November 29, 2000

Set-top time

With the Western Cable show on tap this week in Los Angeles, expect a plethora of announcements related to the set-top box, ranging from new boxes to voice-over data facilities to home LAN connectivity.

The set-top news includes both enabling technologies and end products. For example, Inprimis, which develops set-top reference designs, has packed its i2020 design on a CD-ROM including ready-to-manufacture details. Based on National Semiconductor silicon, the digital-video-capable and Internet-ready design includes a cable-ready tuner and an MPEG-2 decoder.

Aegis Broadband, meanwhile, is introducing its new iVision set-top appliance, which it dubs "a couch potato's dream." The company hopes to sell the offering to service providers that want to offer living-room Internet access with email support and interactive-TV capabilities, such as stock tickers, news and sport services, and program guides.

In the voice arena, Cable Television Laboratories (CableLabs) is announcing that it has completed the second phase of its PacketCable specification. The new work defines standards for call signaling, quality-of-service, and event-messaging extensions that will enable cable operators to directly exchange real-time traffic—such as phone calls—over IP backbone networks.

TollBridge Technologies and Nortel Networks are demonstrating voice-over-broadband using cable, DSL, or wireless channels. Showgoers have the chance to make calls that are handled via the TollBridge PacketCable-based IP Telephony Platform, which utilizes a GR-303 Class 5 switch interface to connect to the public phone network.

CableLabs is also touting its intention to help forward the home LAN market—a missing link necessary for carriers to provide IP-based services throughout a home. The organization has announced that more than a dozen leading companies have joined in its CableHome home-LAN initiative. The participants have essentially agreed to pool intellectual property, and all participants will be able to use the resulting technologies without paying royalties.

While the CableHome specifications will come down the line, others are ready to accelerate deployment of home LANs now. Lucent Technologies, for example, has added to its Orinoco family of wireless LAN products, which are based on the IEEE 802.11b standard. For SOHO applications, the company is introducing a network interface that connects to a client PC via USB, rather than requiring the user to add a PCI or PC Card to the client. The 11-Mbit/sec product works with the Orinoco RG1000 Residential Gateway as well as the enterprise-class Orinoco access points.

Finally, Sharewave and Radiata are moving the industry one step closer to the 54-Mbit/sec wireless-LAN data rates defined in the IEEE 802.11a spec. The two have announced a plan to meld Radiata's 802.11a physical-layer IC with Sharewave's media-access controller. The 54-Mbit/sec rates will allow home LANs to carry multimedia IP-based traffic, including voice and digital video.

—Maury Wright