backtop

Hardware The First BitTorrent Optimized Microprocessor
Marcus Yam (Blog) - January 11, 2007 12:09 PM
Print E-mail del.icio.us 43 comment(s) - last by KashGarinn.. on Jan 17 at 4:16 PM
We now have CPUs and GPUs, and soon we will have BPUs

IAdea Corporation, a Taiwan-based licensee of BitTorrent technology, and Star Semiconductor Corporation, an affiliate of the semiconductor giant UMC Group, jointly announced the availability of STR9810/20 -- the world's first BitTorrent-optimized microprocessor chip.

Most of the BitTorrent downloads today are done by software that runs on the PC. The new microprocessor will enable consumer electronics hardware makers to create devices that directly download and play BitTorrent content.

"I remember in the old days people first watched DVDs on the PC, like how BitTorrent is used on the PC today," says Steven Huang, Chairman and CEO of Star Semiconductor Corporation, the co-developer of the new chip. "Very soon our chip will enable millions of consumer devices to run BitTorrent and help consumers do what they do today on the PC using just a simple remote control."

The BitTorrent-optimized STR9810/20 microprocessors will be available in Q1, 2007. Two versions of the chip are available with various hardware-based acceleration levels. Both chips feature an ARM922-based core, network interface and dual USB 2.0 high-speed ports, allowing fast integration with existing embedded consumer products such as wireless routers, NAS, smart HDD enclosures, DVD players, set-top boxes and DLNA digital media appliances. The chips will be available to systems designers starting at $8.75 in quantities of 1,000.

"BitTorrent is going to fundamentally advance the Web to its next stage. New digital appliances utilizing our chip work cooperatively to deliver large media files. This new service architecture is infinitely scalable, delivers faster as more users join, and can be built at a fraction of the cost of a traditional server farm," says John C. Wang, CEO of IAdea Corporation, the developer of the technology inside the new chip. "We see this trend emerging as 'Web 3.0' where each consumer becomes part of a universal content storage and delivery system. Our new chip plays part in the new paradigm by making BitTorrent available efficiently and economically. You should not be surprised if you find your next car or cellphone enabled with our technology."

BitTorrent has signed content license agreements with over 20 leading entertainment companies, including 20th Century Fox, MTV Networks, Paramount Pictures and Warner Bros. Home Entertainment, to deliver large media files to millions of viewers simultaneously without investing heavily in server hardware and bandwidth. BitTorrent also found its way into consumer electronic-level digital boxes from ASUS, Planex and QNAP, that do not require PC intervention to download files.

"BitTorrent continues to expand its roster of partners along the digital content value chain -- from content destination sites to the semiconductors that power the most popular consumer electronic devices," said Ashwin Navin, President and Co-Founder of BitTorrent. "The growing BitTorrent ecosystem reflects our vision for BitTorrent embedded everywhere people want an improved entertainment experience."

Comments     Threshold


This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled
What in the world does THIS mean?
By vdig on 1/11/2007 2:22:09 PM , Rating: 2
I am now officially stunned. Entertainment companies support this protocol? BitTorrent becomes mainstream? The BitTorrent I know of is a distribution protocol, usually bundled with an interface such as uTorrent, software that takes a pointer and points to a file tracker, which tracks some file that is being shared by leechers who do not have the file in entirety and seeders that do have a complete file(s). Popular protocol used to distribute anything and everything, so long as the seeds are there. Sorry for the run on.

What in the world do they mean by seeing this as "Web 3.0"? If they are talking file sharing without taxing regular system resources, then all the power to them, but... there is a point in this that would change, something, drastically. I just can't put my finger on it.

A little help here?




RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By Aikouka on 1/11/2007 2:42:39 PM , Rating: 2
From what I can surmise, these chips will be put in set-top devices to allow downloading files over the Internet to play on the TV. Allow me to provide an example:

Imagine your TiVo with one of those... we'll call it TiVo D (for Download) just for kicks. TiVo D has all the features of normal TiVo, yet it also lets you download full movies over its vast network (i.e. Torrent network) to view on your TV. You also will serve as an assistant in uploading content to other viewers, so you save the company (in this case, probably TiVo) money.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By mark2ft on 1/11/2007 2:53:22 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah--that would be the only sensible use of this device, I guess. But even then--this type of application is still limited.

Well, maybe instead of set-top boxes, if these chips were integrated into all the TV's sold out there, then yeah, that makes a lot of sense.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By Torched on 1/11/2007 5:13:45 PM , Rating: 2
Here's a scenario for you:

A next generation console such as the Xbox4000 contains this chip. Say the chip allows you to allocate a certain amount of your upload and download to sharing live titles to other users. If you share 1Kb of your upload it doesn't affect your connection speed, but in theory millions of users will be connected and uploading.

Heres another device:

A small embedded touch screen system connected through wifi that is undercabinet mounted in millions of kitchens all across the world. Simple GUI just to create and share cooking recipes with other users. All it needs is this chip and a SoC with wifi and vga.

Just get a little creative. There are more sensible uses.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By TomZ on 1/11/2007 7:18:57 PM , Rating: 2
Why is a separate chip needed to do all this - why can't it be performed by the main processor?

I think the only ones being creative here are the marketing folks.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By Ringold on 1/11/2007 7:25:42 PM , Rating: 2
All I can think of is if the chip does the same job with less power consumption, maybe it's worth the battery life for a mobile device of what ever kind...

But anything connected to power..

I've had bittorrent running for three days, 2.9gb down, 1.5gb up, about 25 different torrents, and task manager says its ate 3:59 cpu time. I've stared at it for a couple minutes, and saw it register 1% usage for about two seconds. I dont see saving 1% cpu usage worth extra silicon.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By defter on 1/12/2007 6:01:06 AM , Rating: 3
And how much power was consumed by your PC during these three days?

This kind of CPU is aimed for small, separate devices that can download stuff directly. This kind of devices already exist, the point is that you don't to keep your noisy PC that consumes >100W at idle running whole night. Instead you use a small device with an external HDD to download stuff using Bittorrent.


By JeffDM on 1/12/2007 1:16:36 PM , Rating: 2
Most modern chips have good power management protocols, such as turning down the clock, reducing the voltage for lower clock speeds and turn off unused sections of the chip.

My computers aren't noisy either. That is another problem that is easily fixable without having to resort to buying more electronic devices.


By oTAL (blog) on 1/12/2007 2:47:36 PM , Rating: 3
1. Buy an Asus router with a USB port.
2. Install 3rd party BT firmware.
3. Connect and external HDD.
4. Use computer to decide what to download.
5. Turn off computer and let the router do the work...

P.S. PLEASE turn off the javascript that focus the post title. I hate that I'm writting and then half my sentence appears at the title!


By codeThug on 1/16/2007 6:39:27 PM , Rating: 2
I totally agree. This is marketing hype.

Any general purpose processor should be able to manage and merge i/o streams.


By KashGarinn on 1/17/2007 4:16:33 PM , Rating: 2
Ted stevens got it right! Except for series of tubes, he meant that the internet is a series of torrents.

K.


By Googer on 1/13/2007 1:51:53 PM , Rating: 2
I think it would be great if they put one of these chips in consumer NAS devices. Then we could have dedicated Bittorrent devises attahed to our network that don't hog up cpu cycles or eat at disk storage/access time.


By mark2ft on 1/11/2007 2:46:38 PM , Rating: 2
Yeah, I don't get it either. I think the makers of this bittorrent chip were trying to analogize by saying, "In the past, there were DVD drives on the PC, and later there were portable DVD players that were independent in themselves." OK, that makes some sense I guess. What I don't understand is--this is targeted at consumers. Why would consumers want to have portable/PC-independent bittorrent players? It's not like you buy a bittorrent "disc" and play it right away--you still need to download the entire file first in random parts (I mean, it's not the same as streaming digital audio/video content).

And with the trend of laptop sales outpacing desktop sales (and even the advent of UMPCs and things like that), why would you need a separate "bittorrent-only" device? Isn't technology all about integration?

As for the bigger companies, this makes sense--use a lot of bittorrent-machines to distribute content instead of building a server and installing an OS in there and everything just for bittorrent. But for consumer devices--I don't know why you'd benefit from it.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By vdig on 1/11/2007 3:17:04 PM , Rating: 2
Bandwidth. Yes, I already know of many problems with BitTorrent regarding that. Many ISPs restrict, if not altogether slow it to oblivion, all torrent file transfers. My provider does it (Rogers). The way around this, generally, is to encrypt the torrent headers. This does not work for everyone, however.

I have heard horror stories about torrent users suddenly hitting a bandwidth cap and getting threatened by their ISPs to "cease and desist", OR ELSE. Obviously the threat is commonly a disconnect from all service, but sometimes it is more than that.

If BitTorrent becomes a common protocol, and all machines on the web becomes some kind of Web 3.0, then what in the world will that turn my bill into? It is bad enough when we are threatened by ISPs for constant uploading. What happens when everyone does it? Something big is missing from the picture to even make it remotely into something workable. I feel like that certain thing will be how corporations take advantage of the whole thing.

ISPs now use the bandwidth I pay for? They better not. Not without giving me coaxial speed rates.

I still don't know what that is, or if what I'm truly trying to pinpoint is not yet in my sights. Still, this is concerning.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By phusg on 1/11/2007 4:26:49 PM , Rating: 2
There is a company who is building a commercial torrent download service based on the open source azureus, see http://www.zudeo.com.

Please don't make a snap decision and start avoiding azureus, it is and will remain open source. uTorrent is the one to watch out for, it is closed source and has recently been bought outright by a commercial company.


RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By Ringold on 1/11/07, Rating: 0
RE: What in the world does THIS mean?
By Seer on 1/11/2007 8:17:26 PM , Rating: 2
Right, like pirating movies and music isn't socialist already. *rolls eyes*


DRM?
By therealnickdanger on 1/11/2007 2:20:07 PM , Rating: 5
I'm assuming this would not work with just any Torrent stream? Only pay-torrents?

This part scares me:
quote:
"We see this trend emerging as 'Web 3.0' where each consumer becomes part of a universal content storage and delivery system.

So basically the consumer pays for all bandwidth and storage of content on top of paying for the product... and how much cheaper will this make the media? Oh, what? It won't be cheaper, you'll just keep the profit to yourself? OK, sounds like a deal.

No, I think I'll stick with BitComet, thanks. Only if the prices on content was super low and I could keep a copy would I pay for a torrent.