And there was the figurative cloud of Friday's Microsoft-Nokia deal, which many attendees felt sucked a lot of oxygen out of the event. Few observers seemed truly enthusiastic about a deal to put Windows 7 on a new breed of future phones from smartphone laggard Nokia. Even Steve Ballmer seemed subdued when introducing his new partner, Stephen Elsop, to Ballmer's keynote crowd. Ballmer kept an odd distance at the other end of the stage and looked down pensively while the Nokia CEO spoke.
Despite the clouds, the Congress soldiered on -- with demos, video walls full of content and carefully-orchestrated stunts. Samsung gamely plugged its second Android Tablet, the Galaxy Tab 10.1, which we found underwhelming, along with a large-screen smartphone, the Galaxy S Wifi 5.0, pictured above. LG had a booth full of glasses-free 3D phones that regularly ran out of a charge while playing battery-killing 3D games. (The company also offered a tablet that does require glasses for its 3D; we'll bring you a closer look tomorrow.)
