Intel has unveiled Atom processor CE4100, a new System-on-Chip (SoC) in a family of media processors designed to bring internet content and services to digital TVs, DVD players and set-top boxes.
The company said that the new CE4100 processor, formerly codenamed ‘sodaville’ is a 45nm manufactured consumer electronic (CE) SoC that supports internet and broadcast applications on one chip, and has the processing power and audio/video components necessary to run rich media applications such as 3D graphics.
The CE4100 processor provides a software framework called widget channel for the development of internet applications, or TV widgets. It can deliver speeds up to 1.2GHz and is backward compatible with the Intel media processor CE3100. It comes with precision view technology, a processing engine to support high-definition picture quality; and media play technology for audio and video, the company said.
Other features include, hardware decode for MPEG4 video, an integrated NAND flash controller, a display processor, graphics processor, video display controller, transport processor, a security processor and general I/O including SATA-300 and USB 2.0. It also enables support for both DDR2 and DDR3 memory and 512K L2 cache.
Reportedly, Intel is also working with Adobe to port Adobe Flash Player 10 to the family of CE media processors to optimise the playback of graphics and H.264 video to enable an array of flash-based content on the television.
Eric Kim, senior vice president and general manager of Intel Digital Home Group, said: Traditional broadcast networks are quickly shifting from a linear model to a multi-stream, internet-optimised model to offer consumers digital entertainment that complements the TV such as social networking, 3-D gaming and streaming video. At the center of the TV evolution is the CE4100 media processor, a new architecture that meets the critical requirements for connected CE devices.
