A side benefit of these mobile optimizations is that Flash on Windows desktop will in turn get hardware decoding of H.264 video and graphic acceleration, said Tom Barclay, senior product marketing manager, Adobe Flash Platform. Adobe has also added support for multitouch and gestures for both phones and Windows 7. Update: Some mobile devices will also get graphics acceleration; it is not available for PCs.

There are also neat new features like microphone access from within Flash — so developers can access binary data from wave forms from a computer’s microphone and manipulate them. Guess what that means? Opportunities for developers to create in-Flash Auto-Tune and karaoke. (Whoo!)

Also, as expected, the beta will support client-side file based encryption, HTTP streaming, in-browser DRM and improved buffering — though those will be more fully appreciated as we get closer to the actual product releases and developers are making things for real audiences.

Somewhat left out of this push is televisions, which can only get Flash Lite for now, but Barclay said to expect fuller support later next year.

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One of the things that has most impressed me about the S5 is the power management that Viliv has incorporated. The user doesn’t have to do anything to get great battery life, and a big part of that has to do with how well the S5 enters and exits Standby mode. The common usage scenario is to pop the device into standby and to resume when it’s needed again. I usually find it only takes about two seconds to go into Standby and 2-5 seconds to resume. Unlike other mobile computers I have used in the past the S5 is able to resume from Standby and reconnect to the WiFi network very quickly, at least until yesterday.

The problem set in all at once, as they often do. I found that the S5 was having trouble resuming from Standby. The desktop would appear right away as usual, but I found that the system didn’t want to execute programs, sometimes for as long as a few minutes. I watched the process many times to determine what might be causing this and began to suspect that the USB systems were not resuming from standby very well. There are many USB systems on the S5, as there are on most mobile PCs. The visible USB systems that were not resuming properly were the WiFi adapter and the Bluetooth adapter. Both of these devices are USB, and I felt pretty certain that one of them was not making the transition from running to standby to running again.

I tested this with repeated standby cycles and hard boots. The USB systems would always work as they should after a hard boot, it was just with a resume that they would fail and cause the system delays I’ve indicated. I set about scouring the Device Manager to see if some power management settings had been changed somehow but nothing really stood out. So I thought long and hard about what could have caused a major change to this system to interfere with this process, one that had been so solid before the problem set in?

The answer was ultimately the hardware driver for the WiFi adapter. My efforts to troubleshoot this went as far as doing a complete system restore to factory conditions. That went well as Viliv has a recovery partition and an easy method to reimage the system using the device buttons. The restore was followed by a Windows Update session to bring it up-to-date and that’s where I noticed what could easily be creating my problem.

I must share the blame for this new driver install as I saw a new Marvell driver update in Windows Update and thinking it was the Ethernet adapter, I checked the box to install it. I don’t remember applying this update before the restore, but I must have done so. I still had the resume problem after the restore so now that I was aware the WiFi adapter had been updated I could deal with it. The fix to my problem that I wasted hours on troubleshooting was to simply roll the driver back to what it was originally. Windows makes that very simple to do and that has fixed my problem.

My system is back happily resuming from standby as it did before. I suspect that Viliv has done a good job customizing the Marvell driver for the S5 and the generic Windows Update driver lost those customizations, thus creating my problem. It goes to show that you have to pay close attention to updates that Windows wants to apply and make darn sure you need a hardware update.

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Netbooks were definitely the big item as CES this year but we expected that.  Almost everybody makes one and the rest plan to make their own.  The little notebooks were everywhere and due to the low prices of them they are not going away any time soon.  The Sony Vaio P appearance was big news at CES and while not a netbook it is a “tweener” device that piqued a lot of interest at the show.

On the smartphone front things were quiet with the obvious exception of the Palm Pre.  The introduction of the new smartphone from Palm was the biggest buzz-maker at the show and put the only life into the smartphone arena that we saw.  Palm needed a transfusion of excitement in their world and the Pre has definitely provided it.

The rest of the smartphone world at CES was dead silent.  There were no new Windows Mobile phone announcements, handset maker displays were just more of the same.  Nokia showed some new stuff but it was largely variants of existing stuff and no one was walking around the show floor talking about them.  It’s as if Palm sucked the wind out of the smartphone world for everyone else.

The biggest surprise for me at the CES was the total lack of anything Android.  There were no new handsets presented, none announced, just dead silence.  The handset makers working on Android phones may be waiting for the Mobile World Congress in February to make their move but it was surprising to not see a single Android phone appear at CES.  It unsettles me a bit as I have predicted on the latest MobileTechRoundup show that I expect to see at least 12 Android phones appear this year.  Android could give Palm a run for its money with new handsets so they’d better get busy.

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UPDATE: after installing Parallels Tools in Windows 7 my connectivity issues disappeared.  This update was performed in Google Chrome under Windows 7 under Parallels Desktop.

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Thanks for coming out Hector!

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We finally found the right time to get over to the Sony VAIO kiosk, so here’s a short, 11-minute preliminary hands on with the P. Very first, limited impressions: this is a well designed device. The P certainly doesn’t feel like 1.4-pounds when you hold it; it feels far lighter. I guess we’re all used to carrying 2.5- to 5-pound devices. ;) It’s definitely pocketable, but not in any pants I own. The P should fit nicely within an inside jacket pocket, though.

Most amazing to me is how thin the lid and display are, which we show in the vid. There’s really no flex either. The keyboard is reminiscent of the chiclet-style keys on my MacBook. Definitely usable, but tracking nub may take some getting used to. I wasn’t thrilled that the camera is off to the side; I had hoped that Sony somehow designed it with a small tilt so you could sit centrally. Nope. We didn’t check the DPI settings, but text was quite readable. It’s sure to be a stretch for some folks, but for some, it beats having to scroll every few seconds.

Clearly, this is a nice device. Nice enough for $899 or more? That’s a tough call and one we can’t make with out spending more quality time. Before I forget: as I was working the camera (and getting jostled around), I thought the Sony P had HDMI out. Sleep deprivation has set in as I was obviously wrong. That’s the multi-purpose port for an external display and Ethernet. Best part of the vid? The guy who was trying to hone in on the device so he could take video too. Listen and you’ll hear what I mean… take a number, dude! ;) We’ll get a link to the higher quality video shortly.

Update: the high-def version of this video can be seen here.

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We were exhausted from walking on day 2, so our daily wrap video didn’t happen until this morning. There were more MIDs, UMPCs and netbooks sighted yesterday. We also spent a good amount of time talking with AMD, who powers the HP dv2: it’s not that much more costly than a well-specified netbook, but doesn’t compromise much in terms of power and performance.

Today we’re hoping to get our hands dirty with more of them and we’ll try to video the experience if things work out. You’d think the show ended yesterday based on the empty press and blogger lounges. Sure, all the big news has come out by now, but there’s still devices to be tinkered with! Only until 5:15pm local time though: I’ve got a very rare playoff game to watch.

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Palm Pre- Kevin and I were both very impressed how smooth Palm has made working with the Pre.  It feels nice in the hand and while it’s too early to tell if the Pre can save Palm it’s definitely a gadget that has impressed me here at the show.

Novatel MiFi- this credit card-sized 3G router made an impression on us when it was first introduced and seeing it in person at the show has not changed that.  There is something totally cool and useful about a tiny gadget that once you turn it on you have an instantly connected hotspot no matter where you are.  In a coverage area anyway.

Sony Vaio P- it is no surprise to find this on my short list.  I haven’t had any hands-on time yet but Sony has done a good job with the design of the P.  I like the fact that the keyboard is touch-typable and the build quality looks pretty decent.  We’ll have to see if the screen resolution is to high to comfortably work with. That may drop it off my list.

HP dv2 notebook- seeing how thin and light this 12-inch notebook really is impressed the heck out of me even though it’s not a netbook.  It’s not much bigger than a netbook and it’s light enough to carry around with ease.  The $699 starting price is very nice considering it has a powerful AMD processor and discrete graphics, unlike netbooks.

Pogoplug- this little box is so useful that it’s amazing no one thought of this before.  You plug any USB hard drive into the Pogoplug and it is instantly accessible from the web.  It has full security and multiple drives daisy-chained are also accessible.  Very cool.

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Ed Colligan

If you haven’t had enough of the Palm Pre just yet or want to see what we saw at the invite-only Press Event, today’s your lucky day. Palm is hosting a video recording of the event and the beauty of it is that you don’t have to live-blog it. Just kick back, relax and soak in all the new-ness that CES attendees enjoyed. Hopefully, this gives you a better idea of what we saw and helps you form your own early opinions on the Pre. We’re getting so many questions about the webOS and this might shed some light on the unique approach offered by Palm.

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Windows Mobile in dashboard

I like this concept from Celio because it leverages the smartphone platform, and more importantly, your data. They showed me this working mock-up. Look close because the automobile dashboard is solely a representative picture. It’s the 7-inch touchscreen display that’s real. That screen is commonly available as an option on autos, but what’s uncommon is to see Windows Mobile on it.

Yup, it’s another application of Celio’s technology in action. Concept only for now, but I could see it become reality. Smartphones are gaining traction over feature-phones, for one. And folks want access to their data all around them. If your existing phone and data plan can provide connectivity to the car, think about what you can do. Tap a contact name and have Google Maps directions appear without any typing or steam personalized audio from your home to your car. While a full-fledged PC and OS work here as well, this has to be far less costly while providing a good portion of the same functionality.

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Dell's $99 Mini 9

We heard that subsidized Dell netbooks were coming and now they’re here. For a limited time, anyway. Dell just announced that from now until the end of January, you can nab a Dell Mini 9  for $99 after a $350 rebate. Of course to get that deal, you’ll need to commit to a two-year AT&T data plan commitment. Essentially, this deal is structured the same as the Acer one that hit Radio Shack last month.

Specs for the subsidized Dell Mini 9 include: 1.6GHz Atom, 8.9-inch display, 512 MB of RAM, 8GB SSD, 4-cell battery, integrated HSDPA and Window XP. Note: pencil not included. I’m still not sold on a subsidized netbook, but that’s because I use multiple devices and prefer an external 3G adapter. Folks that don’t want to rely on WiFi hotspots or don’t have a 3G phone to tether might find this to be a good deal.

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OQO Model 2+

I spent some time at the Intel booth this morning at CES and was glad to see them with an entire display of Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs).  Intel has been pushing MIDs for a while and it is good to see a fair number of units coming to fruition.

I could only get photos of a few of the models due to the crush of people crowding the displays.  This was easily the busiest display booth I have seen yet at CES showing how popular portable computers have become, at least with the crowd that attends the CES.  Intel is using the term MID loosely as they had a few netbooks on display too so that may have played a role in the big crowd.

I got a chance to play with the newly announced OQO Model 2+ that Intel was showing off due to the Atom processor inside.  The OQO has an OLED screen, the first on a PC as far as I am aware.  The screen looked nice and bright but not much different than the displays on all the other non-OLED displays being shown.  While I was snapping photos of the OQO display model it went dead and had to be replaced with another unit.  I hope that’s not significant.

I played with MIDs from Aigo, Benq, Compal and others.  My favorite device of all I saw was the UMID, a tiny clamshell laptop MID.  The UMID seemed to garner a lot of interest with attendees which leads me to believe that folks are naturally drawn to the laptop form factor.  That’s why I think netbooks have done so well, it’s a form people are familiar with and can envision how it would work for them.  Enjoy these photos snapped in the Intel booth after the jump.  Please forgive me for any poor images, the lighting was terrible and the crowd was jostling me every time I tried to take a picture.

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