e.Digital Corporation (fka EDIG)

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STM Demos Multimedia Application On VLIW Micro Core


By Mark Long -- e-inSITE, 1/8/2002


First samples from microprocessor collaboration with HP redefine price/performance/power trade-off

STMicroelectronics has developed an MPEG-4 decoding application demo for the company's first VLIW (Very Long Instruction Word) microprocessor core, called the ST210. Based on an evaluation chip called the ST200STB1, the demo was developed within a few weeks of the first silicon becoming available. During the demo, the ST210 decoded MPEG-4 data in real time.

The new ST210 core, which is based on technology jointly developed by ST and Hewlett-Packard Laboratories, is a scalable and customizable core family designed for embedding in multimedia System-on-Chip (SoC) devices. The first member of the ST200 family, the ST210, reportedly executes four instructions per clock cycle while maintaining the low power benefits of a 250-MHz clock frequency. The ST200 cores are primarily targeted at video/audio streaming applications such as MPEG-2, MPEG-4 and MP3 in digital consumer applications.

Customer samples of the ST210STB1 chip, evaluation platforms and development tools are scheduled to begin shipping later this month.