PC Magazine just posted a review of the annual Combined Exhibition of Advanced Technologies, conveniently timed ahead of the Tokyo Motor Show.

An interesting trend seems to be continuing as entertainment/navigation system manufacturers try to make their systems more like PCs. Now they're adding hard disks for music and map data. (I guess someone showed them an iPod.) Panasonic's HDS955MD high-end radio (pictured) with slide-out LCD display is typical, with a separate hard disk module that can be docked to your desktop PC to refresh the nav database, transfer new music, etc.

Why we would want a proprietary, closed-architecture computer system based on a radio, when we can already get an open architecture in-car PC with more power and functionality is completely beyond me. And docking a removable hard disk? WiFi to the garage seems like a better idea.