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Headlines and summaries from the pages of Electronic Engineering Times . Previous editions are available from the 1994 , 1995 , 1996 , 1997 , and 1998 News Archives.
Friday, Apr il 3, 1998ABC and Fox back progressive-scan format for digital-TV broadcasts(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/3/98)The new availability of progressive-scan broadcast equipment is apparently what tipped the scales for ABC and Fox in their recently announced decisions to adopt the computer-friendly progressive format for their digital-TV broadcasts. Economic sum, dim for Japan(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/3/98)Japan's economic self-confidence absorbed a series of body blows this week, ranging from a plunge in the yen's value to a six-year low to a harsh warning from Sony's chairman, Norio Ohga, that Japan's economy was "on the verge of collapse." Siemens plans to license configurable DSP architecture(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/3/98)The semiconductor division of Siemens AG has launched a 16-bit fixed-point DSP core aimed at high-performance communicat ions and multimedia applications. The announcement of the Carmel device, which includes novel architectural features, had been expected. Executive calls for cooperative embedded design(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/3/98)The embedded systems market has reached a "strategic inflection point," according to Ned Barnholt, executive vice president of Hewlett Packard Co., in a keynote address at the Embedded Systems Conference Spring. Borrowing the terminology of Intel chairman Andrew Grove, Barnholt said that business forces have collided to force a change in the ways of conducting the embedded systems business. Competing audio formats take their fight to the consumers(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/3/98)The battle between two contenders for next-generation sound — the DVD-Audio and Super Audio CD formats — is about to move out of the lab and into the market. At a conference here April 21 , the DVD Forum will detail a near-final version of its DVD-Audio format to member companies and will demonstrate the sound to the public. The rival Super Audio CD format, backed by Philips Electronics NV and Sony Corp., was described here last month in an event where backers offered near royalty-free access to the technology. CompactPCI draws broad corporate interest(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/3/98)A large number of OEMs have embarked on major CompactPCI projects, according to spokesmen for the PCI Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group, speaking at the Embedded Systems Conference Spring. Industry slips on transition to 300-mm wafers(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/2/98)In the last few months the timetable for the semiconductor industry's transition to 300-mm silicon-wafer processing has slipped back by about a year, according to George Lee, director of the 300-mm initiative within the Semi conductor Equipment and Materials International (SEMI) trade association. Altera unveils homegrown BGA package(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/2/98)Altera Corp. is readying production of a ball-grid array package that will put more leads into less space than currently available BGAs. By reducing lead pitch, Altera expects to eventually pack 2,500 leads onto the same chip area that currently holds 256 balls. Customer demands spur RTOS vendors to forge broad links(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/2/98)Tool makers and suppliers of real-time operating systems are opening up their environments and are forging alliances that give developers greater access to tools. The Microtec Division of Mentor Graphics Corp. and Microware Systems Corp. announced broad new programs at the Embedded Systems Conference Spring, and others divulged similar moves. Thursday, April 2, 1998Sony licenses Hitachi's SH cores(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/2/98)Sony Corp. has signed a licensing agreement to use Hitachi Ltd.'s SH-1, SH-3 and SH-DSP cores in systems-level chips for internal and external customers. Sony is already making systems based on Hitachi's SH processors, a Sony spokesman said, though those systems were not identified. $10 DSP seen as opener of new markets(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/2/98)Analog Devices Inc. hopes to make history next week with the introduction of its ADSP-21065L Sharc DSP — the first 32-bit floating-point DSP to target a $10 price point. ITC finds SRAM imports from Taiwan injure U.S. market(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)In a split decision, the International Trade Commission (ITC) ruled on Wednesday that SRAM exports from Taiwan injure the U.S. industry, but that exports from Korea do not.
IEEE-USA president warns Congress on work-force studies(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)The first elected president of the American arm of the IEEE addressed Congress this week and urged legislators "not place too much reliance on industry-sponsored supply-and-demand surveys when making policies intended to meet America's need for better-educated and more highly skilled workers."
Homegrown systems feed China's PC appetite(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)China has so far been unaffected by the Asian financial crisis, and stands as one of the few growth markets in the region for personal computers. But foreign manufacturers haven't yet benefited from this country's strong desire for PCs, and trail the locally produced models favored by China's distributors, according to a study by International Data Corp. (Framingham, Mass.).
Web helps job hunters bypass recruiters(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)One way to get a job is to work through an employment recruiter. But some people find it distasteful to work with middlemen, be they real-estate agents, stockbrokers, travel agents or recruiters.
Siemens forms chip joint venture with Elmos(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)The semiconductor division of Siemens AG (Munich, Germany) has formed a joint venture with Elektronik in MOS-Technologie GmbH (Dortmund, Germany) to develop and market ICs that will combine power, logic and analog functions with flash memory.
DRAM vendors rethink fab plans for Europe(9:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)Fujitsu Ltd. may convert its U.K. DRAM fabrication facility to a site that makes smart-card ICs, under a plan being considered by the company. Such a move could exploit exploit Fujitsu's recently developed ability to combine ferroelectric RAM (FRAM) with an 8-bit controller on a s ingle die.
Wednesday, April 1, 1998Microsoft to take Windows CE into "hard" real-time world(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)In a frontal assault on the embedded-systems market, Microsoft Corp. will revamp its Windows CE operating system to include "hard" real-time features which can support time-critical applications in process control, data acquisition and telecommunications, EE Times has learned at the Embedded Systems Conference Spring.
Keynoter sees strong risk of buggy systems(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)Noting the fierce pressure to move embedded systems into the consumer space, author and industry watcher Jack Ganssle warned attendees of the Embedded Systems Conference Spring that the industry faces an increasing risk of shipping buggy, poorly tested products. This will be a natural consequence, Ganssle said in a keynote address, of demand created by imaginative marketing, by the availability of cheap but increasingly complex microprocessors, and by a shortage of adequate programming tools and talented people to use them.
Coalition to study high-tech skills shortage(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)Semiconductor Equipment Materials International (SEMI) has formed a coalition of European trade associations to investigate a looming skills shortage that could limit the growth of Europe's high-tech industries.
Microsoft brings its digital-TV show to Washington(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)Microsoft Corp. and Compaq Computer Corp. are out in force in the nation's capital this week, as the digital-TV partners demonstrate their progressive-scanning DTV approach to lawmakers and regulators.
ASM Lithography preps 300-mm stepper for Samsung(3:00 p.m. EST, 4/1/98)ASM Lithography NV (Veldho ven, Netherlands) has joined Canon Inc. in the thin ranks of suppliers able to provide stepper photolithography equipment configured for 300-mm (12-inch) wafers.
Fuzzy development system available as Web freeware(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)A freeware fuzzy development system named JFS for Jan's Fuzzy System was recently posted to the Internet by its programmer, Jan Mortensen. JFS offers weighted rules, linguistic hedges and a variety of defuzzification methods.
Reliability needs earlier consideration, executive says(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)Reliability engineers should have greater participation in the early stages of the design process, Julie Spicer England, a vice president for Texas Instruments Inc., told a gathering this week in Reno, Nev.
Switch maker taps wafer-scale integ ration(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)Hyperchip Inc. is taking a second look at wafer-scale integration in a bid to build the ultimate routing switch. Or perhaps it's a third look, since the startup's founder, Richard Norman, believes the technology has entered a third phase that will finally make it a viable approach to large-scale switching and supercomputer design.
Distributor Avnet restructures(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)Avnet Inc., the electronics distributor, is restructuring its components business by combining the sales forces of Hamilton Hallmark, Time Electronics and Penstock and assigning each a specialty.
Tuesday, March 31, 1998Packaging plant settles in Switzerland(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)Custom Silicon Configuration Services NV (Zaventum, Belgium) has established an assembly/foundry operation in Geneva that will provide services involving bal l-grid arrays and other advanced packages, the company said at the Semicon Europa exhibition and conference. Fujitsu modules to cool Intel CPUs for notebook PCs(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)Fujitsu Ltd. has worked with Intel Corp. to come up with a way to deal with heat dissipation, a notoriously weak link in Intel's technology for mobile systems. As Intel prepares to roll out its next-generation notebook processors next week, Fujitsu will unveil a cooling module that satisfies the power-budget requirements of high-performance microprocessors for notebook systems.
Users give pc-board vendors an earful on ease-of-use(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/31/98)As printed-circuit board vendors assess the challenges of pc-board design in the system-on-a-chip era, users want vendors to build ease of use into today's solutions and to provide better tool support, according to a panel discussion held at last week's Printed Circuit Board Design Conference West.
E-commerce and intranets stir IP catalog competition(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)The Reusable Application Specific Intellectual Property Developers industry group (Rapid) plans to add Internet access and electronic commerce to its over-the-Web catalog of intellectual-property (IP) cores, which is expected to be available in May. Audio chips enable smart speakers for PCs(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)In the often-clamorous world of PC audio, a handful of manufacturers are beginning to make a new noise about turning passive analog speakers into a new type of intelligent appliance — a smart digital speaker. Although not everyone is convinced that such devices, which receive and decode audio streams, will be a hit, these new peripherals, made possible in part by the rise of serial digital data buses such as the Universal Seri al Bus (USB) or 1394, may drive forward a new generation of audio semiconductors. PC audio drives a big move to small amps(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)Class D amplification for speakers seems to be gaining universal support among semiconductor component vendors. The high efficiency and miniature size of Class D amplifiers allows high-power amplifiers to be built into portable computers as well as bookshelf speaker housings. "In the future we would not need a codec and amplifier as we know it," said Parviz Ghaffairpour, audio product-line director for National Semiconductor Corp. The speaker could include a DSP with a Class D digital input; a codec would be needed only for voice inputs. Debate swirls around digital-speaker interface(9:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)Even as speaker makers segue to smart digital systems, they are debating which digital interface they will tap to link to a P C or other audio source. Leading candidates include the Universal Serial Bus, 1394 and the Sony-Phillips Digital Interface in addition to proprietary schemes. Monday, March 30, 1998ASIC Council backs ALF for library standard(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)Despite surging revenue for Microsoft Corp.'s products, executives of the company readily admitted at its annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference that the PC, in many respects, is a technological mess. While the confession was hardly surprising to the engineers gathered for WinHEC, public and private comments revealed nascent plans to overhaul the PC's 17-year-old hardware and software underpinnings. Mitsubishi lands customers for embedded CPU with DRAM(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)Mitsubishi Electronics will make a strong case for its proprietary 32-bit embedded-DRAM CPU, the M32R/D, at the Embedded Systems Conferenc e this week. The family of devices -- which combine a RISC-like 32-bit embedded processor with up to 2 Mbytes of on-chip DRAM -- has searched since its 1996 introduction for a killer application. Chip makers target CE-based set-top boxes(3:00 p.m. EST, 3/30/98)Semiconductor suppliers in the PC sector are focused on pushing their wares into set-top boxes. But, unlike today's PC, the new breed of set-top box discussed at the Windows Hardware Engineering Conference earlier this month will likely run the Windows CE operating system, which presents its own unique set of challenges.
PC's drivers ponder architectural overhaul(11:45 p.m. EST, 3/27/98)Despite surging revenue for Microsoft Corp.'s products, executives of the company readily admitted at its annual Windows Hardware Engineering Conference that the PC, in many respects, is a technological mess. While the confession wa s hardly surprising to the engineers gathered for WinHEC, public and private comments revealed nascent plans to overhaul the PC's 17-year-old hardware and software underpinnings. Microsoft offers cash incentives to implementers of key PC features(11:45 p.m. EST, 3/27/98)Microsoft Corp. has inserted a clause into the market-development agreements (MDAs) it routinely signs with PC makers in an effort to promote two of the particulars of its current hardware vision. The clause promises a cash incentive to OEMs that ship as much as 15 percent of their systems starting this July with either the 1394 interface or a TV tuner on board. Undefined business models, unstable core prices dog IP industry(11:45 p.m. EST, 3/27/98)Despite the rapid advent of systems-on-silicon, the IP98 Conference revealed an immature industry that's groping for tools to tackle business and legal challen ges. NIST effort breaks barriers to HDTV(11:45 p.m. EST, 3/27/98)A team of eight companies is set to disclose progress in a landmark research-and-development effort to fill technology gaps in the infrastructure for networked HDTV content-production studios. CAD shakeup hinted as two end resale of Specctra(11:45 p.m. EST, 3/27/98)A possible realignment of the pc-board CAD industry may be under way, given revelations that Mentor Graphics Corp. and Zuken-Redac are no longer reselling an industry-standard router now owned by their strongest competitor: Cadence Design Systems Inc. The failure to sign contracts with Cadence for the Cooper and Chyan Technology (CCT) Specctra autorouter could spell trouble for the top two players in pc-board CAD, industry watchers said last week. |
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