Six gadget trends to look for at CES

Annual trek to Vegas for CES is only a few days away and here we have the large news sites already trying to scoop up all the media coverage.  In the past CES was over and done (from a media standpoint) before the doors opened so I'm wondering what this year will be like.

If the show sets the tone for the year's technology, 2013 will be about watching TV on your 5-inch smartphone while your self-driving car ferries you to work. Companies will continue to try to connect everything to the Internet -- lights, power outlets, cars, cameras, kitchen appliances -- and allow you to control them from a mobile device.

There have been some big changes at this year's conference. Longtime headliner Microsoft has dropped out of CES, and mobile devices are increasingly saving their big announcements for the Mobile World Congress event in February. But hopefully the void is filled by exciting discoveries and gadgets we can't predict.

Some editors have said this will be the last CES as we know it and I suspect they may be right.  Microsoft is sitting this one out, (likely due to the uproar they expected from Windows 8) and I halfway expect there to be several empty booths and less occupied space.

Time will tell.

Related Web URL: http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/04/tech/innovation/ces-...