The adapter doesn’t actually come from Motorola, but from SGW Global, which is licensing the Motorola name in this case.)

The Motorola MA1 adapter goes on sale January 28 at the Motorola Sound website; you should be able to find it at other retailers, too.

The car industry loves CES because it’s the perfect place for them to show off the weird and wonderful stuff they’ve been developing behind closed doors. While those concept cars aren’t likely to hit the round, we might still seem some of their best features make it to a future EV.

Take the Mercedes Vision EQXX, for example. This beast offers 620 miles of range, thanks to a lightweight aerodynamic design, and a brand new compact battery design. That battery has the same power as the Mercedes EQS, but is half the size and 30% lighter. It’s also got a 47.5-inch 8K mini-LED display that stretches the entire length of the dashboard.

Whether we’ll see a Mercedes with quite so much range is a question we can’t answer right now. But the automaker has confirmed some of these advancements are already being added to future cars — and hopefully the battery is one. We can always benefit from extra range, even if it’s not quite so mind-blowing as the EQXX.

We’ve also seen some new mobiles from TCL — yes, the company more commonly known for its TVs — in the form of the budget TCL 30 XE and TCL 30 V. 

They’re both 5G-capable and with a low price tag, giving them a chance to rank among the best 5G phones. We’re looking forward to getting hands-on with the new models try try them out.

Pricing info isn’t available yet, though we expect the TCL 30 XE will cost less than $300. The TCL 30 V might cost a bit more since it has support for Verizon’s mmWave 5G network.

Let’s talk about phones for a minute. We’ve seen some big announcements at CES 2022, including the full reveal of the Samsung Galaxy S21 FE and the partial reveal of the OnePlus 10 Pro, but you might have missed some new Nokia handsets. 

Truthfully, these won’t give the best phones any cause for concern, but they could appeal to budget shoppers. Of particular interest is the Nokia G400, which gives you a 5G capable phone for $239. You also get three rear cameras — a macro lens joins the main and ultrawide cameras — and a 6.6-inch display with a 120Hz refresh rate. That latter feature is normally reserved for much more expensive phones.

The rest of the Nokia models shown off by HMD Gobal — which runs the Nokia brand these days — includes four other new U.S.-exclusive models which it plans to release during the first half of 2022. Options range from the compact $99 Nokia C100, which features a 5.45-inch screen, to the $149 G100, which will feature a larger 6.5-inch panel and 5,000 mAh battery.

The cheapest Nokia device coming out in the first half of this year is the Nokia 2760 Flip, a feature phone that revives a model from 2007. 

Yes, you could painstakingly go through each and every laptop announcement coming out of CES to find out which ones are bangers and which ones are clangers. But why do that when we’ve done all the work for you?

Our round-up of the best laptops of CES 2022 highlights the most interesting machines we’ve spotted this year, whether it’s from in-person briefings or information we’ve gleaned from afar. We may not be at CES in person this year, but plenty of interesting laptops from Lenovo, Acer, HP, Alienware and others are on display, and this guide can bring you all the important details about each model.

Meanwhile, Neato claims its new D9 and D10 have substantially better dust pick-up than previous models. And the iconic D-shape of the body is ideal for reaching into corners and along edges. Though they don’t have self-emptying bases, they are also more affordable. The D9 is $449 on Amazon and the D10 is $599.

I’ve long wanted a robot vacuum, because I have a dog and he has fur and it gets everywhere. Unfortunately I also have several flights of stairs in my house, so it’s not really that practical. If I was getting one, though, I’d be looking at this list of our favorite robot vacuums at CES 2022. 

The big trend this year is improving hybrid vacuum-mop designs. Some new robot vacuums can now rinse and clean the mop head between runs, as well as self-emptying the dust bin — saving you the hassle of doing it yourself. 

The Roborock S7 MaxV Ultra is one of these models. An intelligent docking system and an improved obstacle avoidance system really takes it to the next level. This robot vac does come with a hefty price tag, though — $1,399.99. 

Sleeping is great — although CES does kind of get in the way of it. Damn time difference between Vegas and London. Anyway, CES 2022 saw some neat upgrades to smart mattress manufacturer Sleep Number’s award-winning 360 Smart Bed range. 

The new Sleep Number 360 Smart Bed monitors your general wellness and sleep health, and generates real-time suggestions to help you sleep better (presumably such as “Put down your Nintendo Switch right now, it’s 1 a.m.!”) 

It’ll even learn your snoozing habits so that it can detect and alert you to “abnormal events,” and the company is also seeking FDA clearance for the ability to warn you about insomnia, sleep apnea, and other health conditions.

Let’s start today off by rounding up some of yesterday’s highlights — including an extremely odd PC case that breathes. Don’t believe me — check out the GIF above.

The case in question is the Kinetic gaming-PC case from Cyberpower, which has 18 triangular mechanical vents that automatically open and close according to cooling demand. I’m honestly not sure whether to find it creepy, cool or both.

Cyberpower calls this process “intelligent airflow,” and you can watch it in action on YouTube. Unfortunately, there’s no pricing or availability information yet, although Cyberpower says the Kinetic case is “coming soon.”  

Good morning, and welcome to Tom’s Guide’s CES 2022 live blog Day 4. 

Though many of the big events have already taken place, the CES schedule is still packed with events and conferences. Of the 60 in today’s running order, there are sessions on everything from health to crypto to AI to eSports and space travel. Plus food — quite a bit of it, actually, with ‘The Future of Meat’ standing out as today’s best-named conference.

Anyway, we’ll keep our eyes out for the interesting stuff, and also fill you in on any product announcements you might have missed.