Our Top Picks of CES 2011: The Gadgets that Blew Us Away

CES 2011 has come and gone, and before it becomes totally passe to talk about the annual event, we’ve thrown together a list of each of our favorite pics for CES this year. Is this a list of the top gadgets of CES? Not necessarily, but this is a list of each of our favorite picks that we saw on the show floor.

Scott – Motorola Atrix

The Motorola Atrix is a power house of an Android phone. It has all the features you could possibly want in a new smartphone: 4G, a beautiful (qHD) screen, front and rear cameras, not to mention dual (yes dual) 1GHz processors and a full gigabyte of RAM. Impressive, indeed. BUT, that’s not just why we’re gaga about the Atrix. Motorola is releasing a Laptop Dock, which mounts the phone and allows you to harness the Atrix’s raw power on a nice large laptop screen, complete with a trackpad and keyboard. Using the Atrix innards, the laptop dock displays a beautiful Mac/Ubuntu-looking user interface with multi-tasking, a media center, a virtual view of the phone’s screen, and a full version of Firefox. While all of this amazingness is taking place, the laptop dock is actually charging the phone so you leave with a nice happy battery meter. Motorola–this is why we love technology.

Zara – Hanvon eInk Colour Ebook reader

I’m more or less an eBook junkie, so I was excited to see that the Hanvon eInk eBook Reader has a color eInk screen! This e-reader also promises 30+ days of battery life which should be the standard for most eInk readers, and a 9.7″ touchscreen. Unfortunately, besides for Hanvon’s new Ebook Reader, I was looking forward to seeing more ebook readers at CES this year, but was rather disappointed.

Helena – Polaroid Grey Label GL20 Sunglasses with Built-in Camera

Ok, maybe I’m biased, since as far as I’m concerned – Lady Gaga can do no wrong. But I’m still blown away by the Grey Label GL20 Sunglasses with Built-in Camera that she designed with Polaroid. Leave it to Gaga to design something totally futuristic. Sure, this gadget is a year in the making, and it won’t come out until the 2011 holiday season, but I know more than one Chip Chick that will be lining up to get it.

Ali – Motorola Xoom Tablet

There were a lot of tablets strutting their stuff at CES. Everyone from Toshiba, to Samsung, to LG, to Dell, but the Motorola Xoom really impressed me. Maybe because it’s running Honeycomb which is turning out fabulously, or because it’s running on a Dual core processor, or maybe because it looks like it can be a true iPad competitor in terms of size and user friendliness – but the Motorola Xoom is the tablet to look out for. That said, the Angry Birds board game definitely comes in as my second favorite toy at CES this year.

Tiffani – Doctor Who Speaker System

I’m a self professed Doctor Who fan who owns a fair amount of Doctor Who merch, but the Speakal  T.A.R.D.I.S. speaker with bluetooth and WiFi support takes the cake as the best Doctor Who gadget ever. The dock works in conjunction with an iTunes app that can transform the iPhone into a universal remote control that is able to control all of your TVs, cable boxes, etc in your house, as well as the T.A.R.D.I.S.