Silicon Labs introduces a new generation of digital TV demodulators

     Silicon Labs has announced a new generation of digital TV demodulators that support the latest satellite, terrestrial and cable standards. The new Si218x family includes the world's first demodulator to support the latest DVB-S2X specification, which provides the latest features and improved performance on top of the DVB-S2 standard. The series also expands Silicon Labs' industry-leading line of terrestrial demodulators to fully support the Digital Broadcasting Integrated Service - Terrestrial Standard (ISDB-T) adopted in Latin American countries such as Brazil. The Si218x series meets the needs of TV and set-top box (STB) manufacturers, RF network interface module (NIM) suppliers and DVD/Blu-ray burner manufacturers worldwide for a wide range of digital TV reception.

     Silicon Labs' Si218x single-chip demodulator is based on an evolving digital demodulator architecture that supports a variety of emerging and established standards. These include terrestrial (DVB-T/T2, ISDB-T), satellite (DVB-S/S2/DSS/S2X) and wired (DVB-C/C2, ITU-T J83 Annex A/B/C) reception standards. The single-channel Si218x and dual-channel Si218x2 families are market-proven, low-power, cost-effective demodulator solutions that enable TV and set-top box manufacturers to simplify complex video front-end designs and support a combination of multiple broadcast standards.

     For terrestrial broadcast applications, Silicon Labs has the highest DVB-T2 demodulator market share in the TV industry. Silicon Labs has incorporated its extensive field experience in the terrestrial broadcast market into the third-generation Si218x DVB-T2 demodulator, which now supports the popular ISDB-T standard. Developed to enable high quality terrestrial reception of digital video, ISDB-T was first developed in Japan and is now deployed in Brazil and 15 other countries across South and Central America, Africa and Asia.

     Dr. Gunnar Bedicks, Principal investigator at the Mackenzie Digital TV Laboratory, said: "Silicon Labs' ISDBT demodulator and TV tuner chipsets comply with all ABNT NBR15604: 2007Vc2008 technical specification and significant margin in all validation items. The demodulator performs well in a variety of reception test situations and has excellent overall performance, especially against multipath interference (direct and reflected waves) and Doppler effects."

     The digital TV lab is part of Mackenzie Presbyterian University in Sao Paulo, Brazil, and is a leader in transmitting and receiving systems research. Since 1997, the laboratory has collaborated with the Brazilian Association of Broadcasters (ABERT), the Association of Television Engineering (SET), the Brazilian Ministry of Communications and ANATEL, an agency regulated by the Brazilian government, to conduct certification tests for the ISDB-T specification.

     In addition to supporting the ISDB-T standard, the Si218x family also supports DVB-S2X, the latest extension of the DVB-S2 satellite broadcast reception standard. DVB-S2X enabled demodulators enable developers to develop future-proof TV and set-top box designs with advanced channel recovery features and technologies to support the reception of upcoming 4K Ultra HD TV signals based on High Efficiency Video coding (HEVC) technology. HEVC decoding technology has been integrated into many TV SoC chips and, along with DVB-S2X reception, is becoming a "must-have" feature in the TV market.

     James Stansberry, senior vice president and general manager of iot and Broadcast products at Silicon Labs, said: "As the market leader in advanced digital TV demodulators, we are focused on helping customers around the world keep pace with the evolution of digital video broadcast standards. "Our new Si218x demodulator supports the latest DVB-S2X satellite standard and ISDB-T terrestrial standard in Latin America, enabling TV and set-top box manufacturers to develop future-proof designs and easily scale into emerging markets."

     The single-channel Si218x demodulator comes in the same 7mm x 7mm QFN-48 package as Silicon Labs' previous demodulator family, offering a pin-compatible solution that simplifies board design, minimizes costs, and reduces development. The dual-channel Si218x2 demodulator is also available in a pin-compatible 8mm x 8mm QFN-68 package with an innovative on-chip Crossbar architecture that enables system designers to meet a wide range of multi-receiver applications with a cost-effective solution. The Si218x and Si218x2 demodulators share the same API software, which enables customers to easily extend and adapt their applications to these new demodulators and upgrade their TV and STB products to support ISDB-T and the latest digital video broadcast standards.

     In addition to the introduction of the Si218x/8x2 family, Silicon Labs has also updated the best-in-class Si216x/6x2 DVB demodulator family with new enhanced performance and support for the DVB-S2X standard. When paired with Silicon Labs' market-leading TV tuners, the Si216x and Si218x demodulators provide the highest performance video front end solutions from RF to baseband, helping TV manufacturers significantly simplify their designs.