In the last couple of years we have seen semiconductor tuners extending the reach beyond its traditional roles in narrowband cans. As digital technology permeates the mobile TV space, even though the market is growing at a slow pace, designers are combining advances in CMOS and silicon germanium (SiGe) BiCMOS processes with digital architectures and proprietary algorithms to deliver tuners that support multiple bands of frequencies and handle numerous standards with ultralow power consumption. Thus, a single device is enabling product makers to converge several applications into a single portable handheld device.

Besides eliminating SAW filters and other discrete components normally required with traditional tuners, the emerging broadband silicon TV tuners are also enabling product developers to address multiple standards using a single device. For instance, mobile TV space has multiple standards addressing this emerging worldwide market. As a result, to tackle market fragmentation, last year we saw suppliers unwrapping single-chip solutions. Microtune, for example, demonstrated a polyband universal tuner that could handle multiple mobile TV standards, while U.K.-based fabless startup Mirics Semi-conductor launched what it claimed was the world's first polyband tuner for mobile digital broadcast reception, enabling designers of mobile phones, portable media players and PDAs to easily add mobile broadcast reception to support any global standard. According to Mirics, its SiGe BiCMOS chip is capable of receiving all broadcast standards announced to date, including DVB-H, T-DMB, ISDB-T, DAB-IP, MediaFlo, DAB, DRM and even AM/FM, as well as the upcoming Chinese DMB-T/H (“Will Multistandard, Polyband Tuners Help Mobile TV Realize its Potential?,” July 2006, p. 10).

Since then, many others have advanced the product. In my column last year on this topic, I indicated that such TV tuners must now be integrated with multistandard demodulators to further drive the market. Well, Texas Instruments has made that move with its Hollywood mobile broadcast solution to drive mobile digital TV onto your cell phone. The TI chip combines a mobile TV tuner with a demodulator using a 90 nm CMOS process. Concurrently, some others are exploring the tuner plus demodulator integration in a SiP package. And recently, Frontier Silicon took another step forward by bringing on-board a baseband processor. Designed to bring mobile TV and data services to handheld devices for worldwide markets, Frontier Silicon's Paradiso1H integrates an RF tuner, multistandard baseband IC functions and ancillary passive components.

Meanwhile, new fabless semiconductor players like MaxLinear are combining digital architecture with a 0.13 µm CMOS process to deliver silicon tuners that set new benchmarks in size and power consumption. According to MaxLinear, its new silicon tuner for mobile TV applications measures only 1.9 mm × 1.9 mm to set a new record in size. Also, it consumes only 60 mW (maximum) power, reducing battery draw and minimizing heat dissipation — two important criteria for mobile TV applications, said the manufacturer. It supports ISDB-T one-segment and three-segment applications. It eliminates the need for an external balun, SAW filters and IF amplifier, which reduces board footprint and BOM costs. Plus, it requires a standard crystal frequency and includes on-chip RSSI function and standard I²C interface. MaxLinear said that its TV tuner is enabling several handset designs that target the Japanese mobile TV market, which analysts estimate will grow to 20 to 30 million units in the next 12 months. This market will expand beyond Japan into other countries like Brazil, where a variant of ISDB-T has been adopted as the standard for mobile and fixed terrestrial digital TV transmissions. Future versions of this product will support other mobile TV standards like DVB-H, according to MaxLinear.

These advances are not just for handheld devices. They are also coming to a PC near you. Consequently, any PC equipped with a TV tuner card will be able to display and record TV programming. A study from ABI Research shows the worldwide PC TV tuner market will grow from about 15 million units in 2006 to 41 million units in 2011.

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