Several consumer electronics companies have joined together to form a special interest group to develop an industry standard for multi-room audio, video, and control connectivity using Wireless Home Digital Interface (WHDI) technology. Amimon Inc., Hitachi Ltd, Motorola Inc., Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd, Sharp Corp., and Sony Corp. intend to have the new standard completed this year.
WHDI allows secure, encrypted HD video delivery through multiple rooms and other potential signal obstructions, such as people and furniture, while maintaining superb quality and robustness with less than 1-ms latency. A key ingredient of WHDI technology is a revolutionary video-modem that operates in the 5-GHz unlicensed band to enable robust wireless delivery of uncompressed HD video (including 1080p).
The special interest group’s goal is to enhance the current WHDI technology to enable wireless streaming of uncompressed HD video and audio between consumer electronics (CE) devices such as LCD and plasma HDTVs, multimedia projectors, A/V receivers, DVD and BD players, set-top boxes, game consoles, and PCs. The interoperable standard aims to ensure that CE devices manufactured by different vendors will simply and directly connect to one another.
“The development of the new standard will ensure that when consumers purchase CE devices and take them home, they will enjoy a fast, easy, and hassle-free wireless connection that delivers the highest quality,” said Yoav Nissan-Cohen, chairman and CEO of Amimon. “The WHDI standard’s objective is to enable an enriched customer experience with multi-vendor interoperability.”
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