Audio Video News

One of the major obstacles to wider acceptance of high-definition television is the lack of affordable HD receivers. Almost all HD-compatible equipment in consumers' homes is priced above $5000.

Integrated circuit maker Broadcom Corporation hopes to change the situation. The company has just announced the development of what it is calling "the industry's first end-to-end chipset for receiving and displaying terrestrial High Definition Television." These new products combine Broadcom's BCM3510 HDTV/CATV (Cable TV) receiver with the company's previously announced BCM7020 single-chip set-top box system, in a "reference design" chipset designated the BCM93510 and BCM97020. The pair should make modular HD tuners relatively cheap to produce and incorporate into the next generation of receivers.

The highly integrated chipset consumes less than 1W of power and is compatible with both digital Vestigial Sideband (VSB) broadcasts (the North American HD transmission standard) and QAM cable feeds, according to a company announcement. "Simplified ease of use and improved algorithms for handling difficult multipath channel conditions" make the chipset superior to its predecessors. A 3-D video-graphics processor compatible with both SDTV ("standard definition") and HDTV is part of the package.

"Our chipset offers television and set-top box manufacturers a complete solution for receiving and displaying terrestrial HDTV," said Rich Nelson, Broadcom's Senior Director of Marketing, Broadband Communications Business Unit. "This will allow manufacturers to introduce next-generation products with superior reception and user features, accelerating HDTV adoption in the market. This is right in line with FCC Chairman William Kennard's vision for the widespread availability of digital television to American consumers." In a speech at New York's Museum of Television and Radio on October 10, Kennard suggested requiring manufacturers to make all television sets digital-ready by January 1, 2003.

"The ATSC is delighted to learn of the introduction of Broadcom's second-generation, high-performance VSB receiver," said Robert Graves, chairman of the Advanced Television Systems Committee. "This latest contribution from Broadcom epitomizes the innovative improvements that manufacturers are making in ATSC receivers."