NEC Electronics Corporation and its subsidiaries in America and Europe announced it has sampled a new MPEG decoder targeting the fast growing integrated digital television (iDTV) market.

The ΅PD61123 supports inputs from both digital and digitised analogue signals, allowing the development of a low cost unified iDTV chassis for either CRT or FPD displays.

The ΅PD61123 integrates two MIPS32 4KETM microprocessor cores capable of delivering speeds of up to 300 MIPS each. The device also offers an improved DDR-SDRAM interface, with speeds of up to 166MHz and up to 1GB of memory volume. With the enhanced graphics engine, designers now have even more flexibility to handle advanced graphics and data manipulation. The combination of these performance-enhancing features enables outstanding speed of MHEG interactive applications, smooth operation of MHP, and integration of the standard on-screen display functions.

To provide complete support for iDTV, the ΅PD61123 includes an output for high-end flat panel displays. The device can simultaneously decode and output two MPEG audio streams, an essential function for support of Audio Descriptor services which are a part of DTT standards in the U.K. An embedded USB1.1 host interface permits connection to external devices such as digital cameras, and direct support for DVB-CI eliminated the need for external routing chips. Notwithstanding these functions, the device has comprehensive power management coupled with a design process optimised for low power operation.

The ΅PD61123 is supported by a range of software and middleware, including reference designs, evaluation systems and a full suite of high level application program interfaces (APIs) and wrappers, compatible across the whole range of NEC Electronics' digital AV devices. API and key middleware applications, including MHEG and soon MHP, will be provided by a Europe-based support team.

Pricing and Availability

Samples are currently available and priced at US$25. Volume production is scheduled to begin in spring 2005. Pricing and availability are subject to change.