Sometime midway through next year Broadcom (Nasdaq: BRCM) hopes to give the stuttering 3DTV space a jolt with a higher performance dual high definition set-top box system-on-a-chip (SoC) video gateway that it says double the performance of previous silicon generations and opens the door for service providers to deliver true HD 3D.
Although hyped as HD, today's 3DTV is actually only a single HD stream split in half for 3D effects. The new Broadcom silicon incorporates Scalable Video Coding (SVC) codecs to handle existing half-resolution formats and an enhancement layer "which then provides the full resolution for devices ... that can support that," said John Gleiter, senior director of product marketing during a conversation with FierceCable. "The claim is about 40 percent bandwidth savings versus supporting a full resolution MVC (multi-view coding) stream" that's currently used by Blu Ray.
Gleiter said the enhanced SoC will be used in products that receive higher resolution premium-priced 3DTV primarily for sporting events. Since the higher resolution requires more bandwidth service providers "will obviously charge a premium for that," said Gleiter. On the other hand, by using the advanced codecs within the silicon those same service providers won't have to double that bandwidth use.
"It's a way of preserving or utilizing their bandwidth in a more efficient manner while providing the advanced video experience," he said.
For more:
- see this news release
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