The Verge - Sony at CES 2012: Xperia Ion for AT&T, Google TV, Walkman Z1000, Xperia S, and more

Sony's new MirrorLink-enabled car head units put your smartphone in the dashboard (hands-on)

2012-01-14T10:41:04Z

Sony's announced a number of new products this week at CES, including two car entertainment systems with MirrorLink smartphone integration. Sony's XAV-701HD and XAV-601BT feature 7-inch and 6.1-inch WVGA touchscreens, respectively, along with Bluetooth connectivity and the expected assortment of car stereo features. Where things get interesting is how they interact with your phone.

If you're not familiar, MirrorLink is an industry standard backed by various car manufacturers, as well as consumer electronics companies like Nokia, LG, and Samsung. It works with Android and Symbian phones, and aims to allow greater interoperability between mobile devices and cars — in this case actually mirroring your phone's screen on the head unit via...

Sony's RDH-GTK33iP iPod dock turns your bedroom into a disco dance party

2012-01-12T07:35:04Z

Sony is showing off a new iPhone and iPod dock here at CES that's turning quite a few heads. The RDH-GTK33iP is a 420-watt boombox with a heavy-duty design that is more reminiscent of a stage monitor than a traditional dock — and it also puts on a light show to accompany your favorite tunes. You plug in your iPhone or iPod via the included 30-pin dock connector, or hook up a memory stick or other source via the USB port, and the dock's twin speaker lights pulse through a variety of colors in rhythm with the song being played. We tried it out with a track from Depeche Mode's Violator, and sure enough, it performed as promised — and delivered a nicely detailed sound as well. No official specs were given, but to our eyes the dock packs...

PlayStation Vita plays augmented reality soccer (hands-on video)

2012-01-12T05:21:56Z

Earlier today, we saw Sony's PlayStation Vita show off its AT&T cellular chops with Unit 13, and now we've got the quad-core handheld demonstrating another augmented reality title. In case you're unaware, the US and European versions of the PlayStation Vita will come with six AR cards when they go on sale this February, and you can download a bunch of games: This one is Table Football, which turns the cards into goals, grandstands and a scoreboard. You can place them however you like, spreading them apart for a larger field, or closer in for a smaller one, and when you score a goal, the field gets re-rendered with fuller 3D graphics to show off the replay. Of course, you'd already know all that if you watched the video to begin with!

Sony still working on OLED display tech, developing Crystal LED 'in parallel'

2012-01-12T01:20:46Z

LG and Samsung are showing off crazy next-gen OLED TV prototypes here at CES, but Sony went another way with its Crystal LED prototype — it's extremely impressive, with nearly 90-degree viewing angles, but it's also prompted a lot of rumors that Sony's abandoning OLED TVs for the consumer market. We asked for clarification and it seems the truth is a little different: Sony says that Crystal LED will be developed in "parallel" to OLED for future consumer and professional applications. We don't know if that definitively means that Sony will put out any future consumer OLED TVs — it hasn't done anything meaningful since it killed the XEL-1 in 2010 — but the door is certainly still open. Here's the full statement:

The Crystal LED...

PlayStation Vita 3G for AT&T hands-on demo with Unit 13 (video)

2012-01-12T00:08:34Z

There's not much left to learn about the PlayStation Vita that launched in Japan — find our full review right here — but we just got our hands on a Vita connected to AT&T's 3G HSPA network, and playing Unit 13. It's a third-person shooter from Zipper Interactive, best known for the SOCOM games, where you run from cover to cover though a series of shooting-and-sneaking missions trying for a high score. The game has actual multiplayer over Wi-Fi, but the 3G functionality allows for the game's online global leaderboards to be updated in real time, and in a clever stroke, the game notifies you if a friend beats your score, gently nudging you to jump back into the game. Turnabout is fair play, right? The game will be available in Vita's...

Sony VAIO ultrabook prototype shown behind glass

2012-01-10T07:41:59Z

Sony doesn't technically have an ultrabook — the VAIO Z or VAIO SB doesn't really count — but it seems Sony's planning to look at the category sometime in the future. Labeled as a "future ultrabook concept," Sony's displaying a laptop that looks a lot like its current VAIO Z. Unfortunately, it's behind glass, but from what I can tell it has a different touchpad than the current VAIO Z and is a bit thicker. That's all I could really glean from the chassis trapped behind glass, but it seems very likely that Sony will join the race at some point this year. Now, let's just hope that external GPU and docking station comes along for the ride.

Sony Smart Watch (aka Sony Ericsson LiveView 2) hands-on

2012-01-10T05:15:17Z

Last night we spotted what looked like the successor to Sony Ericsson's LiveView auxiliary display, and it's true: this is the Sony Ericsson Smart Watch. Well, it'll probably just be the Sony Smart Watch soon, given how the company recently swallowed its joint Sony Ericsson venture and has already begun rebranding. Note the lack of an "Ericsson" in that logo? Sony Ericsson reps tell us it can store 255 widgets, most of which will interact with your Android 2.1+ Sony smartphone (some work with Android phones, period, and others run all on their own) and that it will be on sale at an unspecified date for $149. That screen certainly is sharp. Take a gander at the device in our gallery and video below!

Sony displays VAIO tablet prototypes; future Windows 8 hardware?

2012-01-10T04:07:04Z

If you blinked while watching our Sony live blog, you likely missed Kazuo Hirai teasing of a few prototype VAIO laptop and tablets. Well, luckily, Sony's displaying them behind glass at its booth. To me, the most interesting of the two is the tablet that slides over a detachable keyboard. It's a lot like the Series 7 Slider Samsung showed last year (it never came to market), but the tablet separates from the base and also has a stylus. There's a short video of it behind glass below, but if I had to guess this really seems like a perfect fit for Windows 8. (VAIO is Sony's Windows-only brand, its tablet is part of its mobile group.) That said, I ran into a Sony executive at the booth, who said these are really just prototypes, and that...