Interactive TV Coming From ATI
Wednesday, February 23, 2000 - 9:36 am CT
Graphics chips manufacturer ATI and Vestel, Europe's second largest television set and monitor
manufacturer, announced today a partnership to develop a full range of interactive TV products.
Under the terms of the partnership, ATI will provide components and expertise to enable Vestel to
develop and sell interactive consumer devices, including Internet televisions, and a variety of set-top
boxes. The Vestel Internet TV, based on ATI's Set-Top-Wonder technology, has been named the
first product to result from the partnership. It is intended to provide home consumers with instant
Internet access, e-mail and shopping via their televisions. The Internet TV will be DVD ready and
feature 3D graphics.
Consumers will connect the unit to a telephone line, and then can surf the web while viewing
television. The product will support both PAL and NTSC picture formats, have a variety of language
capabilities, and include parental control options. The software for the device is based on Microsoft
TV, the client software component of the Microsoft TV platform. Vestel Internet TV will initially be
available in Europe, and future versions will be distributed in other regions worldwide. |
