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Wednesday November 14, 2007
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At last night's CES Unveiled press event, Oregon Scientific had a table full of cool-looking if largely nichey products. Among the goods was a clock that projects the time on the wall, and a new entry into the rapidly overcrowding field of extreme-sports helmet cams. Surely a lot of people must be buying those, because so many companies are coming out with their own versions.
The device that really caught my eye, however, was the Professional Weather Center--which likely had a lot to do with the fact that the various weather instruments that are shoved into this $419 package were strewn all over the place. This thing is for people who really, really need to know what the precise temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction, wind chill, dew point, heat index, barometric pressure, and rainfall are in their backyards. It's the prosumer equivalent of the station that your local TV affiliate is using.
I asked one of the Oregon Scientific representatives whether anyone, you know, really needed that much information on such a local level. She answered simply that "some people are just really into the weather." Touche.
The box also comes with a touch-screen pad (pictured) that displays all the info your equipment captures, from up to 300 feet away.
If you're the sort who's really into talking about the weather, but you consistently find yourself coming up short, personalized weather reports don't come much more complete than the Oregon Scientific Professional Weather Center.
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November 14, 2007 5:36 PM
Farmers and meteorologists actually need the more detailed information. This past spring and summer my area had highly variable rainfall amounts and several individual storms overflowed the usual 5" rain gauges.
However, when the local TV station reported the rainfall, they had significantly different high and low temperatures from the rural farms and the rainfall was sometimes trace at the airport and sometimes more than other spots. (One of my local stations has a Weatherbug system with reports from local schools. Even these stations had different rainfalls from the spots across the street.)