There were two new search engines presented at DEMOfall that look interesting.
Retrevo is a consumer electronics search engine. Just enter the product you are looking for and it will return categorized links to product documentation, reviews etc. This fills a much needed gap in my opinion since Google seems to be overrun by shopping sites that provide no useful information.
3DSeek: By Doodling is a start towards something I've been wanting to see in a search engine, they let you search, by drawing a picture. 3DSeek is limited to finding manufactured parts and custom service suppliers and only searched diagrams and 3D models in it's database. I would like to see something similar combined with Google Image Search. They could process all the images using some tracing software like Imagaro Z and store the results enabling users to search by drawing, or uploading an image. There have been several time where this would have been extremely useful. A picture is worth a thousand words...