Archive | Feedback

Zarlink "DVB-T On a Chip" Silicon Drives World's Smallest Set-Top Box Design for Terrestrial Digital TV Market

DVB-T (Digital Video Broadcasting-Terrestrial) chips are first to integrate terrestrial demodulator, MPEG-2 video/audio, and high-speed processor

The manufacturer says . . .

ChipCenter's Paul O'Shea says . . .

Zarlink Semiconductor launched its new family of DTV processors for the DVB-T market around the world. With Zarlink's ZL10310 and ZL10311 devices, consumer electronics manufacturers can design the world's smallest digital terrestrial set-top boxes less than half the size of today's models, or slightly smaller than a wallet. Zarlink's ZL10310/311 devices are the first to merge all major DVB-T processing functions outside the RF (radio tuner) onto one chip. The processors integrate COFDM (coded orthogonal frequency division multiplex) demodulation with a complete STB (set-top box) processing engine MPEG-2 (Moving Picture Experts Group, Standard #2) transport demultiplexer, audio and video decoder, a high-performance RISC (reduced instruction set computing) central processing unit, and STB peripheral interfaces. The level of system integration made possible by Zarlink's DVB-T On a Chip processors is demonstrated by the company's supporting STB reference design. This ultra-small board, measuring just 90 mm (millimeters) x 55 mm x 25 mm, is a complete set-top box, including the RF tuner and power regulation. The reference design consumes only 4 W (watts) about 30% less than comparable designs and complies with the European Code of Conduct on Energy Efficiency. "Our DVB-T On a Chip processor, set-top box reference design, and DVB-T software stack is a total package that benefits customers by using significantly less board space and power than competing products," said Paul Fellows, DTV System on a Chip product line director, Zarlink Semiconductor. "Together with our RF tuners, Zarlink now offers a complete antenna-to-display solution." Terrestrial digital TV channels known as "free-to-air" TV are usually received on analog TV sets using standard rooftop aerials and STBs. The STB accepts RF signals from the aerial, and outputs decoded video and audio signals to the analog TV. DVB-T On a Chip processors from Zarlink are optimized for markets in the UK, Europe and around the world that have adopted the DVB-T standard defined by ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute). Global acceptance of the DVB-T standard, coupled with Europe's decision to switch off analog TV transmissions starting in 2006, and increasing numbers of free-to-air digital channels, will fuel consumer demand for DVB-T electronics products. "Zarlink's new DVB-T compliant processors will help drive the roll out of open-market digital terrestrial products around the world, including the new FreeView service in the United Kingdom," said Peter Marshall, Technical Director, The Digital TV Group. The DTG is the primary digital TV industry association in the United Kingdom. Zarlink is developing a range of DVB-T On a Chip processors that can easily be used to design a range of terrestrial DTV products, from lower cost, entry-level STBs to higher-end "media center" products. Media centers exploit hard disk-drive technology to offer such compelling features as multi-channel record and playback, real-time pause and resume, digital sound, and Internet connectivity. To support the ZL10310/311, Zarlink offers a full design database with schematics, bill of materials, layout files, and a comprehensive software development kit that reduces development costs and speeds time-to-market. The ZL10310 and ZL10311 are now in volume production. The ZL10311 is an enhanced device that offers Dolby Digital audio decoding and Macrovision Copy Protection capabilities. Zarlink Semiconductor employs its formidable analog, digital and mixed-signal capabilities To offer the most compelling products for wired, wireless and optical connectivity markets and ultra low-power medical applications. Zarlink Web Site

Zarlink combined the high-performance STB chip technology with integrated demodulation and in this case they used the DVBT standard which is the COFDM (coded orthogonal frequency division multiplex). Initially it will be deployed in the UK, then other parts of Europe, and finally, the rest of the world. The roll out sequence makes sense because the UK and certain European countries use terrestrial reception more than cable, especially since the BBC and Crown Castle recently introduced 30 channels of free-to-view TV on digital terrestrial. Zarlink is in a unique position because they are one of a few that can and are offering the complete solution from the antenna to the display. This standard will offer MPEG-2 technology and COFDM demodulation, a significant upgrade from analog reception. You may wonder why they used MPEG-2 and not the newer MPEG-4 technology and the simple answer is that there is still a very significant infrastructure using MPEG-2 and it would be extremely costly to convert to MPEG-4. There are other reasons for this selection but cost is certainly a significant driving force. The front end of this product is the antenna that connects to a tuner, feeding into the Zarlink chip, which has a tuning modulator. The signal goes into a demodulator where the digital bit stream is extracted. The on-chip demodulator provides the MPEG-2 transport stream, which outputs the transport stream to the demultiplexer block, audio and video decoders, and finally into the CPU and the system information tables. The output of video mixes with the currently displayed graphics and converts it to NTSC or PAL, with on-chip video DACs. It is a complete end-to-end solution, converting digital TV to an analog TV signal for conventional television. Surrounding the ZL1031x is a Flash device to store the program and a single SDRAM chip to run an application and perform all the video and audio decoding. Even in this small form factor it can run the Linux operating system (and others), and that provides a lot of benefits, offering an environment for the entry level solutions for something like basic TV channel changing boxes to those that are fully featured. The product uses a PowerPC CPU and has the entire infrastructure to run the main stream operating systems. It also has virtual memory and memory management, providing the benefit of running the basic kernel of the operation separately while extra services run in protected memory spaces. This design means you can run an application program in a protected memory space and the whole system won't crash if one of the applications stops working. The kernel size is about 800 kB and the minimum memory provided on STBs is about 16 MB, so there's plenty of space for applications. Another key attribute of the product is its low-power of operation. With everything running and at full speed it uses less than 1.4 W. That means that you can build a complete STB with a total power consumption of <4W. That's less than the standby power for the European Directive for Integrated Digital TVs. That also means there won't be thermal problems. Finally, these chips are currently available and reference designs are offered for what may be the smallest form factor STB for Digital Terrestrial TV. The devices are packaged in a 388-ball PBGA (plastic ball grid array) Measuring 27 mm (millimeters) x 27 mm x 2.56 mm. The ZL10310 is priced at US$35.00 in quantities of 1,000. The ZL10311 costs US$38.00 in quantities of 1,000. Data Sheet

Analog Main | Product of the Week | Columns | Editorial | Tech Notes

		Click here to get your listing up.