Digitalization and technological progress make mobile multimedia a reality

JasonYoo

Digitalization and technological progress make mobile multimedia a reality [Copy link]

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We've always wanted electronics to be portable. It started with vacuum tube radios that ran on three batteries and were the size of a large suitcase, but still had a handle for easy carrying. Then came car radios, handheld transistor radios, and even Sony's Walkman. Today, we have the iPod, the Game Boy, and the RAZR. There will be more and more feature-rich music players, gaming systems, and cell phones to suit every taste. All of this is possible because everything is digital.

Traditional radio is still popular

Believe it or not, traditional analog AM and FM radios are still widely used and popular. They will undoubtedly continue to thrive, even as satellite and HD radio usage grows. A key trend is the inclusion of single-chip FM radios in MP3 players, audio handsets, and cell phones. FM radios can even be found on plug-in USB dongles in laptop computers.

Satellite radio was introduced several years ago by Sirius and XM and continues to gain momentum. Most new cars and trucks now come with satellite radio capability built in, and dozens of radios can be added as accessories. Tabletop radios have been less popular, but they still have their place. Even handheld satellite radios have a market, although they require an unobstructed line of sight to the satellite for good performance.

For example, Pioneer's Inno allows users to download XM Radio songs and store them on its built-in MP3 player for playback. XM has been sued by the music industry for not supporting the Inno's ability to record digital music. In addition, Sirius's S50 can store and play up to 50 hours of audio content.

Although HD Radio may seem unfamiliar, it is actually a mature technology. There are more than 700 stations in the United States that offer HD AM and FM services, but the number of listeners is so small that most users don't even know it exists. This technology is mainly used in car radio accessories and some desktop radios, and portable radios will also be a good application area. Once car manufacturers start integrating it as a feature, it will become more and more popular.

Satellite radio manufacturers have spent years integrating their products into cars, so don't expect HD Radio to be available overnight, but it will happen eventually. However, given the competition with satellite and traditional AM/FM radio, HD Radio may have to wait until a combined AM/FM/satellite/HD car model is available.

Audio: The King of Mobile Media

Over the past few years, Apple's iPod has become a must-have electronic accessory. Many accessories now focus on listening experience rather than convenience. Docking stations with amplifiers and speakers allow music listening without borrowing those white headphones. Some wireless devices allow users to listen to iPod songs through the car's audio system via FM or Bluetooth signals. In the future, more and more music sources and larger flash and hard drives are expected.

MP3 players also appeared in other products, such as Pioneer's Inno. However, their main application area is still mobile phones, such as Motorola's ROKR. Samsung's SGH-i310 mobile phone has a music storage hard drive capacity of up to 8G (Figure 1). In addition, Sony Ericsson's Walkman-Phone was also very successful, which tripled the company's profits compared with the first quarter.

Apple has also found success with its iPod features. The small color LCD screen on the iPod nano lets users view digital photos, music videos , and even TV clips. Because they have large hard drives, they can play video as easily as audio.

Video: The ultimate winner in mobile media

Moving video has always been a challenge. But with processors getting smaller and faster, memory devices getting larger and cheaper, and LCD screens getting better, it's now pretty easy. The main problem right now is the video content. Traditional TV shows, movies, and other video programming aren't suited to small screens. However, new content is being developed for the small size.

Mobile TV has long been used in small battery-powered TVs at outdoor locations such as beaches or in cars. However, receiving signals with marginal antennas such as single-chip or rabbit ears has always been a problem - especially for car TVs where signal reception can be fickle. Handheld TVs such as Sony's Watchman are also available. Although the Watchman never caught on, it laid the foundation for smaller screen TVs in the future.

There are also portable DVD players, which cost less than $100 even when the screen size is as large as 7 inches. Many SUVs, vans and high-end cars now come with built-in DVD players and a variety of accessory models that are no longer available in the car but are useful. Sometimes DVD players are combined with in-dash navigation systems. Although it is not recommended that drivers watch TV at the same time, in-dash video is still coming. Car owners in Europe and Asia can already own the device, but will it succeed in this field?

Mobile TV is the most eye-catching trend. Currently, more than 500,000 users can watch video clips through the MobiTV service provided by Sprint Nextel, Cingular and Verizon. Users can download video clips from major networks and store them in flash memory, or watch them through the operator's streaming data. The quality is mediocre, with a fairly low resolution of no more than 15 frames per second (fps), but it is still watchable.

Sprint Nextel's LiveLocal allows users to download content from the WNI network, including local news, weather, sports, traffic and other broadcast information. The information on LiveLocal is provided by Weathernews, which has 1.5 million paid mobile subscribers. MTV channels provide downloads to users using Amp'd phones. In addition, some major operators also provide VH1 channels Pocket VH1 Mobile Storefront (mobile storefront).

The outlook for mobile TV is very optimistic. Market research firm IDC points out that within four years, the number of mobile video users may reach 26 million, with annual consumption of up to $3 billion. Another research company, iSuppli, predicts that video content will grow from about $538 million this year to $16.06 billion in four years.

Meanwhile, Vision Gain predicts that the mobile TV market will grow from 5 million units in 2005 to more than 105 million units by 2009. Juniper Research reports that the global mobile content market could reach $59 billion by 2009. The technology is here, so high-quality, relevant content will drive its growth.

As more content is developed for small screens, more mobile TV will emerge in the market. Operators will manage traffic or provide video on demand (VoD) downloads. Any 2.5G or 3G base station phone can have streaming video capabilities. EDGE GSM phones can handle it, as can CDMA phones with cdma2000, EV-DO or UMTS WCDMA. To deliver MPEG4/H.264 compressed video data to a small screen, a speed of at least 100kbps to 300kbps is required.

But carriers face a big problem in offering video services. If too many users want to watch at the same time, the network capacity will be exceeded, and the service may be forced to shut down or performance may be too poor to watch. In addition, too much video will reduce voice bandwidth and reduce the reliability of phone calls. Carriers want users to use high-speed connections, but not too many. Balancing voice and video in the system will be quite tricky.

To overcome this problem, several companies have been planning to build independent mobile TV networks that would not use cellular carriers to deliver content but would instead broadcast their programming directly to a separate receiver on a handheld device.

The first company to launch such a service is cellular base station maker Crown Castle. The company's Modeo system will use the European Digital Video Broadcasting Handheld (DVB-H) mobile TV standard, broadcasting over a 5MHz-wide frequency band near 1.67GHz. The company expects to launch its multichannel service in 2007.

Another mobile TV broadcast system is Qualcomm's MediaFLO, which will broadcast multi-channel content in the 716MHz to 722MHz frequency range based on the former UHF TV channel 55. Service is expected to be launched in 2007. Hiwire, a newly launched mobile TV supplier under Aloha Partners, also has 12MHz of frequency in the 700MHz range. Hiwire is expected to provide a variety of video content for DVB-H compatible mobile phones.

Will people actually watch TV on their phones? While the polls overwhelmingly say no, it remains to be seen how this plays out. Once it becomes possible to format content for small screens, more consumers will be willing to pay for it.

Mobile TV may end up being a niche market, but with sales of mobile phones expected to reach 900 million to 1 billion units this year, the market is likely to be more than 100 million units. Given this, which company wouldn't be eager to get a piece of the action?

game

Kids absolutely love handheld game systems like Nintendo's Game Boy. They're supposedly designed for small screens, and higher resolutions and more complex games are driving growth in this area of mobile media. Now the goal is to get more of these games onto cell phones. In fact, Motorola recently sponsored a competition to develop new games for cell phones.

Some Java-based games are available for cell phones, but they are simple and uninspiring. There are more and better games in Asia, and they are far more popular than in the United States. And as cell phone screens increase in size and resolution, more sophisticated games are just around the corner.

One major issue is the user interface. PC-based games use complex controllers with joysticks, wheels, and multiple buttons. But mobile phones only have one or two buttons. Games must be developed to work with the limited controls and small screen size. Such games are coming, including online interactive games that were all the rage on PCs,

The challenges of mobile media

The only secret to mobile media success is content. Music is easy because people can always find what they like and the music industry has finally made it possible to buy music online. But video is not. Movies don't translate well to small screens, and their length is a surefire hit on battery life.

Therefore, most recent mobile media videos are short clips (15 to 20 minutes) developed specifically for 2 or 3 inch LCD screens. These content materials will be provided by mobile phone operators and independent service providers. Video content is still limited now, but it is expected to emerge in large quantities soon. The development path of games is similar to this, that is, there are few games now, but better games will appear soon.

At one time, it was widely believed that entertainment would converge on the PC. Some convergence has occurred, but it has never been as successful as industry pundits expected. Now, entertainment is converging on the mobile phone. Mobile phone users can now enjoy functions such as photography, sending and receiving emails, and even browsing the Internet through their mobile phones. The addition of audio and video will be even more powerful.

But how much can we cram into a phone? Physical limitations are a challenge. Users want smaller, lighter, and more advanced designs. But smaller chips can only do so much more. Another issue is battery life. The capacity of lithium batteries decreases with size. The increase in multimedia features makes it difficult to balance standby time and charging times with working time. Users may need to accept larger handheld devices that must be charged more frequently.

Improvements in power management will be key. It is not currently practical to pack everything into a phone. Some companies may be willing to try, but most consumers prefer phones that have only the features they need, like a BlackBerry for email or a ROKR for music. However, a phone that combines all features to suit everyone will eventually emerge.

Implementation Technology

Mainstream semiconductor companies such as Analog Devices, Freescale and Texas Instruments are launching chipsets with relatively simple multimedia functions. Doug Grant of Analog Devices said that two basic architectures have emerged. One solution uses two separate processors, one for regular phone functions and the other for multimedia applications. In the latest designs, all processors are integrated on a single chip.

One example is the Analog Devices AD6900 LeMans baseband processor, which integrates an ADI Blackfin DSP and an ARM9 processor. Grant also mentioned that Analog Devices' new motion sensors are well suited for new user interfaces in mobile games.

Berardino Baratta, general manager of Freescale's multimedia applications division, said his company's MXC300-30 platform uses a single-chip baseband that also integrates Freescale's StarCore DSP and an ARM11 processor (Figure 2). Both devices make multimedia implementation faster and easier.

Despite the use of compression, the storage requirements for audio and video downloads are still greater than ever. Flash memory and hard disks are both used. But flash memory is getting larger and larger, and its form factor is very attractive, so it can be easily inserted into a mobile phone or other device. Samsung's MultiMediaCard (MMCmicro) is a 2Gbyte module (Figure 3) that integrates four of the company's 4Gbit NAND flash devices. This card can store 12 hours of mobile video content and is so fast that it can download 3 hours of video content in less than 2 minutes.

"Toshiba's NAND flash memory is a high-density storage medium that is ideal for a variety of mobile consumer electronic devices, including music or video in portable media players, photos and videos in digital cameras and camcorders, and increasingly sophisticated mobile phones," said Scott Nelson, director of memory marketing at Toshiba America Electronic Components.

As the density of individual components grows into the gigabyte range, consumer demands are almost insatiable. The price/performance ratio is constantly improving due to the storage of multiple bits per cell and the use of smaller process geometries. Market analysis firm Web-Feet Research expects this trend to continue, with the price per gigabyte estimated to drop from $32/Gbyte in 2005 to $6/Gbyte in 2010.

At the same time, the Mobile Industry Processor Interface Alliance is also planning to establish standard hardware and software interface specifications for mobile application processors.

By Louis E. Frenzel