Broadcom’s new chip, for home gateways and UltraHD STBs, is said to raise UltraHD video decode efficiency, with a 25% reduction in bandwidth use (compared to Broadcom’s previous generation).
As well as raising decode efficiency, the BCM7445S supports Google’s VP9 codec at 60fps. Operators can thus leverage the chip to introduce UltraHD at high frame rates on YouTube; four 1920 x 1080 picture-in-picture options; and faster performance in graphics-rich UIs. UltraHD is not the limit of the device’s power: it actually supports resolutions up to DCI-4k at 60fps.
The chip uses a quad-core ARM processor, providing quad transcode and flexible content format support. Higher video transcoding is achieved through a new (proprietary) video processing technology, as well as on-chip hard-ware-based IP switching.
Broadcom says that the chip is the industry’s only SoC with four real-time transcoders for 1920 x 1080 at 30fps, supporting FullHD viewing on a mobile device.
The BCM7445S is currently sampling.
