Microtronix Accelerates Consumer Display Designs With New HD Video Development Board

Low-Cost Cyclone® II FPGA-Based Display Development Platform Helps Consumer Electronics Manufacturers Beat Lengthy ASIC Development Cycles

LONDON, Ontario -- January 03, 2007 -- Microtronix® today announced an Altera® Cyclone II FPGA-based development board optimized for next-generation flat panel display development.      

The ViClaro II Video Enhancement platform (ViClaro II) allows display designers and ASSP vendors to add next-generation picture enhancement features to their products as market demands evolve, rather than being tied to lengthy application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) development cycles.

Consumer electronics product development times are typically far shorter than ASIC development cycles. Display manufacturers cannot rely solely on ASIC-based application-specific standard products (ASSP’s) for needed features that enhance HDTV quality and help differentiate their products. By decoupling product innovation from the lengthy ASIC development cycle, Microtronix and Altera allow designers to offer exactly what their market demands as rapidly as they want it.

“Low cost FPGAs have become an integral part of innovative display product architectures,” said Tim Colleran, vice president, Altera consumer, automotive and broadcast business unit. “Display manufacturers are demanding an optimized and affordable development platform for quickly creating, testing and deploying new picture enhancement algorithms, as a distinctive sustainable advantage. The ViClaro II directly addresses this demand.”

Microtronix has developed a long experience in servicing leading display developers and ASSP providers and in identifying and delivering the right platform & solutions for the development of their next-generation picture enhancement features. All this knowledge is now available thru ViClaro II, Microtronix’s new video enhancement development platform.

ViClaro II Key Features & Benefits:

• Dual LVDS links, 1080p bandwidth capable, ready for the coming 100/120Hz HDTV display enabling smooth motion judder removal
• HDMI support, the de-facto standard high definition TV digital interface
• On board 128 Mbit DDR2 SDRAM together with the Microtronix high performance multi-port SDRAM Memory Controller IP Core, significantly boosting memory access times, an essential requirement in video processing

“As the leading provider of programmable logic solutions to the consumer market, Altera is our ideal partner for ViClaro II” said Philippe Morin, VP Sales & Marketing at Microtronix. “Altera offers the right combination of consumer market expertise, FPGAs equipped with optimal features for display applications, and the lowest cost devices which are critical for the cost-sensitive consumer market”.

Price & Availability

The ViClaro II development board is priced at $1,295 and will be available by the end of Q1 2007 through the Microtronix Web Store  at (http://www.microtronix.com/acatalog) and through Arrowdevtools.com 
 
About Microtronix

Since 1977, Microtronix has pioneered the X.25 protocol for the telecommunication market.  Today, Microtronix continues to lead the industry in innovation with its AMATPS, X.25/TCP Gateways, and SMDI/SIP Solutions.  Microtronix is also spearheading the embedded engineering design revolution with its complete range of services from engineering design to manufacturing.  Microtronix also specializes in the rapid development of Intellectual Property and embedded applications for FPGA devices. Much has changed since 1977 but our mission to provide the same high quality embedded engineering solutions to answer today's problems, using faster embedded platforms, operating systems and high-speed connectivity that support our customers' business and strategic objectives remains unchanged.