Marvell Supports RVU for 'Whole-Home' TV Entertainment

Demonstrating RVU Client Solution on the ARMADA 1000 HD Media SoC at IBC

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Sep 09, 2010, 02:48 ET

AMSTERDAM, Sept. 9 /PRNewswire/ -- International Broadcasters Conference (IBC) -- Marvell (Nasdaq: MRVL), a worldwide leader in integrated silicon solutions, today announced the integration of the RVU protocol onto their ARMADA™ SoCs. Marvell, a member in the RVU Alliance, provides CPU and connectivity solutions for multiple entertainment platforms in the "Whole-Home."

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The first adoption by Marvell of the open standard RVU protocol begins with the ARMADA 1000 High Definition (HD) Media Processor System-on-a-Chip (SoC). Marvell's low power ARMADA SoCs will be deployed in various consumer video devices including thin client set-top-boxes (STBs) for second and third TVs in the home.

"We are pleased that Marvell has joined a host of other silicon companies powering RVU's vision of enabling consumers to access their entertainment content in a consistent manner on more devices in the home," said Henry Derovanessian, president of the RVU Alliance and senior vice president at DIRECTV. "Inclusion of RVU technology across handsets, tablets and set-top box platforms will accelerate the availability of service provider content throughout the home with a comprehensive Remote User Interface (RUI) that allows for pixel-accurate representation of the user experience rendered by the service operator's media server on thin clients. The RVU technology is at the forefront of the move to advanced in-home video networking solutions and we are glad to see Marvell adopting this pioneering technology."

"The demands for home entertainment are rapidly expanding with 3D, streaming, multi-room TV and personal content consumption and the ARMADA 1000 with RVU protocol enables Pay TV operators to meet and exceed those consumer demands," said Gaurav Shah, General Manager for the Digital Entertainment Business Unit at Marvell. "Bringing the RVU protocol to the low-power and scalable ARMADA 1000 HD media processor opens brand new levels of operator and consumer engagement, rapidly advancing the home entertainment experience."

RVU is a client/server-based technology that allows the television content viewer to experience a consistent server-generated user interface, on various consumer electronics devices. The RVU protocol uses DLNA technology as a foundation.

Marvell's client RVU support is demonstrable today, and will be working with various CE manufacturers on various platforms for production deployment in 2011. Marvell will demonstrate an RVU client solution based on the ARMADA 1000 SoC (88DE3010) at IBC (Hall 9, Booth 131).

About ARMADA 1000

The award-winning Marvell ARMADA 1000 HD Media Processor SoC targets network-connected consumer electronics applications and is designed to enable multiple networked applications and many operating system frameworks, in conjunction with high performance, immersive viewing experiences for the next generation of connected high definition consumer electronics platforms. The ARMADA 1000 features dual CPU cores running frequencies up to 1.2 GHz, an award-winning Qdeo™ video processing pipeline, dedicated hardware acceleration for multi-format video and audio decoding, and support for a comprehensive set of peripherals.

About Qdeo Technology

Qdeo video processing, delivers rich, high-definition quality through a suite of advanced QuietVideo™ technologies, providing quiet, natural video free of noise and artifacts. Per-pixel noise and compression artifact reduction removes noise inherent in digital video, and per-pixel motion-adaptive 3D de-interlacing removes jaggies and eliminates feathering. Adaptive Contrast Enhancement and Intelligent Color Remapping render rich and vivid images. For more information on Qdeo, visit http://www.marvell.com/Qdeo.

About Marvell

Marvell (NASDAQ: MRVL) is a world leader in the development of storage, communications, and consumer silicon solutions. Marvell's diverse product portfolio includes switching, transceiver, communications controller, wireless, and storage solutions that power the entire communications infrastructure including enterprise, metro, home, and storage networking. As used in this release, the term "Marvell" refers to Marvell Technology Group Ltd. and its subsidiaries. For more information, visit http://www.marvell.com.

About RVU Alliance

The RVU Alliance is an Oregon-based non-profit mutual benefit corporation formed to develop a specification for the new RVU technology including a full-featured "pixel accurate" Remote User Interface (RUI). Founding Promoter members are Broadcom, Cisco, DIRECTV, Samsung and Verizon. For more information about the RVU Alliance, please visit www.rvualliance.org.

Marvell and the M logo are registered trademarks of Marvell and/or its affiliates. ARMADA, Qdeo and QuietVideo are trademarks of Marvell and/or its affiliates. Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.