In the keynote speech yesterday at MacWorld Jobs brushed over the MacBook Air SuperDrive fairly quickly giving the message that the need for optical drives are becoming less, especially since the new MacBook Air has no internal optical drive. According to Apple it can download what software it needs through the internet and connect wirelessly to the Time Capsule for backing up and storing data. Apple does know that the end of optical drives is still a ways off and created this MacBook Air SuperDrive as an external optical drive accessory to the MacBook Air, and ONLY for the MacBook Air according to the specs.

It connects and is powered through a single standard USB cable that’s built into the drive so the MacBook Air will power the SuperDrive both when plugged in and when on batteries. The slot-loading SuperDrive is not much bigger than a CD case at 5.47 x 5.47 x 0.67 inches, and weighs 1.09 pounds. It also has some decent speeds with writing CD-Rs at 24x and double-layer DVDs at 4x.

The One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) has announced they are launching OLPC America and will be offering Nicholas Negroponte’s “$100 laptop” to needy students here in the United States. Negroponte stated the reasoning for launching the laptops, which were originally intended for children in developing nations, in the U.S. is party due to building “critical mass” and getting some more momentum and production volume going. He also said the goal was to proved education for U.S. children, communication with kids in other countries. “To have the United Sates be the only country that’s not in the OLPC agenda would be kind of ridiculous,” Negroponte said.

The OLPC has been in the news quite a bit over this past year. The original goal was to provide a $100 laptop for children in poor, developing countries, helping their education, communication and understanding of current technologies. The program has met a number of “bumps” along the way, mostly with the production numbers. In order to obtain a $100 price tag Negroponte needed to have large orders of the XO laptop, targeting the governments of many developing countries. To date the orders from these countries have been limited and have kept the price well above the $100 mark. The OLPC has also be working with partners such as Microsoft with rumors of a dual-boot system that would be able to run Windows which has not yet come to fruition. They also had partnered with Intel on development of the XO, in which Intel has recently withdrawn.

[NOTE: With CES now over, we are winding down our CES coverage. Expect to see a trickle of stories on trade show announcements next week, but also expect we will be focused on MacWorld and anything else that comes our way. Thanks to everyone who has visited and linked to us - we enjoyed providing you indepth coverage of new product releases.]

Sony seems to have found enough success with its mylo Internet device to have unleashed at CES this week a new generation of the product. The updated Sony mylo goes on sale this month for around $300.

The Sony COM-2 mylo communicator, as it is being called, comes in black or white body colors and has a backlit, slide out QWERTY keyboard. Like its predecessor it lets you connect to open wireless hotspots to instant message with your buddies. You can also use it to view Web videos, take pictures and post them directly to a variety of sites, use widgets to do various online functions, play games and enjoy various media formats.

Get more details on the new Sony mylo after the jump.

We aren’t sure what shocks us more with this product announcement – the Taser itself or the fact it is outfitted in a leopard print. Either way you look at it Taser drew some attention at CES this week by unveiling this stylish (?) take on a way to zap your attacker. It is the latest addition to the company’s C2 line up of personal protection devices.

Taser also was showing off a holster for your C2 which doubles as a MP3 player with 1GB of memory. That’s right – you can stalk the streets at night, favorite rock song playing in your buds, as you zap bad guys all around town.

Read more about Taser’s new gear after the jump.

If you were on Alienware’s newsletter list you might have gotten notice last night that the company has quietly made the new m15x gaming notebooks available for order. The new Area-51’s come have a few configurations in the lineup with the tow higher-end ones available now for $2099 and $2699.

The m15x is a 15.4-inch widescreen notebook with the Intel Core 2 Extreme processor and the NVIDIA GeForce 8800m GTX. You can get up to 4GB of DDR2 memory, dual HDD and high-def video and audio. They also feature Command Center and a Stealth Mode power management. There is also a $1499 model that is listed on the site but not available for order quite yet. As NotebookReview points out, the $2100 model looks to be a pretty decent deal with the Core 2 Duo processor, quality graphics card, fast HDD and 2GB of memory.

If you’ve been in some quiet anticipation of some pricing and release time frame for that new iAudio U5 MP3 player from Cowon your wait is over. Our buddies over Crave have caught wind that Cowon America has went ahead and already started shipping the U5.

The player is available in a black 4GB model and a white 8GB model for $119 and $159, respectively. Unlike most of Cowon’s stuff, this one lacks some of the frills you’ll find in many other competitors, but it does house a 1.8-inch TFT LCD (no video playback, audio only), an FM tuner that can be recorded, an equalizer, voice recorder and alarm clock.

If you want to get a better idea of the players functionality you can check out Cowon’s video after the jump:

Toshiba came to CES loaded down with new flat panels to display. The company is showcasing 20 new LCD TV models across five different model families.

Toshiba was specifically displaying models which totaled include “five new series, four new cosmetic designs, three new dimensions of picture quality and two new gaming features.” They run from the top line Cinema Series REGZA XF550 Series (around $3,200 max price) to the lower end AV500 (lowest price around $430). Availability for all models is spread out between February and May.

Get all the details on Toshiba’s 2008 LCD TV line up after the jump.

This little Iwavecube personal microwave is pretty self-explanatory. It’s measures just 10.5″x12″x10″ so it doesn’t take up a lot of room, but you aren’t going to be putting a big microwaveable TV dinner in there either. Have one of these at your desk and you avoid trips to the break room, keeping up your introvert profile and avoiding awkward conversations while your waiting for your stuff to heat.

Unfortunately, unlike the USB Mini Fridge, USB power just doesn’t cut it for running the Iwavecube and it will require a standard outlet. And if your office is like ours and frowns on plugging in personal appliances at your desk, I can think of a number of other handy places for it like my TV room, home office, wet bar, in my car, etc.

Amidst all the technology hype going on at CES in Las Vegas this week, Warner Bros. Entertainment somewhat quietly made an announcement with potentially significant implications on the high-def DVD war between Toshiba’s HD DVD and Sony’s Blu-ray disc formats. Warner made an announcement on January 4 that it would release its movies in only the Blu-ray high-definition format, and no longer would offer any of the rival HD DVD formatted discs.

According to Reuters, in talking to Warner Bros Entertainment Group President Kevin Tsujihara the company chose to go the Blu-ray route due to falling DVD says and a “deteriorating U.S. economy”. Tsujihara said the plan was made with the intention of ending the format war and hence ending confusion and split purchases by consumers between the two formats. This move to Blu-ray exclusively is so significant due to the fact that Warner has the industries largest offering of movies and continues to produce big titles, making 5 of the 7 major studios on board with Blu-ray.

Bang & Olufsen is introducing the new BeoVision 8 LCD display at this years CES event, providing what they describe as “a flexible LCD display with superb sound and picture at an entry-level price point.” Anyone familiar with Bang & Olufsen likely knows them for producing very high-end home theater system products, so keep in mind that their definition of “entry-level” is all relative. With an MSRP of $3950.00, this 32-inch LCD is at the high-end of this guys budget.

The display is of course designed with as much style in mind as it has performance and functionality. The BeoVision 8 adds quality sound to its quality flat screen picture with a downward facing bass speaker and front units designed for reproducing human voices. The picture on the 32-inch screen has a special glare polarizer and the absence of glass in front of the screen in order to give less glare in well-lit rooms and better contrast, which is should for that kind of bank.

Panasonic and Comcast are tag teaming to bring Comcast customers a portable DVR so they can record programming at home and take it with them wherever they go. The Panasonic AnyPlay P-DVR Model TZ-LC100 will be available beginning in early 2009 and is being showcased at CES.

The Panasonic AnyPlay P-DVR Model TZ-LC100 is developed by Panasonic and co-branded with Comcast. It’s got 60GB of hard drive storage space, an 8.5″ folding LCD display screen and integrated stereo speakers. Also included are dual headphone jacks.

Targus wants you to enjoy your music as you roam down the street, sharing it as you go to others who may or may not want to hear it. The computer case maker has unveiled at CES the SonicPak, an audio backpack priced at around $100.

The Targus SonicPak is much like your typical gear carrying backpack with its padded compartment for laptop PCs, side mesh water bottle holders, adjustable, padded shoulder straps, molded carrying handle, oversized zipper pulls for easy gripping and a fully equipped interior workstation that includes plenty of pockets for your accessories.

Bang & Olufsen have announced their EarSet 3, as a “unique mobile accessory” pairing music headphones and a phone headset in a single device. They bridge your cell phone headset and MP3 player earphones in one. I know, that doesn’t seem very unique, but what are you gonna do? The company’s first stereo headset with a built-in microphone is compatible with the Apple iPhone.

The 1.09 oz set has been developed to closely match the contours and curves of each ear, ensuring that no sound escapes. The ear buds include foam rubber covers and should stay firmly and comfortably in place.

For those that want the easy way to connect their video-capable iPods to the television for video viewing, JVC has just announced from CES its new line up of P-Series LCD TVs with integrated iPod docks. These models have no specific pricing announced yet.

The new P-Series consists of the the 32-inch LT-32P679 (pictured), 42-inch LT-42P789, 47-inch LT-47P789 and the 52-inch LT-52P789. The LT-32P679 is a 768p model, while the others offer 1080p resolution. All sport an integrated iPod dock, letting users interact with an on-screen menu for selecting music or video. The included remote control offers a “circular keypad with a control scheme that mimics the iPod’s control wheel.”

Polk Audio is always known for bringing excellent products to the Consumer Electronics Show to show off. It has a new two-piece surround sound system set to unveil known as the Polk Audio SurroundBar 360 DVD Theater. It is priced at around $1,200.

The Polk Audio SurroundBar 360 DVD Theater has a “multichannel loudspeaker (44 1/2″ W x 4 7/8″ D x 4 1/8″ H) and a separate, compact electronics console (16 1/2″ W x 11 1/2″ D x 3 3/16″ H) that contains an integrated DVD/CD player, SDA signal-processing amplifier, AM/FM radio, and a host of digital, analog, USB, and video inputs.” That’s right from the horse’s mouth folks – all of that in a tight little design which will make you drool over its very cool looking gloss black enclosure.