X-bit labs

Intel Developer Forum Spring 2005: Day 2 Coverage (page 5)

Category: Editorial

by Anna Filatova

[ 03/02/2005 | 11:53 PM ]

Entertainment PC in the Digital Home Environment

With the continuous evolution of the digital home concept more and more solutions which should fit in it get finally shaped up. And entertainment PC is definitely one of them.

This time Intel revealed those features and functions that an entertainment PC of today should boast thus setting s certain basic standard for devices of the kind. All hardware benefits combined together represent an ideal entertainment platform. According to Intel should be based on the dual core processor, which is new for this year. As for the mianboard, it will be built around Intel 945G Express chipset with the integrated graphics core and with the new ICH7 South Bridge, which will support:

• Enhanced motion compensation
• Dolby certified high-definition audio (new Dolby codec)
• Intel Matrix Storage Technology, which will help arrange drives in RAID arrays without going much into the RAID array building details and ensure high data redundancy
• Media Expansion card that implements standard and high definition broadcast, analogue and digital TV output all on one card. This card will include single or dual tuner. AT launch there will be only analogue tuners, but in the second half of this year we will also see solutions with digital tuners onboard.

You can see that there is DVI digital output. All today’s cards will have DVI outputs. The system will be supplied with a cable with a DVI connector on one end and a DVI or HDMI connector on the other. In fact, these two protocols, DVI and HDMI, are electrically compatible. HDMI does not have audio, though.

Also the card will feature analogue output, S-video or component and an antenna to catch your broadcast.

As I have already said above, this card will combine two devices on a single PCB, which will bring down the power consumption rate as well as the pricing point for the complete system quite noticeably.

Display is one the key points of the entertainment PC. Right now the quality of video is not good enough. The video performance should be as god as that of the mainstream consumer electronics devices, then the solution will succeed in the consumer electronics market where entertainment PCs are actually targeted. So it is important that selected tuner solutions have no compatibility issues with the entire platform. The most common tuner and display options as of today are the following:

All display and tuner cards are installed on risers. But there is no unified design for that, because depending on the cards selection you have different riser card design applied.