With Blu-ray now the winner of the HD format wars, the time for PC makers to get Blu-ray technology into the hands of consumers is here. The catch is that for a computer to handle the Blu-ray playback, requirements typically include either a dedicated discrete GPU or a high-end CPU.
In the price range most computer shoppers are buying, you don’t commonly get fast CPUs and discrete graphics. You get low-end CPUs and integrated graphics incapable of Blu-ray playback. Broadcom has introduced new products that allow these low end computers that are already in the marketplace and new systems that will be released to playback Blu-ray films with lower specs.
Broadcom says its technology is aimed at the UMPC, mobile Internet device and embedded x86 markets. The solutions are called the Broadcom BCM70012 and BCM70010 media PC solutions. They both allow seamless playback of high quality and more compressed video in smaller, cheaper form factors.
The BCM70012 is designed for PCI Express applications and the BCM70010 is for PCI applications. Allen Light, director of Marketing for Broadcom Media PC Products said in a statement, “Broadcom has a long history of delivering a rich multimedia experience to consumers across various media,” said Allen Light, Director of Marketing, Media PC Products in Broadcom’s Broadband Communications Group. “With our latest media PC enhancements, PC OEMs have the ability to turn UMPCs and MIDs into multimedia hubs, addressing consumers’ needs to access high quality multimedia content on-the-go, in a low cost, low power consumer device.”
The new media PC solutions are compatible with Windows Vista, XP, and Linux operating systems. The products will be available in three add-in card formats including a desktop PCI Express card, PCI Express mini-card and an ExpressCard 34 format. Broadcom will also provide the technology as a chipset solution for use in PC motherboards.
Broadcom announced back in January that it had an injunction barring Qualcomm from importing technology into the U.S. that infringed on Broadcom patents.
