The weirdest CES 2016 gadgets… so far

There’s a very fine line between genius and madness

By

1/10
Smarter Fridge Cam

Smarter Fridge Cam

Straddling the fine line between genius and madness, the Smarter Fridge Cam takes a photo of the inside of your fridge every time the door is opened. That photo is then available to you wherever you can get an internet connection, so you can check your fridge shelves when you're wandering around the supermarket trying to decide what to buy for dinner. In theory it should prevent you from buying stuff you already have, although in practice we think writing shopping lists on paper is just as efficient, and cheaper.

2/10
Tipron Robot Projector

Tipron Robot Projector

Could this be any more CES? The Tipron is a cross between a robot and a projector that can trundle around your house or apartment and project things on the walls. The key selling point here is the automation: once you've shown Tipron to a particular point in your home it memorises the location, ensuring it won't bump into anything unless you rearrange the furniture, and it will be able to do things such as wander into your bedroom and project the weather forecast on the ceiling when you're waking up. Yours for $1,000, or maybe $2,000. Creator Cerevo doesn't seem sure yet.

3/10
D-Vine wine maker

D-Vine wine maker

Have you ever wished somebody would invent a Nespresso, but for wine? Then you'll be glad 10-Vins is at CES, because its D-Vine offers pretty much that. It doesn't actually make the wine - it's leaving that to the vineyard owners - but it uses a microchip on its 10cl wine vials to identify and set the correct temperature for the perfect glass. It's not going to appeal to those of us who would drink paint thinner if it was on special offer in the supermarket, but if you've ever cursed your poorly aerated glass of wine you might think the D-Vine is worth your $250.

4/10
CleverPet

CleverPet

CleverPet first surfaced on Kickstarter back in 2014, and now it's at CES with what's essentially the doggy equivalent of a PlayStation. The $269 device offers light and sound puzzles to keep your dog amused when you're not around, and it includes a treat dispenser to make sure that your pet stays interested. It's upgradeable via its built-in WiFi, so your pet can get new games whenever they're released, and it has multiplayer so your dog can call faraway dogs rude names. We made that last bit up.

5/10
Curie

Curie

The Curie isn't actually a weird product - it's a low-power processing unit designed for wearable devices - but weird doesn't begin to describe the toe-curling way Intel demoed it with wearable musical instruments. From the “oops! I dropped my drumsticks!” intro to the spectacle of massed musicians waving their arms around like loons as the music drops in and out of time, it's the kind of thing you watch from behind your fingers. Imagine the worst bits of a primary school concert, but performed by adults.

6/10
Flex Cam Pic

Flex Cam Pic

Another Kickstarter graduate, the Flex Cam Pic is a selfie camera crossed with an action camera. But it's no ordinary selfie camera, and it's no ordinary action camera either. It's a bendable, shapeable camera with a shape and a hairstyle that seems to have been inspired by repeated viewings of Yo Gabba Gabba, so it looks like some demented kind of space Cyclops. There are seven “funny faces” to choose from, but we suspect that even the non-character base model is a little too cutesy and lurid for anybody much older than seven.

7/10
DietSensor

DietSensor

Some gadgets sound too good to be true, and DietSensor appears to be one of them: its tiny scanner promises to detect the nutritional content of food by bouncing an infrared beam off it. If you're fed up manually entering things into apps such as MyFitnessPal that sounds brilliant, but even if it works as promised it can only scan single food types - so you could scan an unadorned chicken breast but not a KFC - and it's expensive, with a $249 price tag and a $10 to $20 monthly subscription.

8/10
ASU Cast One

ASU Cast One

Have you ever wished you could project videos from your watch? Despite the obvious problems inherent in such a device - battery life, projection distance, stability, your arm going to sleep halfway through The Martian, people pointing at you and honking with laughter - Chinese startup ASU has come up with one in the form of the ASU Cast One smartwatch. The Android Wear smartwatch is capable of 720p resolution, throws video up to six and a half feet and can create a display as big as sixty inches - although with a battery of just 700mAh you might be better sticking to cartoons than entire movies.

9/10
Digitsole Smartshoe 01

Digitsole Smartshoe 01

Remember Marty McFly's self-lacing Nikes from Back to the Future? Digitsole clearly does, but it's also clearly been listening to too much Kiss. The self-lacing Smartshoe 01 looks like a squashed stormtrooper helmet and it's the kind of thing Gene Simmons might dismiss as a bit much. That's a shame, because the idea of app-controlled self-heating, fitness-tracking footwear is quite fun. Thankfully Digitsole has put the tech into some slightly less glam rock styles too.

10/10
Kettle Kup

Kettle Kup

On the face of it, the Pot Noodle-backed Kettle Kup is a great idea: it's a portable, rechargeable, self-heating kettle that means you'll never have to shell out on expensive coffees when you're commuting. And that's fine, if you also want to carry around coffee. And milk. And sugar. And of course you have to remember to charge it, and to fill it before you get on the train or bus, and… you get the idea. This problem was solved back in 1892 when Sir James Dewar invented the Thermos.

Latest

You might also like

View More ▸

Useful links

Features

Top Guides

Best Deals

T3 is part of Future plc, an international media group and leading digital publisher. Visit our corporate site.
© Future Publishing Limited Quay House, The Ambury, Bath BA1 1UA. All rights reserved. England and Wales company registration number 2008885.