Pulse-LINK Showcases Whole-Home HD Video Distribution with Ethernet-Over-Coax at The Cable Show

Thursday, May 15th, 2008

Solution extends DVR functionality throughout the home

NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana — Ultra Wideband (UWB) semiconductor pioneer and performance leader, Pulse~LINK Inc., will demonstrate the unmatched advantages of its CWave® UWB Ethernet-Over-Coax solution for whole-home HD video distribution in booth #3605 at The Cable Show 2008, taking place in New Orleans, LA, May 18-20. The “no new wires” solution extends Gigabit Ethernet connectivity over a home’s existing coaxial cabling, providing service providers, A/V manufacturers and professional installers with a cost effective method to deploy whole-home DVR functionality.

Pulse~LINK’s demonstration of its Ethernet-Over-Coax solution will also showcase CWave’s coexistence with other signals on the same coax cable, including broadcast video services from a local cable company and coexistence with MoCA® technology. The accelerated growth in high definition television sales has increased consumers’ desire to access HD content from their family room DVR and distribute it to other HDTVs located around the home. Pulse~LINK’s CWave Ethernet-Over-Coax platform networks up to nine HD multimedia content source and display devices throughout the home with end-to-end Quality of Service over existing coax cabling and splitters, eliminating the high expense of re-wiring a home with Ethernet cables.

“With the fast growing DVR market, the industry is looking for cost effective, multi-room DVR solutions to generate additional revenue and meet the consumer demand for viewing premium recorded content on any TV in the home. Our Ethernet-Over-Coax solution extends DVR functionality throughout the home with the added ability to view content from multiple sources on any TV in the home, providing a true whole-home multimedia networking solution,” said Dan Friedman, Pulse~LINK Vice President of Sales and Marketing. “By bridging IP traffic at Gigabit Ethernet performance over a home’s existing coax cabling, we enhance triple play services while cost-effectively enabling new services.”

Pulse~LINK’s recently released Ethernet-Over-Coax Reference Design Kit (RDK), featuring its CWave® PL3100 UWB chipset, is a low-cost, small form factor, ready-to-manufacture reference design, enabling quick market entry for OEM customers. The RDK can be implemented in external bridging devices or integrated into set-top boxes and DVR products.

In addition to showcasing its Ethernet-Over-Coax solution, Pulse~LINK will demonstrate room-to-room HD video streaming with its HDMI-Over-Coax and 1394-Over-Coax solutions at The Cable Show 2008. Demonstrations featuring CWave® Wireless-for-HDMI, for single-room wireless applications, will also take place. CWave® is the first technology to offer multiple “flavors” of transport for HD video distribution, providing high-speed wireless and wired HDMI, Ethernet and 1394 connectivity – all from the same chipset. This enables Pulse~LINK to support a variety of industry groups including the Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA), which uses Ethernet for home networking, and the High-Definition Audio-Video Network Alliance (HANA), which leverages 1394 to network HD content throughout the home. Pulse~LINK is also a Promoter Member of the recently launched HomeGrid™ Forum, formed to promote and influence a single, next-generation worldwide standard for networking digital content over home wiring.

Pulse~LINK’s CWave® UWB technology was validated in independent testing as the world’s fastest commercially available “no new wires” solution for HD video distribution. A long-recognized innovator of UWB technology, Pulse~LINK invented the use of UWB over coax systems in 2001 and was the first to patent and demonstrate this revolutionizing technology for streaming HD content throughout the home. Devices enabled with the CWave chipset allow HD video content, multi-channel audio and high-speed data located anywhere in the home to be shared room-to-room across the existing coax backbone and wirelessly within a room.