Product category:
Intellectual Property Cores
News Release from: ARC International
Edited by the Electronicstalk Editorial
Team on 11 May 2001
ARC core drives MPEG-2 audio/video codec
Stream Machine's new SM2288 MPEG-2 audio/video codec chip uses ARC's configurable microprocessor core.
Stream Machine's new SM2288 MPEG-2 audio/video codec chip uses ARC's configurable microprocessor core The SM2288 is designed to drive down the cost of the next generation of digital audio/video recorders and players
This article was originally published on Electronicstalk on 20 Feb 2001 at 8.00am (UK)
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Typical products include home DVD players and recorders, personal digital-video recorders, video CD players, cable/satellite set-top boxes, digital TVs, PC digital-video peripherals, and other advanced consumer products.
The SM2288 codec goes beyond the capabilities of earlier chips by offering both audio and video real-time encoding and decoding in a single highly integrated device.
It supports the MPEG-1 and MPEG-2 digital-video standards as well as Dolby Digital and the MPEG digital-audio standards.
It enables high-quality video recording in real time over a wide range of bit rates for different consumer applications.
For example, it can compress a video stream for high-quality DVD recording at bitrates up to 15Mbit/s, or conserve storage and bandwidth at bitrates down to 2Mbit/s for personal video recorders and video streaming over home networks.
Stream Machine chose ARC's technology because of its versatile RISC capabilities and configurable architecture.
ARC's core is a 32bit synthesisable microprocessor that allows developers to customise the architecture with application-specific instructions and other features.
In the SM2288, ARC's core performs overall system control and the mux and demux functions.
Stream Machine plans to release the SM2288 for volume production beginning this quarter.
"Stream Machine selected the ARC core because of its small size, computing power and the availability of software-development tools, such as compilers and operating systems", said Brian Heuckroth, vice president of marketing at Stream Machine.
"ARC provided a soft core that gave us the necessary design flexibility to make our 0.18-micron chip the market leader".
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