While digital tablets generated the biggest frenzy at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas over the weekend, smartphones managed to hold their own on the show floor, particularly when it came to unique applications in the home and for the road.

Apple may not have had an official presence on the show floor, for example, but its vaunted iPhone was a big player among a wide array of vendors looking to offer distinctive products and services for the platform.
Third-party developers are also paying close attention to the rise of Google's Android mobile operating system and the millions of phones running that software, as well as Waterloo, Ont.-based RIM's BlackBerry, which still has a significant piece of the market.
Total control
Many companies were offering products that make smartphones much more than a talking-and-surfing gadget. With home entertainment becoming so prevalent and given the attention paid to web-connected TVs and devices, for example, several vendors were showing off software that turns an iPhone into a universal remote that can control all these components.
Griffin Technologies unveiled a small receiver device it calls Beacon, which works in tandem with an application on the iPhone to turn it into a universal remote. It also works with Apple's iPad and iPod Touch, a rollout is planned for Android, and a BlackBerry version is a real possibility, according to the company.
Germany's Zero1.tv presented the VooMote ONE, which works much the same way, except it houses the iPhone (or iPod Touch) in a case that has an infrared blaster at the top. Device control codes for different makes and models of audio-video components (the company says it supports ""up to 90 per cent"" of them) are then consistently updated through the phone's internet connection so that the VooMote app can interact directly with anything from a Blu-ray player to a stereo system. A version for Android phones will be coming soon, Zero 1.tv said.
Healthy apps
On the health side, there were two blood pressure monitors that work with the iPhone.
The iHealth Blood Pressure Dock is a cuff with a wire connected to a docking station propping up the iPhone. The app on the iPhone begins the process wherein the cuff contracts, and then releases, logging all the data onto the phone's screen. This includes everything from your pulse to systolic and diastolic numbers.
Like iHealth, France's Withings unveiled its own unit called the Smart Blood Pressure Monitor. It has no docking station, but sports a more elegant design and works in much the same way as the iHealth system, Both apps are able to keep a record of your history, including a graph that indicates if you are at risk of hypertension based on standards set by the World Health Organization.
Withings released its Smart Baby Monitor for both the iPhone and Android. A small video camera placed in the baby's room connects to the phone via Wi-Fi, where you can view the child anytime. The included sound and motion detector picks up the baby's cries and pings the phone to alert you, even if you have another application open.
(Source: cbc.ca)