CES 2010: Microsoft's game is up

At CES 2010, the keynote events got kicked off with Microsoft's usual dog and pony show. Undaunted by a pre-show power outage on stage that required rebooting all of their computers that weren't battery-powered, Microsoft's CEO Steve Ballmer reiterated his company's successes in 2009. Chief among them was the introduction of Windows 7, which had been anxiously awaited due to the general public's disenchantment with Windows Vista. Though it's difficult to say whether the uptick of PC sales we're seeing stems more from a recovering economy or the new Windows, 7 has met a much more positive opinion from users.

Ballmer did a hard sell on Microsoft's Bing search service, stressing the versatility of its mapping feature, with which he was able to zoom into street-level views that looked at least as good as Google Maps. He did this with gestures on a touch-enabled tablet PC, which is a pretty intuitive way to search a map. Microsoft is heavily partnered with HP, which will pre-install Microsoft's Windows Live web apps on its new PCs, as well as setting Bing as the default search service.

Other Microsoft products are being updated in 2010, not the least of which will be their Office suite, now available as a public beta. Office 2010 continues the "ribbon" interface, extending it to Outlook and PowerPoint, so, better get used to the ribbon, folks. The Zune HD continues to gain capabilities in Microsoft's strategy to "mobilize" entertainment content, but continues to take a back seat to the iPod family in sales. Windows Mobile will upgrade to version 6.5, but has increased competition in the smartphone-OS arena with Android-based devices gathering steam. MediaRoom 2.0 aims to take content "seamlessly" from your Xbox 360 to any other Microsoft-equipped screen you own.

Ballmer showed their Blio e-reader software for PCs, with a convincing demonstration of how college textbooks can be enhanced with animations, videos and embedded quizzes. And there was a brief mention of the Uvo in-car system running an embedded version of Windows being developed in partnership with Kia, that, as with Ford's Sync, looks to be another competitor to GM's OnStar.

Speaking of Xbox, Ballmer showed some "compelling" (he likes that word) new "games that rival real life" (sic) slated for 2010, including Halo Reach, which will be released in a downloadable preview version to anyone who already owns Halo 3 ODST. An episodic game series called "Alan Wake" aims to create a new, psychological thriller game format. Another effort, called "GameRoom", lets you create your own virtual arcade composed of classic games from the Pac-Man era and later, allowing you to compete with your friends remotely through their Xboxes (all your friends have Xboxes, don't they?)

Finally, in a nod to the Nintendo Wii's body-motion-sensing controllers, Microsoft will have by "Holiday 2010" a 3-D camera for the Xbox that can track the motion of your own, un-wired body to control game play. The possibilities here are "virtually" endless, if it works well enough.

—Dean Gallea