The Yonge-Dundas Square was transformed into a huge tech carnival with the Best Buy’s Life & Tech Festival. It was their 3rd annual tech showcase that featured some of the industry leading technologies in Smart Home, Connected Gaming, Connected Health, Fitness Wearables and many more. The festival was thrown open to the public for free and thousands of enthusiastic tech enthusiasts and other people witnessed the largest display of products in the Yonge and Dundas square. Almost 60 top exhibitors exhibited their emerging technology and ultra-modern products and this year’s showcase was bigger and better than the previous year.
Christine Tam, Best Buy Canada Spokesperson was so excited in bringing the major industry leaders to Canada to educate the people about the upcoming technologies and how they can improve their lifestyle in the future. Many top brands are already thinking in the line of creating a smart home with smart products connected to one another to make people’s life pretty much simple, safe and fun.
People who visited the event where amazed at the level of new technologies available for them and many decided to upgrade their existing products with the newer and modern products available in the festival. The festival didn’t disappoint anyone as there was something for everyone including connecting gaming products, digital cameras, laptops, drones, ultra-modern mobile phones, connected toys, smart wearable, VR gaming (virtual reality), smart home products and many more.
Some of the interesting showcases in the festival were:
- A complete interactive “Smart Home” showcasing connected appliances
- A fun golf swing experience with the Zepp Golf Swing Analyzer that analyses the swing and speed of your swing along with a Golf Professional, Jason Helman to teach you tips and tricks about PGA Golf
- Fun Filled Drone Zone featuring the latest drone technology and products
- The HP Torture Chamber presented a 6D fully immersive gaming experience to the customers
Brands and Products Showcased at Best Buy Life & Tech Festival
HP OMEN
HP Omen featured their exclusive line of gaming products and laptops. Visitors to the HP Omen booth were also welcomed with a full-immersive sensory gaming experience, where racing enthusiasts and kids were allowed to play a racing game and winners were gifted with exclusive HP omen goodies.
SONOS
Sonos also featured their smart wireless home sound systems in the Best Buy Life and Tech festival. With the sonos sound system, you can stream music to any room inside your house. You can also enhance the TV viewing experience with the complete 5.1 surround sound.
JAYBIRD WIRELESS EARBUDS
One of the most annoying thing about headphones is that it never stays inside your ear and Jaybird wireless headphones has come up with a great solution to ensure that it stays in your ears with the help of those tips and fins. It stays charged for about 8 long hours and you can even pair the headphones together as well wear from the back or front as per your needs.
Another great product featured was the UE speakers that is 100% waterproof and provides 360 degree sound features. You can even pair with as many speakers you want to create a party experience right at your home. You can also download their app to change the equalizer settings. It is made using high quality Kevlar housing and bulletproof vesting. It can provide up to 20 hours of battery life and is self-drying.
OCULUS RIFT
Oculus Rift showcased their Virtual Reality (VR) gaming experience that transforms you inside virtual worlds for a fun filled and thrilling experience.
iHEALTH
Another great health based booth was featured by iHealth, famous for producing the best health monitoring devices including blood pressure devices, glucose devices to monitor diabetes, pulse oximeter and body composition scale monitoring devices. It also comes with an app that is iOS compatible for now. The app is completely free to download and free cloud storage is also provided to store all your medical data for future reference that can be accessed anywhere in the world.
Once you have the device with you all your readings will be stored in the cloud or in the device memory to enable you to instantly email your data to the doctor in email, pdf or in excel format. You can also sync the data from the device into your mobile phone and also have a backup of the data in the cloud, so you can be sure that your data is always safe.
RING
Home security solutions at its best is what Ting promises with its DIY home security setup at affordable costs. Some of its exclusive range of security solutions includes a smart video doorbell that sends alerts to your smartphone when someone presses it. You can even speak to that person even if you are not at home to inform them that you are not at home and will be back in sometime. These video doorbells from RING comes with siren, night vision cams, floodlight cam, spotlight cams with LED lights built inside. RING also provides you with subscription based cloud storage for their security solutions for users to download their videos on to their computer systems.
RETRAK
Retrak one of the world’s leading retractable brand also showcased their exclusive products in their booth. They featured their exclusive Augmented Reality (AR) cards that allows you to experience a world beyond your imagination. All you need to do is just scan the cards and the pictures in the cards like dinosaurs, various animals in the zoo comes to life right in front of you. You can also explore the space and they also featured a steam based learning program for kids 7 -13. The gaming controller also comes with a high quality headphone and capacitive button for easy control.
NONDA
NONDA has come up with some innovative solutions to solve some of your everyday problems like running into a drained battery, forgetting where you parked your car, getting parking tickets for overdoing the parking time and many more with a simple USB charger that is not your regular charger but a smart car charger. It automatically monitors your car’s battery performance and alerts you if anything comes up, so that you won’t run into a drained battery any time. Once you park your car, the location is automatically updated in the app and you can find your car with the help of a compass easily. Also, sets a parking timer to alert you before the time runs out.
MICROSOFT SURFACE PRO
Want to have a keyboard built with a material that is used in the dashboard of a Lamborghini? Then you need to embrace the Alcantarian experience with the Microsoft Surface Pro 4 signature type covers for your keyboards that comes with 77 keys and 2 button trackpad for easy input. Type easily and clearly even in dim light.
XIRO
Xiro one of the leading drone manufacturers in the world with its innovative and outstanding products. Xiro was launched exclusively in BB in Canada and now has become a successful company in high quality and superior drone. They showcased their Xiro Mini drone in the Best Buy Life and Tech Festival. The Xiro Mini is a compact and affordable drone and can be flown continuously without the camera for 20 mins and 15 mins with a camera on board. It also comes with a Full HD 1080p camera on board comes with a great feature called “Follow Me” as it tracks your smartphone and follows you wherever you move.
NOKIA
Nokia also came with an exciting digital health booth mainly focused at the fitness enthusiasts. The featured product was a smart watch which resembled nothing more than a normal watch but had many great features inside that. The watch tracks all your activities day and night and is completely waterproof as you can go swimming with that watch in your hand. It uses the standard battery which can last upto 8 months. You can even sync all the activities recorded on the watch completely onto your smartphone for further reference. It tracks your sleeping pattern, BMI level, fat percentage, blood pressure and also the pulse wave to provide indications of how healthy your heart is and lot more. You can even set a silent alarm.
DJI
DJI, a leading drone designer and manufacturer showcased their various drone models at the life and tech festival. Some of the featured models showcased in the venue are provided below:
DJI Spark
DJI Spark features a 1080p camera, 2-axis stabilization gimbal, built in gps and a flight time of 16 mins. It is a mini drone and features all the DJI’s signature technologies with intelligent flight controls. With an incredible obstacle avoidance sensor, it automatically detects any obstacles on its way and stops. You can operate the drone either with your mobile phone or with a remote controller that need to be bought separately.
Phantom 4 Pro plus
With a Phantom 4 Pro Plus in your hands, aerial filmmaking is made easier. Avoid obstacles automatically with its 5 way obstacle avoidance sensor and also tracks moving subjects with its exclusive ActiveTrack feature. Battery life lasts upto 31 minutes and comes with a 4K 60fps camera, mechanical shutter and 1 inch sensor. The PRO Plus series comes with its own high definition screen with better clarity so you can use it under the sun.
Mavic Pro
Another great product that detects only obstacles in the front side and comes with a 30fps 4k camera. Battery life lasts upto 27 mins. Standard vision positioning system. Foldable feature make it compact for lighter travel. It has a range of upto 7 km and comes with a remote controller. Comes with wireless DJI Googles as you can see what the Mavic Pro sees from top. It seems like you are almost flying with the drone. It comes with a dual 1920x1080p screen. The mavic follows the gimbal as you move it upwards, downwards or sideward. So whatever you see on the sky as your head goes it will reflect the same way and will give you the full flight experience.
RICOH
Ricoh presented their latest line of cameras that allows you to use the camera itself as a remote. It also provides a remote playback features and can be used for live streaming when it is connected through an USB cable. Streaming functionality is exquisite and also comes with microphone to enhance the frequency of the audio.
GUESS (WATCHES)
Guess showcased their latest line of exclusively designed watches to the visitors at the Best buy life and Tech Festival. With the Guess watch in your hand, you can decide the color of the dial to have a single design or with a combination of designs with the help of an app. Download the app and control your watch design according to your taste. Once you connect to wifi, sync all the designs stored in your phone to your watch instantly. There are also different straps available.
We sincerely thank each and every exhibitors for participating in the 3rd Annual Best Buy Life and Tech Festival and hope to see them again next year.
| Zeeq Smart Pillow | Noon VR | Parrot |
| Google Home | Retrak | Yuneec |
| Meural | Oculus | Xiro |
| Ring | HP | Sphero |
| Logitech | Microsoft | Propel |
| August | iHealth | Tangible Play |
| Nest | Nokia | Wonder Workshop |
| Philips Hue | Muse | Spin Master |
| Nanoleaf | Zepp | Anki |
| Sony | FitBit | Little Bits |
| Linksys | Fossil (Fossil, MK, Diesel, Armani) | UB Tech |
| Smart Companion | Movado (Movado, Hugo Boss, Tommy H) | Samsung |
| Nonda | Nixon | Click and Grow |
| Thinkware | Guess | LIFX |
| Fensens | DJI | Samsung |
| BBY Mobile | UE/Jaybird | Ricoh (Pentax) |
| Altec Lansing | Sonos | ESET |
