Best of CES 2019: Award winners from the blockbuster tech expo

CES 2019 is drawing to a close, and once more we’re left with a barn’s worth of technology announcements. The themes, if there were any, were the march of enormous 8K screens and the ongoing fight between Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa to control your home. Around this were internet-connected planks of wood and roll-up TVs, new graphics cards and turntables, and even a smartwatch that draws its power from your body.   

Below are the products we thought worthy of our Expert Reviews Best of CES 2019 awards, from smart bedside clocks to next-generation TV screens. Congratulations to all the winners.

Lenovo Smart Clock with Google Assistant

Lenovo’s Smart Clock is a cleverly thought-out bedside assistant that could genuinely help your bedtime routine. It comes with in-built Google Assistant and a convincing £70 price tag.

As Tim Danton writes in his hands-on review: “It’s cute, carefully thought-out and, thanks to the omission of a camera and the physical option of switching the microphone off, it doesn’t feel like an invasion of privacy. Smarts when you want it, a dumb clock when you don’t.”

Asus RoG Mothership GZ700

Asus’ beefy Mothership GZ700 is a supercharged Surface Pro for gamers, with detachable keyboard and a desktop class CPU and graphics chip. It’s one of the most innovative gaming laptops we’ve seen.

“Is it crazy?” asks Tom Bruce in his hands-on review. “Probably. But the ROG Mothership is also totally new, completely different and a breath of fresh, but presumably quite toasty, air.”

Samsung 75-inch MicroLED TV

Samsung showcased a TV running on next-generation MicroLED technology at CES. It also brought a totally different take on flexible screens, with a modular setup that allows viewers to assemble panels in all sorts of different arrangements.

More useful in the short term is the 75in 4K TV iteration the company presented. Using inorganic MicroLEDs means Samsung’s screen should rival OLED without the drawbacks that come with using organic compounds, such as degradation and image burn-in.

HP Spectre 15 with AMOLED display

HP pitches its Spectre 15 as the first laptop with an AMOLED display, and while this isn’t technically true (that honour goes to Lenovo), it still hints at the boldness of this machine.

As Tim Danton writes in his hands-on review: “Viewing angles are superb, and the whole experience makes going back to a bog-standard IPS screen feel a little like you’ve put on your sunglasses inside.”

Royole FlexPai

The Royole FlexPai is the first handset out of the gate with a foldable screen, and suffers from some early growing pains as a result but it’s an impressive piece of engineering. More than this, it’s a glimpse into a possible future for smartphone and tablet design.  

With Samsung poised to launch its own bendable smartphone, possibly this year, the Royole FlexPai has beaten the big names to be the first with the technology. “It’s a brilliant innovation,” writes Tim Danton in his hands-on review. “And arguably the most important technology breakthrough on show at CES 2019.”  

Audio-Technica ATH-ANC900BT

Japanese firm Audio-Technica released a trio of headphones during CES 2019, but it’s the top-end of these – the ATH-ANC900BT – that really grabbed our interest. Bringing the fight to Sony and Bose, these wireless cans have three different modes of active noise cancelling. Most impressive is its promised 35 hours of battery life between charges, with Bluetooth and noise cancelling turned on.