You’ve seen what we loved at CES last week, as well as some of the weirdest news out of the event. Now here’s a choice selection of the very worst of CES 2013.

Huawei’s Ascend Mate destroys all logic

In the quest to make smartphones ever-bigger, Huawei now reigns supreme. That’s not exactly a good thing. The Chinese company debuted the 6.1-inch Ascend Mate at the show, putting it firmly between Samsung’s already big Galaxy Note line and 7-inch tablets.

The impracticality of the Ascend Mate trumps the slight convenience of a bigger screen: It’s too big to fit in most pockets, almost impossible to use one-handed, and it looks completely ridiculous when you actually try to use it as a phone. There’s a point where we have to say “no more!” when it comes to increasingly larger smartphones, and I believe the Huawei Ascend Mate is it. – Devindra Hardawar

The big players hold back

This was a surprisingly weak year for major device announcements from big companies like Microsoft and Sony. Most companies now hold their own events for smartphone and tablet launches, since it allows them to control the news, instead of fighting for attention at CES. Many are also waiting until Mobile World Congress next month to show off their new mobile gadgets. It could be that we’re also seeing a drought of new devices after the tablet and smartphone gold rush of the past few years.

Whatever the reason, the door seems wide open for smaller companies to make a splash at CES in the future. Just look how much of an impact Nvidia and Qualcomm were able to make at the show. — Devindra Hardawar

Sony and Microsoft had nothing to say on the console front, as they’re waiting for E3 in June to make a splash with the game audience. On top of that, Microsoft had very little to say about where the Windows 8 ecosystem is going after its underwhelming launch in the fall. This foot-dragging by industry leaders is giving opportunity to startups and usurpers. But those companies won’t have the muscle to push aside their rivals. For consumers, that means they’ll have to wait longer for innovation. — Dean Takahashi

Source: Hyper Drive's Instagram

Hyper Drive proudly posted pics of its booth babes on Instagram.

The booth babes

It’s 2013 and we’re still dealing with companies showing off scantily clad ladies to hype their wares. You could say it’s just Vegas, but of course that would be a lie. “Booth babes” are a staple of pretty much every major tradeshow, especially when they involve tech like games and cars. But it seems more than a little anachronistic today when we’re having serious and important discussions about gender equality in the tech industry.

The storage company Hyper Drive was one of the worst offenders. Its booth featured women wearing practically nothing except underwear and body paint, with all the agency of a statue. Sexual objectification ahoy!

Just look at the storm VentureBeat’s Jolie O’Dell whipped up when she (rightly) lambasted a sexist CES ad campaign. That post ended up sparking the #notbuyingit hashtag, which sadly applied to quite a few companies at CES. — Devindra Hardawar

4K Ultra HD TVs swing … and miss

4K Ultra HD TVs were introduced by nearly every major consumer electronics vendor at the show. But the innovations were all too similar. Each vendor had similar (huge) screen sizes, since they source their screens from many of the same vendors. Nobody spoke about price tags, but $10,000 for a 55-inch 4K screen sounds like a typical figure.

The big problem is that the 4K ecosystem is very weak. Hollywood-style support in the form of movies is going to be slow in coming. That lack of content support is similar to the debacle around 3D TVs and the 3D glasses needed to watch them, when consumer electronics manufacturers tried to push a technology that consumers didn’t want. There isn’t a great way to get 4K video content into the home and distributed around the house. 4K looks better than the usual HDTV, for sure, but the manufacturers better bring down the prices and make the systems more useful and differentiated. – Dean Takahashi

As a movie lover, I’m enamored with the idea of getting an even bigger TV with a crazy-high resolution. But Dean’s point still stands — right now we’re just seeing nice TVs, not the content ecosystem to support it. There’s no new disc-based format on the horizon to support huge 4K files, and we’ll need to see major advances in streaming compression (not to mention home Internet speeds) to see a 4K version of Netflix’s streaming.

The practicality of 4K TVs is also a problem. You’ll need at least an 80-inch set to see the difference between 4K and today’s 1080p HD, which makes the format all but useless for people who can’t fit giant screens or a projector into their home.– Devindra Hardawar

If hardware manufacturers are to survive, they can’t just keep pumping out hardware, Panasonic chief executive Kazuhiro Tsuga said in a keynote speech at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas today.

“We are expanding our role from a hardware manufacturer to a total solutions provider,” he said.

Having said that, he promptly introduced a new 4K OLED TV. The TV is a half-inch thick and 56 inches diagonally. That’s a pretty big achievement, but it won’t fly off the shelves unless there is content to support it.

Panasonic’s approach to organizing home video involves creating profiles for each family member. When you sit down and login, the TV shows the channels that are relevant to you.

Panasonic believes a next-generation TV experience is more personal. And in a world flooded with content, discovery of what is important to you is a priority. That problem has popped up for those perusing app stores, which have hundreds of thousands of apps, and it will happen soon on TVs as well.

Tim Vanderhook, CEO of Specific Media, spoke on stage about a partnership with Panasonic to create an enhanced viewing experience. Specific Media uses your history of rating shows and liking content to make recommendations to you within a menu. A heat map (or darker color) shows which shows are highly recommended to you.

A few more key areas Panasonic said it is focusing on: It’s working with IBM to bring cloud computing to managing connected devices in smarter, greener homes. It’s also working to push forward the electric car market, making batteries for a variety of electric cars, like the Tesla S, and applying its energy-saving know-how to that industry.

Sony said today it will launch several new 4K Ultra HD televisions. It will also start filling out the ecosystem to support the switch to a new line of brighter and crisper displays.

Phil Molyneux, head of Sony Electronics, announced at Sony’s press event at the Consumer Electronics Show that Sony will launch new 55-inch and 65-inch 4K TVs in addition to the 84-inch TV it has already launched. The move is similar to announcements by a number of other TV makers at the show today.

“It’s really like looking through a window,” Molyneux said.

He said Sony would launch the first 4K video distribution service to provide more content for 4K TVs. Movies such as the Amazing Spider-Man are available in 4K Ultra HD, but a lot more content has to materialize before consumers will join the bandwagon. Sony has 4K digital cinema projectors in 14,000 theaters and has now launched a 4K video camera for consumers. Sony Pictures plans to release a number of Blu-ray 4K movie discs in the spring.

“4K is not the future,” said Kaz Hirai, chief executive of Sony. “It’s now.”

Sony also announced a 4K 56-inch OLED display. But, unfortunately for Hirai, the TV gave a blue screen when it was unveiled.

“Excellent,” Hirai said, when the TV failed. Everybody laughed, except the Sony employees, who wheeled the TV off the stage.

As expected, Korean electronics titan Samsung has unveiled a series of feature-filled smart televisions with voice controls, a 110-inch Ultra HD 4K set, and a powerful 55-inch OLED TV.

Samsung has been a major player in the Smart TV race, and last year’s Samsung CES conference was filled with TV models that helped build a connected home with tablets and smartphones. Now it’s upgrading those experiences with the latest tech like 4K TVs, which are incredibly expensive but deliver stunning visuals.

Samsung showed off a variety of new TV models, including a number of LCDs and plasmas. The highlight was easily the announcement of the 110-inch ultra HD TV, which sounds like a concept but it’s still crazy. There’s also the 85-inch ultra HD TV set (pictured above), which was shown onstage and looks similar to the Toshiba 4K TV set we saw last night.

Samsung also showed off its 55-inch OLED TV, which it showed last year at CES but never released it to the market.

It notes the following features as highlights on its latest TVs:

Samsung Smart Hub: Five intuitive panels help consumers manage and navigate different types of content, which are displayed as thumbnail images for the first time so it’s even easier to select and watch the content on the big screen. With a light hand gesture (flipping), you can discover five totally different experiences in Smart Hub, as if you have five new TV sets.

S-recommendation: Quickly and easily search for TV programs, premium video-on-demand, apps, social content and locally stored content on personal devices. The special recommendation engine also offers customized content recommendations for the most personal TV experience ever.

Advanced Smart Interaction: Use everyday language and casual gestures to find content or command and control the TV.

Content and device convergence with multiscreen features: Samsung’s Smart View allows you to move your content seamlessly between devices in real-time; AllShare connects the TV to compatible mobile devices and home appliances wirelessly and creates a smart center for media and whole-home automation. You also can mirror your TV content on compatible Samsung Galaxy tablets and phones.

Evolution Kit: Owners of flagship Samsung 2012 TVs will be able to update their TVs with the latest Smart TV features simply by slotting in this Evolution Kit without having to buy a new TV.

Check out the photos below for more from Samsung’s event today: