Surprise!Sony's big CES surprise was an electric car

Sony unveiled an electric car at CES Monday. It's the first prototype vehicle under Sony's new mobility efforts, called the Vision-S initiative, and based on what the tech giant said during its press event, it was built to showcase the automotive technologies it has developed over recent years. Sony teamed up with a number of companies, such as Bosch, Continental, NVIDIA and Qualcomm, to create the prototype sedan.

It's loaded with 33 sensors, including ones that enable Level 2 autonomous driving. Inside, the prototype has 360 Reality Audio tech, widescreen displays and more. The company didn't reveal everything about Vision-S during the press event, but we should get an even closer look later this week.

The new TVs include Dolby Vision IQ, Filmmaker Mode and HGiG.LG's 2020 TVs: Massive 8K screens and the first 48-inch 4K OLED

Samsung, yesterday. LG, today. The company revealed some huge 8K screens, up to an 88-inch model, and a notable smaller addition: a 48-inch 4K OLED with gaming in mind. If your problem with previous models was that they were too big (or perhaps too expensive), the smaller model could be a good way to fix that issue. Plus, with 4K resolution at that size, LG says its pixel density is similar to a 96-inch 8K TV.

LG's new GX Gallery Series has paper-thin screens that shift all of the processing and inputs to an external box that has to sit close, so mounting any of them can be a bit complicated. The GX model is just 20mm thick, so it can still hang flat on your wall like a picture frame, but without the add-on box. Everything is behind the TV, while a specially designed indent provides space for a wall-mount without leaving any noticeable gap. These will come in 55-, 65- and 77-inch versions.

Grown-up looks for a maturing OS.Samsung made an utterly gorgeous Chromebook with a 4K AMOLED screen

The Galaxy Chromebook has a 13.3-inch 4K AMOLED screen. It also happens to be pretty darn gorgeous. Now, it might be a little excessive to put such a sharp, high-quality display in a Chromebook, but it's great for people who watch Netflix or their favorite YouTubers from their browser. Cherlynn Low says the Galaxy Chromebook is making a statement -- it's an expensive laptop, not an entry-level Google PC. Now I need a price confirmation...

Weird? Yes. Cool? Also yes.Mercedes unveils wild 'Avatar'-inspired concept car

Mercedes has made sure to play up its tech chops during the past few CES events, and this year is no different. Instead of a straight autonomous electric vehicle, the company has gone outside the box with a vehicle based on Avatar. Yeah, the James Cameron film. Even the name is a nod to the movie: the Mercedes-Benz AVTR (advance vision transportation).

It's an EV and can drive forwards and sideways. And it has clear doors that will, apparently, get the driver closer to nature. During the event, Mercedes spoke at length about how the car is almost a living thing and an extension of a person and nature.

The head of Mercedes-Benz, Ola Källenius, also talked about plans to create a zero-impact car. "This may be in the distance but it's our goal nonetheless," he said. It's that goal, apparently, that got James Cameron on board.

What's next after TVs and soundbars?TCL is working on a folding device that costs less than $1,000

At CES, TCL showed off three phones: the 10L, 10 Pro and 10 5G. They're slick devices with 6.5-inch screens, but there were also a couple of folding prototypes on display, too. One is a RAZR-style folding phone, and the other is a collapsible tablet-like device that it expects to sell for less than a grand.

But wait, there's more...

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