Acer announced the Aspire S5 ultrabook and Iconia Tab A200 tablet at CES this week. The S5 carries definite improvements over Acer’s first ultrabook release, the Aspire S3, and the A200 tablet hits a very reasonable price point for its capabilities.

Apple and HTC are once again being accused of patent infringement, this time related to how the iPhone, iPad, and iPod transmit digital images. Eastman Kodak announced on Tuesday that it had filed lawsuits against the two companies both with the International Trade Commission (ITC) and the US District Court for the Western District of New York, hinting that it had already attempted to engage the two companies in licensing talks without success.

The patents that Kodak names in its suit against Apple discuss methods for transmitting camera images to a service provider using a network configuration file, the aforementioned network configuration file, methods for capturing images to be sent to an e-mail address, and a digital camera interface for selecting how to transmit images over the network. 

One Laptop Per Child unveiled its XO 3.0 tablet at the Consumer Electronics Show Sunday, designed to bring the tablet experience to developing countries. The tablet sports impressive specs given its targeted price point ($100, but only sold in bulk to countries) and OLPC has made sure the device has a variety of charging methods at its disposal.

The XO tablet can run Android or its own Sugar OS on a 1024x768 PixelQi display for both indoor and outdoor reading, or a 1024x768 LCD. Internally, it has 512MB of RAM and 4GB of internal storage, as well as a USB port, microUSB port, audio in and out ports, and a power jack.

Lantronix was on hand at CES 2012 to demonstrate its upcoming xPrintServer Network Edition device, which automatically makes every printer on your network AirPrint-compatible. The small device connects via Ethernet to any router and automatically configures itself to send print jobs to connected printers on a local network.

AirPrint, based on HP's ePrint technology, allows any iOS device to print Web pages, PDFs, photos, and more to compatible printers via WiFi. Naturally, HP offers a number of printer models that are compatible with AirPrint, but other vendors have been slow to embrace the standard. That's beginning to change, though—we spoke with representatives from Epson and Canon on Monday who confirmed that their latest models going forward are AirPrint-compatible as well. Still, not everyone needs or wants to buy a new printer just for printing from an iPhone or iPad.

At yesterday's NVIDIA press conference here at CES, Asus took the stage to talk about using NVIDIA's quad-core Tegra 3 mobile processor in its tablets. Fans of Asus's Tegra 3-powered Transformer Prime tablet will be thrilled to know that the 10-inch device will have an Android 4 ("Ice Cream Sandwich") update pushed out beginning Wednesday.

But the real news came when ASUS CEO Jerry Shen showed off an upcoming 7 inch tablet dubbed the EeePad Memo (pronounced "MEE-moh"), which runs Ice Cream Sandwich on a Tegra 3 processor, has an "incredible" rear-facing camera, and features a "magical" price. That price? $249.

With many new tablets launching at the Consumer Electronics Show, now is a great time for makers of counterfeit hardware to tempt deal-hunting consumers who may not be savvy at distinguishing between real products and their fake counterparts.

Anti-counterfeiting vendor OpSec Security today pointed out numerous listings for counterfeit Motorola Xooms, Samsung Galaxy Tabs and Amazon Kindles, saying "E-commerce sites like Alibaba, DHgate, EC21, Made-in-China and TradeKey often provide anonymous yet attractive venues for counterfeiters to sell illicit goods in bulk at suspiciously low prices. Given the number of new tablet technologies projected to debut at CES, it's likely we will see an uptick in counterfeit tablets within weeks of the show."

Some are laughable. This "7" wifi color ebook reader kindle 3" on Alibaba, being sold for $59, looks nothing like any Kindle we've seen. A listing for a "9.7 Xoom Tablet PC" almost looks real, whereas this "7 inch tablet pc 70-R3 and sam sung galaxy tablet pc" has a somewhat suspicious product name. That "sam sung" listing also shows images of a factory where the counterfeit tablets are being produced.

The above listings seem to be targeted at people buying in bulk, at least 50 units at a time. But of course, consumers looking to purchase a single device should go with reputable sellers, and remember that if the price is too good to be true, there's probably a reason.

"Examples of suspicious listings include photos of tablets that are similar to the design but upon further inspection, do not include the markings of the brand manufactured tablet," OpSec said. "Many of the listings include photos of legitimate products, while others … are clear knock-offs. Counterfeit sellers will advertise under a brand or trademarked name hoping to make the connection between their illegal product and the real thing."

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iPad users who subscribe to Comcast cable TV can now watch it live on their tablets while at home. Comcast announced on Tuesday its new AnyPlay service (really, more of a device combined with service) that allows cable subscribers to securely stream TV channels to their iPads via their home WiFi networks. The service is currently available to Xfinity HD Triple Play customers in Denver and Nashville, with Comcast promising to expand to more markets in the "coming months."

Comcast describes AnyPlay as a device akin to a set-top box that delivers video to a WiFi router instead of being connected to a TV set. "The router then distributes the secure video signal to the iPad or Xoom over your home's wireless network," Comcast SVP of Video Product Development Mark Hess wrote in a blog post. "So as long as your tablet is within range of the home wireless router, you can turn it into another television screen."

For the time being, AnyPlay appears to only be available for users of the Xfinity TV app on the iPad, though Hess claims support for the Motorola Xoom tablet is coming "soon." AnyPlay differs from what the Xfinity TV app already delivers because it allows customers to watch their linear channel lineup instead of just what's available on-demand, seeing shows as they're being broadcast.

Comcast isn't the first company to roll out a service that lets subscribers watch their cable channels on the iPad, but as the largest cable provider in the US, this is one of the higher-profile launches. Time Warner also tried to launch a similar service for its own subscribers last year but was initially met with resistance from some of its content providers (Time Warner's dispute with Viacom is apparently still ongoing). Cablevision, on the other hand, was reportedly able to reach a settlement with Viacom over the right to stream its content to subscribers' mobile devices, allowing Viacom's content to appear on Cablevision's own iPad app.

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At 4:30pm PT (7:30pm ET) today, January 10, Intel CEO Paul Otellini will take the stage at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show to talk about Intel's hopes and plans for 2012 and beyond. Ars Technica will be there to liveblog the event.