CES - Car tech

LAS VEGAS--On CES 2010 press preview day, in-car electronics vendors have less than 24 hours to set up their high-powered, often-thumping and pulsing booths in the North Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center. By show open Thursday morning, these displays will be complete.

While some of these exhibitors simply drive their biggest attractions (Lamborghinis! Classic Cadillacs!) onto the show floor, many others piece together elaborate walls of speaker systems, amplifiers, GPS systems, and various forms of safety and entertainemnt tech. Flip through our slideshow for a behind-the-scenes look at CES 2010's car tech.

LAS VEGAS--Pioneer is taking steps into a segment of the car audio market that up until now has been monopolized by Alpine, with its first ever mech-free receivers, the MVH-P8200 and the MVH-P8200BT.

Tossing out the often-unused CD drive, the single-DIN MVH-P8200 has no moving parts--hence the designation "mech-free." The receiver was designed to work best with Apple's iPhone and iPod, but it should play back MP3, WMA, and iTunes AAC music files via USB and SD memory card. The USB port is located directly on the front face of the receivers and the SD memory card … Read more

LAS VEGAS--Pioneer unveiled the latest addition to its AVIC line of in-dash navigation solutions and its first Pandora Internet radio-enabled car stereo, the AVIC-X920BT, during its CES 2010 press conference.

One of the most notable changes to the AVIC's software is Pandora Link, which adds the ability to stream audio and display metadata from the Pandora Internet Radio app on a connected iPhone with a 3G connection. Users are also given access to album artwork and controls such as skip track, thumbs up and down, bookmarks, and station changes from the X920BT's touch-screen interface.

The X920BT bumps the … Read more

Taking a nod from the tuner set, Pioneer has announced a new four-stage structure for its full-range of car audio offerings. The idea is to make choosing, matching, and upgrading car audio components easier for the layman by simplifying the way they are organized.

Simply put, in the same way that a Stage 3 turbo kit is clearly better than a Stage 2, Pioneer's Stage 4 audio components should be clearly better than Stages 3, 2, and 1, and should produce best results when paired with other Stage 4 components. This simple system should keep users from, for example, … Read more

Updated: CNET video added.

The Chevrolet Volt hasn't even hit the sales floor yet and there's already an app for that. On Tuesday evening, Chevrolet and its OnStar telematics system announced working smartphone apps for the Motorola Droid, Apple iPhone, and BlackBerry Storm that will allow Volt owners to connect to their vehicles wirelessly to access remote features via smartphone.

The Chevrolet Volt OnStar smartphone app will let users know if the Volt is plugged in or not and whether it's charging on 120V or 240V. Users can also schedule charging times to get the lowest off-peak … Read more

When we last heard about Garmin's add-on to make its ecoRoutes software smarter, it was going under the name of ecoRoutes ESP and details were sparse. Now, as we approach CES 2010, Garmin has revealed new details surrounding the device on its corporate blog and a new name, ecoRoute HD. OK, so the name's not that different.

The big news here is the announcement of the expected availability date of March 2010 and the suggested retail price of $149.99.

The ecoRoutes HD system is built around two parts: the wireless OBD-II port dongle, which interfaces with your … Read more

Certain Kia car owners will soon be able to play music and make phone calls, all by just the sound of their voice.

Kia Motors' new infotainment system "Uvo powered by Microsoft" will let car owners access its key features by voice as well as by touch. With an assist from Microsoft speech technology and an embedded version of Windows, Uvo will help drivers and passengers make and answer phone calls, respond to text messages, and play music from different sources, said Kia.

Using Microsoft's voice recognition, car owners will be able to direct the system by issuing short voice commands rather searching through complex menus, said Kia. Drivers and passengers can scroll through their music lists and phone books by voice or via the touch screen.

For greater accuracy, speech recognition profiles can be created and trained for two different voices from among a variety of languages. The system can even respond to questions, such as "What's playing?" so that drivers don't have to fumble or take their eyes off the road.… Read more

The Consumer Electronics Association has named its 2010 Best of Innovations award winners. Among them is the XM SkyDock, an iPhone/iPod Touch XM Radio tuner.

In our recent review of the XM SkyDock, we found that its ease of installation and use and, to some degree, portability made it a good choice for iPhone users who want to add XM Radio to their vehicles without the complication and expense of a permanent installation. However, we weren't thrilled with the fact that the SkyDock didn't continue to stream while, for example, navigating.

The XM SkyDock joins other in-vehicle … Read more

Matt Howard, a software entrepreneur, developed ZoomSafer following an incident when he almost killed a 9-year-old boy because he was texting while driving. He knew that if it happened to him, it could happen to anyone.

Howard, along with co-founders Mike Costello and Mike Riemer, gathered $1 million in venture capital to launch preventative mobile software, called ZoomSafer. When the car has passed 10 mph, ZoomSafer disables the keyboard on the phone and replies to calls or texts with a message letting them know the driver is on the road.

Big deal; why not switch the phone to airplane mode … Read more