3D you can reach out and touch

3D TABLET: Korean firm i-Station plans to release a tablet computer which lets you see 3D without special glasses. Source: Supplied

While technology giants including Dell, BlackBerry, Toshiba and Panasonic all revealed tablets at the Consumer Electronics Show, Sharp showed off a 3D smartphone and a Korean firm revealed plans for a 7-inch 3D tablet, both designed to be enjoyed with the naked eye.

Sharp's Galapagos 3D smartphone shows video, photos and even phone animations in 3D on its 3.8-inch touchscreen.

The display uses parallax barrier technology to deliver 3D vision to viewers, who must look at the phone from the right angle to see the effect. The smartphone can also convert 2D photos to 3D.

Korean firm i-Station plans to go bigger with its glasses-free 3D gadget, however, by launching a 7-inch 3D tablet as early as May.

The stereoscopic 3D screen of the tablet, called Zood, was on show at CES yesterday. A spokeswoman said it would screen 3D videos and photos at launch.

More conventional tablets were in large supply in Las Vegas, though, including Dell's newly announced Dell Streak 7 tablet that uses a powerful 1GHz dual-core processor and features cameras front and back.

Dell Australia sales director Matt Telfer said Optus and Telstra had both expressed interest in the Google Android tablet, though no launch date was scheduled.

Research in Motion also revealed the first working models of its 7-inch BlackBerry PlayBook tablet at CES yesterday. The smartphone companion uses its own finger-friendly software and comes with two cameras and up to 64GB memory.

Toshiba and Panasonic also revealed tablet prototypes that used Google and Microsoft software, from 15-29cm in size.