Online video is experiencing tremendous growth including purchased or rented videos, advertisement-supported professional content and user-generated video (UGV). Most online videos today are low resolution and low quality, diminishing their entertainment value. In a bid to improve quality of both standard definition (SD) content (DVDs) as well as low resolution content, Broadcom plans to unveil its so-called “super resolution” upconverting technology.

“Our new super resolution technology takes advantage of the demand in connected TVs for accessing online videos and enables TV manufacturers to enhance the viewing quality of standard definition content, as well as online and Internet videos, providing for a more enjoyable entertainment experience," said Dave DiOrio, vice president and general manager of Broadcom’s Digital Television line of business.

At CES 2009, Broadcom will demonstrate super resolution technology for DTVs that solves the problem of upgrading low resolution Internet and SD video onto a large screen TV, such as high-definition HDTVs with 1920x1080 resolution. The technical benefits associated with this functionality include increased spatial resolution, additional fine detail, sharpened details with less blurriness and reduced artifacts such as jagged edges and flickering lines. The result is better quality Internet, online and SD video viewed on large screen TVs, thereby significantly improving the viewing experience.

“Our latest super resolution technology is a further testament to Broadcom's commitment and leadership in developing advanced capabilities that enable TV manufacturers to develop best-in-class products,” Mr. DiOrio added.

In-Stat market research predicts that 94% of U.S. households with broadband access will watch online video by 2012 and 39% of U.S. adults will have either purchased or rented an online video.

Broadcom is not the first company to address the issue of upconverting low-resolution UGVs or SD DVDs in order to make them much more appealing on modern high-definition panels. Earlier this year Toshiba said that its new breed of DVD players featuring SpursEngine processors would be able to upscale standard-definition videos to “nearly” high-definition quality using technique that required extensive computing capabilities.

Broadcom did not unveil any concrete details regarding its super resolution technology.

Tags: Broadcom