Matsushita Electronic to Develop Micro Digital TV Reception Module
July 28, 2003 (TOKYO) -- Matsushita Electronic Components Corp developed a module for receiving terrestrial digital TV broadcasting.
Matsushita's new module on the left. Right is a SD card for size comparison
The module, reduced in size to 2mm, and in power consumption to around 200mW, is embedded with an RF tuner circuit and an OFDM demodulation circuit and other components.
This is the industry's smallest and lowest power-consumption module for receiving terrestrial digital TV broadcasting, it said.
It is to be installed into small mobile equipment, such as mobile terminals and PDAs. The company is planning to launch sample shipments from the autumn of 2003, and mass-production shipments around 2005.
The reception module developed this time is specialized in services for mobile equipment, which will be offered in terrestrial digital TV broadcasting. By adopting Matsushita Electronic Components' original design IC as its tuner circuit, external components were reduced. It is believed that the size-reduction and low-power consumption were realized through such integration and revisions in reception circuit architecture.
The module has a dimension of 20mm x 28mm x 2mm, according to Matsushita Electric Components.
An obstacle to installing a function of receiving terrestrial digital TV broadcasting into such a piece of mobile apparatus has been the need to reduce the size of the antenna.
Because the frequency is lower than that for mobile phone services, and uses a long wavelength, with the conventional structure, the antenna needed to be extensive.
In order to overcome this obstacle, Matsushita developed its original antenna and an antenna control module. The antenna is as short as 50mm, and it enables reception of seven channels in VHF band, and 13 to 62 channels in UHF band.
It is compatible with 1.5V and 2.8V power supply voltages, and DQPSK, QPSK, and 16-QAM modulation methods. A sample is priced at 99,000 yen. (119.04 yen = US$1)
Related story: Matsushita's Antenna Handles All 3 Wireless LAN Formats
Read this story in Chinese.
(Hiroki Yomogita, Staff Editor, Nikkei Electronics)
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