SALTZMAN: Your next PC will have 27 hours of battery life

Billed as the world’s largest consumer electronics show with more than 182,000 attendees from 140 countries, IFA 2024 (pronounced “ee-fah”) is taking place Sept. 6-10 at the massive Messe Berlin fairground in Germany’s beautiful capital, and spilling over to other surrounding facilities.

Article content

It’s also the world’s oldest tech show of its kind, celebrating its 100th anniversary this year.

Similar to the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), which takes place on our side of the pond every January, the annual IFA serves as a showcase to the latest in computers, smart home innovation, home theatre gear, and mobile tech.

While the show hasn’t wrapped up at the time of writing this, a few highlights so far from IFA 2024:

AI-powered laptops

Intel chose IFA as its “coming out” party for its second-generation Intel Core Ultra processors, dubbed “Series 2,” which will power portable PCs starting later this month with more than 20 computer manufacturers.

As announced at its pre-IFA event, these laptops can deliver more performance – between 30% to 80% more for gaming compared to last year’s Intel Core Ultra machines – but consuming up to 50% less power to do so. This translates to battery life of more than 20 hours on some applications, says Intel.

Article content

Article content

Fusing a CPU with a GPU (for graphics) and new NPU (neuroprocessing unit), these Windows 11 laptops are also capable of delivering better artificial intelligence (AI) experiences than its predecessors. For example, last year’s PCs could generate an image you asked for in 15 to 20 seconds, but these new PCs can perform the same operation in as little as 5 seconds (such as a student asking for a custom image to drop into a presentation).

Available for preorder now and shipping Sept. 24, these new Intel Core Ultra laptops will be branded with a “200V Series” naming convention, to indicate it’s a Series 2 model.

One example is the ASUS Vivobook S 14 “256V,” which not only is a super thin and light laptop with a crisp OLED display with Dolby Atmos audio system and light-up RGB keyboard (something gamers love), but can last up to 27 hours between charges, the company says, for (offline) video playback. That’s the equivalent of about 15 back-to-back movies.

As someone who travels a ton, battery life is super important.

Lenovo also showed off a laptop with an innovative design: the Auto Twist AI PC concept PC has a display on a motorized hinge, which can then rotate itself to face you when it tracks your movement – and can also transform into various modes through verbal commands.

Article content

Smart humidifiers, air purifiers

While not a household name in North America, SwitchBot had an innovative humidifier and purifier at IFA 2024.

The SwitchBot Evaporative Humidifier can have its water refilled by a robot. That is, when the 4.5-litre tank needs a top up, if you own the SwitchBot S10 robot vacuum it could bring water to the humidifier when it’s running low.

On the air purifier front, while they can effectively clean the air in your home – especially ideal for allergy sufferers like yours truly – they’re not much to look at. But the aptly named SwitchBot Air Purifier Table will serve as a small table with integrated wireless charger and an app-controlled light underneath for illumination in a darkened room.

Article content

A small oval-shaped platform is on top of the air purifier, where you can place a Qi-compatible smartphone or earbuds case to juice up, perhaps beside your car keys when you come home, or a cup of coffee. Not only can you change the colour of the lights, it will automatically change from green to blue to red based on air quality.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

Foldable phones, new tabs

Honor, a popular Chinese mobile tech brand, officially launched its foldable Android phone, the Honor Magic V3, making it the thinnest foldable phone on the market at just 0.36 inches slim.

It’s also said to be very durable, with a competitive camera system, AI features and long battery life. I had some hands-on time with a model and its dual screens – one on the outside and the larger (almost 8-inch) one on the inside that unfolds to a tablet – were bright and colourful, too.

Article content

Speaking of tablets, Honor also showed off its 12-inch MagicPad 2 Android tablet, which weighs just 555 grams, featuring eight separate speakers.

Finally, a flying car?

Anyone who grew up watching The Jetsons in the ‘60s (or at least Back to the Future in the ‘80s) have long dreamt of owning a flying car – and we’ve seen some prototypes over the years.

From San Mateo, California’s Alef Aeronautics, the 2-seater, all-electric Model A could potentially be released over the coming years as it’s slated for production by the end of 2025 and already has nearly 3,000 preorders.

Shown at IFA 2024 (well, only in stationary form for now), Alef’s Model is designed to drive on the street, take off vertically when needed, and fly overhead above traffic in congested cities – where allowed, of course.

That is, tech is always ahead of legislation, and no doubt you’ll need some form of a pilot’s licence to fly one, but the eVTOL market (“electric vertical take-off and landing”) could be worth $1-trillion by 2040, according to JPMorgan. Alef Aeronautics was the first company to receive limited FAA Special Airworthiness Certification, which limits the locations on where it is allowed to fly.

Article content