Marvell enhances digital TV reception with new hybrid silicon tuner

CES, LAS VEGAS, USA: Marvell, a leader in integrated silicon solutions, unveiled the Marvell® 88DE8500 Hybrid Silicon Tuner with integrated Clear RF technology for the robust reception of analog and Digital TV (DTV) signals.

Available for worldwide use, the alignment free, new hybrid tuner provides optimized Automatic Gain Control (AGC) designed to ensure an excellent picture performance for Radio Frequency (RF) signals in terrestrial and cable analog and digital networks, and to fine tune and receive weak analog and digitals signals for an acceptable picture performance.

Featuring a 32 pin QFN package along with its low noise and power consumption, Marvell’s hybrid silicon tuner is a competitive solution for slim DTVs and Set Top Boxes (STBs). Combined with the Company's comprehensive suite of consumer solutions and storage solutions, Marvell delivers a total system solution for next-generation high-definition digital entertainment.

“Marvell’s RF front end silicon solution for DTVs and STBs push the envelope in performance and cost, enabling manufacturers to deliver state-of-the-art products to consumers,” said Dr. Nikhil Balram, Vice President and General Manager for the Digital Entertainment Business Unit, Communications and Consumer Business Group at Marvell. “Marvell’s high-definition digital entertainment products enable world-class media processing, providing consumers with a groundbreaking audio/visual experience.”

The Marvell 88DE8500 is a high performance, low-power CMOS silicon tuner that delivers a robust performance without using external components like Surface Acoustic Wave (SAW) filters, Low Noise Amplifiers (LNAs) and other tracking filters. The chip is capable of tuning to channels in the RF range from 40.5 MHz to 1002 MHz and converting those frequencies to a programmable low Intermediate Frequency (IF).

The silicon tuner interfaces with the Marvell single chip hybrid demodulators for Europe (88DE8020) and North America (88DE8010) to provide a complete RF receiver for DTV applications. When paired with Marvell single chip demodulators, the complete RF receiver front-end provides robust reception for digital signals and good Audio/Video (AV) reception from analog terrestrial/cable networks. The tuner can also be interfaced to demodulators from third parties.

Production of this tuner is expected to start in the third quarter of 2010. Pricing and samples are available on request.