What Tech Wowed at PAX AUS in 2024
Every year, I take great pleasure in wandering through the tech booths at PAX Aus. This is my chance to see all the latest toys, gadgets, and gizmos firsthand and not just rely on press releases and YouTube videos to find out what is coming. So I took the time to book appointments with all of the big tech brands so they could show me all their wares and convince me what I needed to start saving for. Let me tell you, this year had some great stuff on show so I thought I would highlight the most exciting tech I saw first-hand.
ASUS/RoG
As always, the RoG team had a huge booth showing off all the latest and greatest toys from their extensive gaming collection. As expected, the RoG Ally X had the spotlight along with their extensive range of gaming laptops built to suit just about any person in any situation. But there were two products that really caught my eye—products that I immediately thought I could put to good use.
The first was the ROG G22CH, a smashing small form factor PC that was about the size of an Xbox 360. It was rocking a 4070, i7 and 32 gigs of DDR 5 RAM. Obviously, that is a lot of horsepower for such a small box, which is where the fancy liquid cooling came in. My immediate thoughts were that this would be ideal sitting next to the TV, allowing gaming, as well as things like running a Plex Server, on your whopping big TV with ease. It was such a tidy little system that would fit perfectly into just about any TV unit and not look out of place at all. The case, even though tiny, allowed users to tinker and upgrade with some amazingly functional engineering going on to make sure all the components were easily accessible once the lid had been popped. Of all the things I saw at PAX Aus, this is the item I want to get my hands on and thoroughly test.
The second thing at the ASUS/RoG booth that caught my eye was the ROG Zephyrus Duo 16 (GX650) a wild laptop that features a smaller, second screen that is ideal for multitasking, tweaking the laptop’s settings mid-game or even just making sure you can see your work emails while you are playing games (not that Player 2 condones that sort of behaviour.) It looks like a gimmick, but after seeing it in action, I get how this could be a game changer, especially if you didn’t have room for a second monitor on your workstation. What’s more is, it rocks up to a Ryzen 9 and 4080 so there isn’t a game on the planet (at this point) that the Zephyrus Duo would struggle to play.
LG
The team at LG were at PAX for the second year and once again hit gamers with an impressive array of monitors and TVs, all of which would make perfect gaming devices. But it was two slightly abnormal gadgets that caught my eye, both doing something new and exciting that I hadn’t seen before.
The first was the LG CineBeam Q, a new, ultra-portable projector that spits out 4K with ease. Now projectors are hardly new but what caught my eye was the auto-adjustment features. Not only does the CineBeam Q detect the lighting levels and adjust accordingly, it also automatically levels out the picture to ensure it looks its best. No more trying to move the projector into the perfect position on an uneven floor, the CineBeam Q does it for you, in real-time. As someone who uses a projector in their backyard which has some old, uneven concrete as a floor, well this would be a blessing, stopping the need for me to constantly chock, level and adjust the projector to get things right. The CineBeam Q doesn’t come cheap at an RRP of $2500 but that is pretty comparable to other 4K projectors on the market.
The next thing that caught my eye is the LG OLED Flex, a 42 inch tv that has a smashing secret. You see, with the press of a button on the remote, this 4K tv converts from a Flatscreen to a curved screen. Now this sounds a bit like a gimmick, but it didn’t take me long to see just how useful this could be in the right scenarios. For example, studio apartments or student accommodation where space is a premium, this TV could be both your computer display and your entertainment device, giving the best of both worlds. There is no pricing or release date set for Australia yet, but I am sure it won’t be long. I suggest when it does get a release that you all head to JBHI FI or The Good Guys to see it in action, frankly it is amazing.
Samsung
Samsung had a huge presence on the show floor, there was no escaping their massive display. Just like LG, they had a range of monitors and TVs, along with their flagship phones, on display. Samsung are known to push the tech limits of monitors and for me, that is where they really stood out on the PAX floor. Two monitors in particular represented some amazing tech that deserves to be mentioned.
The first is the 27-inch Odyssey G6 OLED gaming monitor that boasts a 360hz refresh rate. While that is impressive enough, what really caught my eye (*cough) was the anti-glare technology it boasted. This new tech promises to reduce glare from external light sources without affecting the quality of the images on the screen. This would be perfect for those of us who don’t always like to game with the curtain drawn in a dark room. I know my office is a much nicer place to be when I can look out the window, but, depending on the time of day, I have to have the curtains drawn to be able to use my PC. I hope as the tech gets more widely available, it is something that becomes the norm for all types of TVs and computer monitors.
The second thing that impressed me, simply because of its pure audacity, was the 57-inch Odyssey Neo G9 Gaming Monitor. Not only does this ultrawide beast sport Display port 2.1, a 1000r curvature, 240Hz refresh rate and a 1ms response time but it can switch modes and act as 2 individual 32inch 4k monitors at the press of a button. This means that this monitor is the first ultrawide I have ever seen that truly recreates the convenience of having two individual monitors. Add to that the sheer quality that this beast offers and this became my first purchase if I was to ever win the lotto. I can only dream of playing my games on a monitor like this, but it is a dream that is absolutely worth having.
So there you have it, the tech goodies that wowed me the most at PAX this year. That isn’t to say that these were the only cool things on show, not at all. Aftershock and Coolermaster both had some amazing PCs on display and Intel brought their new, more power-efficient (and therefore cooler) processors to show, but I felt these six bits of tech magic were doing new and exciting things that I hadn’t seen to this level before.
Did you see anything on the show floor that really stood out for you? Let us know on your socials. We are keen to hear what you think.
