CES Proving Tough, and it’s only just starting.

Despite what seemed like a double-day of work and a whole day without mobile internet yesterday, I hardly had time to publish any content at all which wasn’t really my intention but I guess that’s how it’s going to go for the next few days at CES as the madness builds to a crescendo today, the first real day of CES.

I do have some news though and I’ve got some videos and information to sort through and post on an individual basis but here’s a quick run-down of what I saw yesterday.

Intel, as usual, had a few surprises at Pepcom. The Hanvon Tablet, a 9 inch capacitive touch 1.6Ghz slate looking not unlike the HP tablet shown at the Microsoft keynote, was interesting. It’s targeted for the Asian market but based on what I saw, I think it would sell in EU and US too.  I also got hold of the Fujitus UH9000, the UMID BZ (I have a loaner here on the table) and the Viliv N5 (thumbs up!) I’m being told that I need to watch the Intel keynote very closely today and as I’ve finally got myself sorted out with a Mifi unit here, there’s a good chance I might be able to live blog it.

In addition to Intel’s offerings I got hands-on with the ICD Ultra 7 inch Android device. It wasn’t working but I can say it’s super lightweight. I also checked out a 9 inch convertible from Haier which didn’t seem to offer anything more than the Gigabyte T1028M I have but it sounds like it will be competitively priced.

Nvidia will announce Tegra 2 today and after talking to a number of people i’m quite sure we’re going to see a Cortex A9 multi-core  platform that will be ready in Q2. That’s not confirmed but all the rumors and responses I’ve had point in that direction. We’ll find out for sure at about 10am here.

Finally, I spoke to Novatell about their MiFi product. The 2352 (version with the applications processor inside and seen in Europe) is getting a bunch of applications soon. One of which will be an application that works with the Eye-Fi card enabling digital photos to be sent straight from the camera’s SD card to Flickr via the Mifi unit.

Stay tuned.