CES 2024 Lasting Impressions: The Highlights

CES2024 was the best in a long time. I said that in my First Impressions article, and as we distance ourselves from the whirlwind of those hectic six show days, the stronger that feeling grows. And one of the reasons has to do with the fact that important technologies are already making a difference in the audio products that we will soon see in the market - while many others are about to. And there are clearly companies that left us with very positive, lasting impressions that we can and need to share.

Alango’s SoundAround technology uses a sound acquisition module that attaches to the inside of a car window. At the heart of the module is the vibration sensor, or accelerometer, which records vibrations caused by sounds, both external and internal. Alango's patent-pending DSP software technology is used to clean up vibration sensor signals from components that correspond to sounds inside a car cabin.

With the availability of the HEL/HER 4.4 ViBRIDGE Flexible Pinna for HMS II.3/5, the industry as gained a vital testing tool for in-ear headset designs that utilize bone conduction sensors. Evaluating these systems is vital to optimize near-end structure-borne sound to improve speech quality in the presence of background noise, improve echo cancellation, and double-talk performance. The unique technology developed by HEAD acoustics is being enthusiastically embraced by the industry.

Knowles released a low power, high bandwidth, specialized vibration sensor that can be used to filter background noise and create reliable, high-quality voice calling in noisy environments. The Knowles V2S200D Digital Voice Vibration Sensor, the first-of-its-kind for the brand works in conjunction with microphones to improve voice signal pick-up in True Wireless Stereo (TWS) earbuds.