Fear And Load Times In Las Vegas: The Tech We're Bringing To Survive CES 2024

Packing for a work trip is always a harrowing adventure. You don't want to overpack, because you're going to have to carry all this stuff through the airport, and, in this case, around the show floor. Then again, you don't want to need something, but not have it.

A tradeshow like CES can be a real challenge since you'll have to balance necessities with the fact that you're going to have to carry all your gear on your back for 20,000+ steps per day. Power won't always be reliable, nor will connectivity. You might want a powerful laptop, capable of editing photos on the fly, but you need to balance it against the portability a slimmer laptop will offer.

SlashGear veterans Adam Doud and David McQuilling are hitting the show floor in Las Vegas to find all the coolest gadgets and gear for your eyeballs. So, what tech did they ultimately decide to bring to the show that will keep them connected and powered through a week in the desert? Read on to find out.

First, let's talk about the important stuff — phones and wearables. For Adam's daily carry, he will have the iPhone 15 Pro, the OnePlus Open, and the Google Pixel 8 Pro. The iPhone 15 Pro is his go-to travel phone because everything "just works" and it powers his Apple Watch Ultra 2. The OnePlus Open was and remains his favorite phone, and the inner screen gives a good overview of the show floor and itinerary. The Pixel 8 Pro will be his go-to device for recording interviews, taking notes, and capturing images (though any of the three phones will do an excellent job in that last category).

Adam also has the Lenovo Yoga Book 9i which was introduced at last year's CES. The dual-screened laptop is great for his workflow, writing or editing as necessary on the go. The battery life is not the best, so it will be plugged it in every night. That's also the reason he'll be carrying around a 20,000 mAh Anker power bank with 200W output. If a phone needs a top-off, the Infinicore P3 charger is particularly handy since it has a built-in plug and supports Qi and passthrough charging.

For audio, he definitely overpacked. He has the Sony WH-1000XM5 headphones for the plane. The noise canceling is truly stellar. But for walking around, he's going with earbuds — the Apple AirPods Pro (2nd generation) and his standbys, the Technics EAH-AZ80 earbuds which are his favorite earbuds because they're really good at everything from sound quality to touch controls to ANC. 

Finally, there are the support accessories for the hotel room. For supplying power, he has a Tessan International plug adapter which has two USB-A ports and three USB-C ports. It works fine in American plugs, so it's basically just a compact USB hub. Another power go-to is the Ntonpower travel powerstrip which allows you to wrap the cord around the body and provides four outlets and three USB ports for charging.

As for the actual charging, he has the ESR 3-in-1 travel charger for Apple products and an adorable Butterfly travel charger from Twelve South. Since the Pixel 8 Pro also has a MagSafe-compatible case, he'll be using both chargers as intended. MagSafe all the things!

The last accessory he'll carry is the Moft MagSafe tripod for my iPhone. Whether or not he'll need a tripod remains to be seen, especially since the OnePlus Open acts as its own tripod, but the Moft tripod is so thin and light, it won't make a difference in his bag.

In David's case, the most important thing he can bring to CES is a good smartphone. It can do almost everything you need to do. You can message colleagues, manage your appointments, set alarms, find your way around, write copy, take photos, display your credentials, connect with people, upload said photos, shoot videos, post to social media, etc. 

The smartphone in question is a Pixel 7 Pro, which he got when his formerly trusty Samsung Galaxy S22 decided to die on me. The screen size is good, the camera is great, and despite seeing some complaints about battery life online it consistently lasts all day with moderate to heavy use. With that being said, CES, especially with a phone alone, will likely go beyond heavy use.

It can be argued that mid-level phones are perfectly adequate at a great price point. But the one thing that stands out with a high-end device is its camera. Reporting on CES means you're taking a lot of pictures and usually have a limited time to do so, so a camera capable of holding your hand through the process is worth its weight in gold. With that being said, most other flagship phones will tick the same boxes, and there may be a lower-end gem or two worth considering. A backup would also be helpful if you have a drawer full of smartphones and remember to bring an extra one.

Meanwhile, while Dave's phone choice for this event may be spot on, everything else is hovering somewhere between the worst possible choice and "may as well have not bothered." Dave is rocking an Alienware M15 R6 and it's drilling home the point that gaming laptops are massively impractical. It has a great keyboard, good specs, and a decent screen — but everything else is pretty poorly suited to this kind of environment. Battery life is awful; you'll get around two hours max. Then the barrel jack you use to charge it has engineering tolerances that make a Ford engine from the 1950s look precise, so the slightest movement means the charger will fall out. Beyond that it's heavy, and running programs as light as MS Paint will make it try and set itself on fire.

You may be more of a PC fan than Mac, but this is an environment a smaller MacBook Pro is ideal for. For a show like this, prioritize battery life, and a good WiFi card, over most other things.

In terms of wearables, a smartwatch is pretty useful. You can track the thousands of steps you're taking and many of the devices on display are designed to interact directly with something like an Apple Watch. However, Dave went analog, rocking an Oyster Perpetual, which keeps time pretty well (which is important) but does little beyond that. With that being said, you have to talk to a lot of people so a bit of style over substance probably has its place.