Hauppauge selects NXP PC TV system-on-chip for award-winning dual hybrid PC TV tuner

Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 features highly integrated NXP SAA7164E PC TV tuner chip

EINDHOVEN, The Netherlands and, NEW YORK — NXP Semiconductors today announced that Hauppauge Computer Works, Inc., one of the world’s leading PC TV receiver manufacturers, has selected the NXP SAA7164E PC TV system-on-chip (SOC), as well as its latest generation silicon tuner TDA18271HD, to power the Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 PCI Express tuner – a unique dual hybrid PC TV tuner for the North American market with hardware encoding, recently awarded the PC Magazine Editor’s Choice award. With the WinTV-HVR-2250, users can watch a digital or analog TV program on their PC screen, while watching, pausing, or recording a second program of any type at the same time. The Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 supports popular analog and digital TV formats used in North America, including NTSC analog terrestrial and cable TV, over-the-air ATSC high-definition digital TV, plus clear QAM digital cable TV.

Hauppauge takes full advantage of the SAA7164 dual-channel PC TV SOC offered by NXP, the independent semiconductor company founded by Philips. The highly integrated NXP SAA7164 SOC enables true watch and record capability, integrating dual-channel TV capability with native hardware encoding to reduce the CPU overhead demands on consumer PC systems. The single-slot Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 PCI Express tuner board also uses a pair of NXP TDA18271HD tuner chips to decode NTSC, ATSC and clear QAM digital cable signals.

“Consumers are becoming increasingly savvy about making the most of the multimedia capabilities of their PCs. Dual hybrid PC TV tuner cards will have significant appeal for consumers who want to be able to watch TV on their computers and record programs in the background, without slowing down the performance of their PCs,” said Gerry Kaufhold, principal analyst, In-Stat. “The dual-channel PCI Express TV tuner introduced by Hauppauge and powered by NXP offers a versatile and powerful solution that delivers a vibrant viewing, recording and playback experience on home PCs, which is critical to continued growth of the broader PC TV market.”

“The Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 delivers what customers have been asking for – the ability to enjoy a great viewing experience regardless of whether you’re watching or recording analog or digital TV, or even both at the same time,” said Hauppauge Computer Works CEO Ken Plotkin. “By working with NXP, we’ve been able to design the first dual analog/digital PC-TV tuner board for the North American market. The WinTV-HVR-2250 is a solution that gives our customers the freedom to view, capture and record TV programs when and how they want to from the most popular sources.”

With the WinTV-HVR-2250 MC, consumers can use Microsoft® Media Center’s TV scheduler to automatically record their favorite TV shows and play back recordings at any time on their PC screens. The Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-2250 is the North American version of the WinTV-HVR2200, which supports European standards such as PAL TV and DVB-T, and also uses the NXP SAA7164E SOC and TDA18271HD tuner chip.

Additional features in the NXP SAA7164 dual-channel PC TV SOC include fully integrated Remote Control (RC); the widest range of video encoding compression formats, including MPEG-2/4 and VC-1; and advanced video processing technologies, including an integrated 3D comb-filter and 3D noise filtering. The advanced encoding capabilities of the SAAA7164 also enable support for DVD, iPod®, iPhone, Apple TV, Sony PSP®, PS3™, Microsoft Xbox® 360™, Zune™, Zen, Archos and various multimedia phone formats.

“Today’s consumers are demanding advanced TV features in their PC, such as high-quality capture, picture-in-picture and simultaneous watch and record, but they want it all in the most compact form factor possible,” said Martin Maloney, marketing director for PC video solutions, NXP Semiconductors. “With the SAA7164, NXP is enabling all this and more – making it easy for manufacturers such as Hauppauge to develop breakthrough devices through its advanced multi-format hardware encoding and advanced video processing, all integrated in a robust, single-chip solution that builds on our proven track record in PC TV systems.”