TI unveils DSP-based digital camera platform

TI unveils DSP-based digital camera platform
By Junko Yoshida, EE Times
July 21, 2000 (2:12 p.m. EST)
URL: http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20000717S0015

DALLAS — Texas Instruments Inc. will make its first serious foray into the digital still camera market on Monday (July 17) when it unveils a programmable chip that integrates a TMS320C500 digital signal processor and an ARM7TDMI RISC processor with an imaging coprocessor and a variable-length coder.

OEMs can design a digital still camera with the fully programmable solution, which allows the addition of such features as the recording of video clips with audio in real-time MPEG-1, MPEG-4 and motion JPEG, or the playing of MP3 music files.

Both the imaging coprocessor and the variable-length coder are designed to accelerate image processing. The chip also comes with a hardwired preview engine, SDRAM controller, video encoder and I/O block. Such an architecture makes it possible for OEMs to design a camera that's able to transfer images at 320 megabits/second, preview 30-frames/s NTSC and PAL video, and achieve real-time frame capture in burst mode to the full resolution of the 2-Mpixel image sensor.

Samples of the chip are available now, and production volumes are scheduled to become available in the fourth quarter, priced at less than $15 each in volume.