By Peter Nowak, CBCNews.ca

LAS VEGAS - This year's Consumer Electronics Show is considerably less sexy - or sexist, depending on your perspective. The mainsteam manufacturers, including the Sonys, Panasonics and Toshibas, have really toned down their use of "booth babes" this year, probably because they're realizing women actually buy a ton of electronics and that maybe it's not the best way to sell to them.

Make no mistake - companies are still making use of models to show off their giant televisions. But this year they seem to be much more modest in appearance.

At least that's the case in the central hall, where most of the big mainstream manufacturers are displaying their latest gear.

In the north hall, home to the smaller and more hard-core techie companies, however, it's business as it has always been at tech shows. Skimpy skirts, go go boots and overdone makeup are still the de rigeur uniform of the booth babe among the industry's smaller players.

Mind you, at a predominantly male convention, this sort of thing has its fans, as evidenced by at least one website.