BETTER LIVING THROUGH TECHNOLOGY – ISSUE NO. 188

Last week I attended the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. This is the 3rd CES I have been to, and for a gadget hound like me, it is the closest thing to heaven on earth! As the largest trade show every year in Vegas, the meeting is massive. It is booth after booth, row after row and even conference hall after conference hall of electronics and related products. Many of the products on display are oriented toward entertainment. The most dramatic are the massive new video displays. Companies such as Panasonic, LG, Samsung, Sony, to name a few, are demonstrating their newest televisions and also prototypes of televisions to come. This year, the 4k - OLED televisions stole the show. These displays are 4 times the resolution of today's HD televisions. OLED is the newest display technology capable of producing incredibly vibrant images in an incredibly thin design (down to 4mm in thickness!). They do so with very low power consumption. I am guessing it will be 3 or more years before us mere mortals will be able to affordably buy these displays, but it will be worth the wait! Other technology presented was what I would describe as functional - for individuals and for organizations. The most obvious of these were the "workout" watches. In the South Hall, booth after booth was showing their version of watches capable of measuring distance travel (including number of steps taken), calories burned, heart-rate, blood pressure, body fat, perspiration rate, etc. etc. These tools can help motivate a healthier lifestyle by providing feedback on your physical activity. In fact, I have such a watch that I got last Spring. I wore it during my day at CES. I took 26,008 steps that day! Under the category of functional technology, Healthmark is introducing 2 new technology based tools: WiFi enabled thermometers. One model is designed to measure and record the temperature and humidity in the ambient environment (such as sterile storage). The other model has a temperature probe which can be placed into different environments, such as an ultrasonic cleaner, to monitor the temperature of the bath. Both thermometers have big, easy to read displays. The WiFi part? With the included software, each thermometer can be set up to report the vital statistics to your PC. You can record and graph these key statistics as a measure of quality and performance of your department. Click on the coupon below for more information about these great new technological tools. Ok - not as much fun as a 110" television, but at least they are affordable!