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Technology Stocks : Voice recognition... is utter nonsense in computing -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: stak who wrote (34)	11/2/1998 1:28:00 AM
From: stak	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 112

If you think there's even the slightest possiblity that the PC might die, then you might want to peruse this article. Blackbird details Early (and Easy) Additions -- Motorola's Blackbird Architecture Looks To Take The Angst Out Of Upgrades Carl Weinschenk An assumption underlying virtually all network development is that significant changes mean equally significant headaches when it comes to rebuilding and upgrading infrastructure. Tweaking applications usually means lots of time and money spent replacing equipment and handling problems.Because of the high costs that improvements can generate, service providers must weigh changes carefully: Will the new application bring in meaningful new revenue, or is it more trouble than it's worth? The trick is finding a way to add new features quickly without causing massive service disruption. Motorola Inc. says service providers soon will be able to do just that. The company's Blackbird architecture promises to let service providers change features or implement entirely new applications without replacing equipment in customers' homes. The new functionality is simply downloaded in software. This idea has powerful allure for network operators. Take cable operators, for example. For the past three years, cable companies have been deploying proprietary cable modems, but the industry soon will switch to standards-based versions that are starting to emerge. The transition to standards-based modems will require that cable operators physically replace or upgrade modems, which is costly. And operators could end up with a load of suddenly obsolete first-generation modems. If, however, the proprietary modems were based on Blackbird, operators could upgrade to the standards-based models simply by downloading new software to ROM or flash memory in the consumer device. An upgrade that normally would take months could take just minutes. Blackbird works by coupling two powerful CPUs, Motorola's PowerPC and "Project X" from VM Labs Inc. (Los Altos, Calif.), says Ray Burgess, assistant general manager of Motorola's consumer groups, which is part of the company's semiconductor sector. Blackbird emerged from research and development done with TeleTV, a defunct telephone company and video entertainment consortium. The phoenix rising from this ill-fated venture could significantly change how content is distributed. "We got to thinking the media processing technology we were creating allowed us to create a software-defined network," Burgess says. Instead of providing the ability to change functions by ramping up on memory (see "The Chips Are Up for Network Help," November 1997), Blackbird makes better use of a fairly standard amount of memory. It runs on 8 to 32 megabytes of RAM and 2 to 16 megabytes of ROM. The PowerPC CPU runs most of the generic functions, explains Tom Starnes, the director of the embedded microcomputers for consultancy Dataquest Inc. (San Jose, Calif.). The Project X CPU, which was designed as a media engine, performs the value-added processing. "Project X is the sexy thing," Starnes says. Some of its capabilities include 3-D gaming, videoconferencing, digital video disc (DVD) processing and high-speed data transmissions. Blackbird currently exists as a reference design. Customers can insert motherboards from Motorola in their boxes, have Motorola build boxes with the customer's brand name on them or simply license the reference design and have the circuitry built at their own plants, Burgess says. Motorola does not intend to build its own Blackbird boxes, he says. Since the processing and media engine functions are partitioned from the network interface device, Blackbird can be used with many common architectures, including hybrid fiber/coax (HFC), digital subscriber line (DSL) and switched digital video (SDV). "It's the first I've seen that truly makes programming for all possible platforms, whether it be satellite, cable, LMDS or MMDS," says Will Strauss, president of Forward Concepts Co. (Tempe, Ariz.), a high-technology market research firm. "It's the closest I've seen to a universal set-top box." LMDS (local multipoint distribution service) and MMDS (multichannel multipoint distribution service) are types of cellular voice, video and data distribution platforms. The ballpark price for the Blackbird hardware and software will be between $300 and $700. "It's a lot of horsepower at a very moderate price, and it takes up a very small space," Strauss says. How GIC designs a set top techweb.com