Channel Expo: Day 1

The Entrance

This year, Channel Expo was situated in Hall 19 of the NEC in Birmingham. Bless you, to the Xerox girl…

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Once you make your way under the large Expo logo, you can see the Expo Column which has a list of sponsors and media partners.

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If you look closely…

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Oh yea.

Once inside, I wandered around for a while, getting my bearings. However, it wasn’t long before my first meeting came about, this one was with Tripplite, an American surge protection company.

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Tripplite

Yasmine and Darwin showed me some of their latest products, a server diagnostics platform being the most impressive of the bunch.

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They were also showcasing some home user surge protectors and a desktop based UPS with a voltage readout.

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They also have a strangely long power adaptor, which allows you to choose the order in which your servers power down. This thing measured in at nearly 2m long…

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Afterwards, even though Yasmin wasn’t keen, I insisted on a group photo…

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Antec

Then it was over to the Antec stand to meet up with Dan Reeves, the man notorious for stabbing SorX with a case panel last year. He had some interesting new products to show off.

First up was the Antec 300, a budget version of the 900. Apparently it’s going to retail for around £30 which from the look of it, should make it a fantastic budget case. Unfortunately it doesn’t come with the media panel or the front 2 x 120mm fans, shown in the picture, but it does come with a top and rear mounted 120mm as standard.

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While the 300 will be the new budget case in Antec’s gamer range, they were also showing off their new top end gamer case, the 1200. It has a clear side window, 3 x front mounted 120mm fans with blue LEDs. All these are fitted to removable hard drive cages that slide out the front. They all have small fan controllers attached to the cages, 2 rear mounted 120mm fans and a top mounted 200mm. lots of cooling, lots of lights. It should retail around £120.

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Antec were also show casing their new range of Signature PSUs which will apparently, upon release, revolutionize the PSU industry. It’s going to use a DC-DC converter, which is said to stabilize the rails more than anything seen before and use a PWM fan which will base it’s speed off of the power used by the components, as apposed to their temperature, so it should cool the components more effectively before their temperature rises, not afterwards.

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And the obligatory, “Me with..” shot:

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Edimax

Edimax have worked with XSR for a while, with their forum being part of our own. Therefore it was a pleasure to finally meet up with Paul from the same company. He showed me a couple of their latest products, and introduced me to the staff on the reseller stand he was hanging out at.

J & J Computers, Edmax Reseller
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The Edimax products were mainly showcased, in a showcase at J & J.

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There were also some products at another nearby reseller stand; Edimax’s top router, and their top selling wireless IP cam.

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As stated, I was also introduced to the lovely ladies at J & J:

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One of them was kind enough to snap a picture of myself and Paul.

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Yea I know… the arm position isn’t the most manly.

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Gaming Collection

Next up was one of my favourite meetings of the day, because I got to have a go in a gaming chair. This bad boy features speakers in the headrest, a fully cushioned body with cup holder and draw underneath. But that’s not all, it also has a massage function, which while not being hugely powerful, is enough to make you feel a bit more comfortable.

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Nice job leaving the laptop bag in shot…
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It also features sliding controls for almost everything you could want to adjust. Volume, massage strength; though I’m still not sure what “sensitivity” alters.

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Oh, and there’s some pretty LED’s too.

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The game I played was a bit of COD3, and I must say it adds to the experience quite a bit. It’s surround sound capabilities are quite impressive, and it does sound like bullets are whizzing over your head. However, I think this could be improved with some front mounted speakers also. It retails for £235.

After I’d had a play I got everyone together for a group photo, though I had to take this one so couldn’t be in it myself.

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Pay attention love…

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Still no smile, but that’s better.

Look out for a review of this soon.

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Foxconn, Gigabyte, IASO

As the day was drawing to a close, I checked out a few more stands before I headed back to my hotel. The first was Foxconn’s stand, where I was happy to meet with their product manger, Andrew. He showed me their latest concept case, which is insanely big (we’re talking twice the size of the Coolermaster Cosmo S sat next to it) and the concept build inside it, featuring quad crossfire. It was also powering the 4 centre monitors on display.

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XSR haven’t worked with Foxconn for a couple of years now, so hopefully this could be the start of some new Foxconn reviews. Keep your eyes peeled.

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Gigabyte

While Gigabyte always had a well packed stand, with plenty on display, they didn’t have anything particularly ground breaking to showcase. Perhaps the most interesting piece of kit they had was their new Micro ATX board using an Atom CPU. This should be available in a few months, as is genuinely very small, measuring about 6 inches in either direction.

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Couple the fact that Gigabyte didn’t have much on display, and that their staff repeatedly asked me if I was from Hexus and then looked incredibly disappointed when they learned I wasn’t… I moved on.

IASO

To finish up the day, I met with the eccentric heads of Danish data backup company IASO. They explained to me the merits of their software, and I must say, it seems like they offer a pretty complete package. No pictures of their stand unfortunately, though it was definitely one of the more impressive ones there. I do have the group photo though, say cheese guys.

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End of the Day

With day one over, it was time to retire. Look for the day 2 article sometime in the next few days. However, I know the one most of you are looking for is the “Ladies of Expo.” It’s coming don’t worry. As always, watch this space.

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