WIFI

Pace has announced its latest set of High Definition set-top boxes for the connected home. The new set-top boxes are expected to offer pay TV subscribers an advanced viewing experience. The boxes offer a number of flexible features to enhance users viewing experience and network setup options.  Operators are expected to benefit from the devices, which are accompanied by upgraded software, business consulting, specialised customer care call centre and product delivery services.

The momentum in implementing Smart Grid technology is growing in developed countries.  Homes are being fitted with Smart Meters, home owners are installing advance connected solutions that monitor and manage how they use their electricity and gas. To further support this market the Wi-Fi Alliance and HomePlug Powerline Alliance have teamed up in a joint effort to promote the use of their respective technology in these modern digital home.

Toshiba America today introduced two 4G WiMAX-ready models of the Portégé R700, the world’s lightest 13.3-inch full-performance ultraportable laptop with an integrated DVD drive. The new Portégé R700 models not only provide business users with unprecedented performance and durability in a highly mobile form factor, but the most comprehensive connectivity options available.

Veebeam has join a list of companies within the last month that has launched a wireless solution that steam content from your laptop or desktop PC to your Television at 1080p HD. So far we have had the Asus WiCast and HP TV Connect all offering the same functionality. According to Veebeam, Veebeam gives every broadband consumer the freedom to share their favorite content with others directly on their TV’s big screen.

HP has release a wireless PC to TV connector; like the Asus WiCast, the HP Wireless TV Connect allows users to stream wireless 1080p HD multimedia content from your laptop to your TV. The adapters are powered the USB port of the Laptop and simply work by connecting the PC adapter to the Laptop computer and connecting the TV adapter to the HDTV via HDMI, without the need to install any software. The HP Wireless TV Connect fully supports protected content such as Blu-ray and DVD movies.

Coming this September is the Asus WiCast EW2000, a PC to TV connectivity kit. Developed on WHDI (Wireless Home Digital Interface) technology, the WiCast kit allow you to project 1080p high definition content from your PC (notebook, netbook or desktop) onto a television or LCD Monitor. The kit can transmit images up to a distance of 33feet, with no noticeable latency (less than 1ms).  The adapters will come as a set (HD video transmitter and receiver) in a compact consumer friendly design, and will interface to the PC and TV. In addition the adapters are powered the PC’s USB ports for ease of use and making the solution highly portable for use with laptops or netbooks.

Vodafone has announced that they are releasing a new DLNA compatible Wi-Fi device called the R201 – the first DLNA certified mobile Wi-Fi device. It will allow you to share your mobile broadband connection with up to five devices, along with the sharing of documents and other digital media between other certified devices.  The R201 is available on an 18 contract with 5GB data for £25 per month.

Bluetooth has upgraded it’s BTW (Bluetooth for Windows) to version 6.4.  This new version it to facilitate better interaction between Bluetooth devices – that are based on the windows operating system, and to help drive more advance Bluetooth functionality into a wider collection of consumer connectivity applications.  Included in BTW 6.4 are two new profiles that extend Bluetooth enabled devices to communicate with other devices.

Atheros has upgraded their XSPAN solutions to offer a better quality viewing of video over wireless.  The XSPAN router solutions (AR938 and AR390) are the world’s first 3-stream 802.11n that supports reliable video over wireless and other bandwidth hungry applications.  The new architecture will boost performance by 50 percent across the entire wireless link, said Atheros.

Maxim and Celeno have combine their spcecialities to offer manufacturers a reference design for whole-home wireless HDMI solutions manufacturer of devices such as game consoles, digital video recorders (DVR), Blu-ray players, home gateway and set-top boxes will be able to use the reference design to build devices that distribute full-HD content wirelessly to remote HDTV displays.