PLANO, T.X.—Signaling the next cutting-edge advance in its silicon TV tuner technology, Microtune, Inc. introduced a new family of high-performance, ultra-low power, multi-band tuners targeted for mobile handhelds, including cell phones, PDAs and other multimedia convergence devices. The new MT2260, the first member of the new Mobile MicroTuner family, is currently sampling with major handset manufacturers. When integrated into portable handheld devices, the tuner permits users to watch multi-channel broadcast TV with full-motion digital pictures and CD-quality sound.

As a strategic advantage to manufacturers, the device is the first single-chip tuner that currently enables handheld devices to operate across the networks allocated for mobile broadcast TV services in Europe (UHF: 470-890 MHz) and in the U.S. (L-Band: 1670-1675 MHz). The MT2260 is the first single-chip DVB-H tuner, sampling today, to support the U.S. frequency range. Because the tuner integrates all active radio frequency (RF) components on-chip, including the external low noise amplifier and balun, manufacturers can develop handset designs for world markets without the added expense and duplication of effort needed to develop band-specific devices.

The tuner is also fully compliant with the Digital Video Broadcast-Handheld (DVB-H) standard, an industry specification that enables the simultaneous transmission of multiple television, radio and video channels to mobile handheld devices.

"In 1999, Microtune invented the single-chip TV tuner," said James Fontaine, CEO and President of Microtune. "We continue to pioneer tuner technology advances that make new digital TV markets, from car TV and HDTV to multi-tuner set-top boxes, a reality. As the market leader in broadband silicon tuner technology, mobile broadcast TV is a natural extension for us. We are leveraging seven generations of tuner innovation and our patented circuits and designs to be an RF leader in the DVB-H market."

"In developing our tuners for mobile devices, given their challenging performance and ultra-low power requirements, we draw on a wealth of RF silicon and systems expertise," said Albert Taddiken, Chief Operating Officer of Microtune. "The Mobile MicroTuner architecture benefits from our practical experience with the DVB-T standard and from our success in solving our customer's real-world RF problems."

The MT2260 is based on a new patent-pending multi-band architecture that is engineered to deliver robust performance in a very low-power mobile environment. Implemented in an advanced silicon-germanium process, the architecture features a shared mixer and filter structure and is single-ended, reducing components, cost and space. The tuner's high level of integration eliminates the need for an external low-noise amplifier and transformer balun, further reducing both component cost and the total power budget.

Measuring only 6 x 6-square millimeters, the MT2260 is offered in a 40-pin QFN package, supporting the significantly reduced footprint designs of leading mobile phone and handheld device manufacturers. It operates from a +2.7-VDC power supply and consumes as little as 20 mW in "viewing" mode, depending on the severity of the reception environment. It features 9-mW power-down and 250-uW sleep modes to further conserve battery power. This low power consumption enables mobile phone manufacturers to obtain up to 10 hours of TV viewing time on 2" or 4" displays using 800mAh or 1300mAh batteries, respectively, for their DVB-H handsets.

The tuner is engineered to deliver high sensitivity and low distortion for excellent performance and picture quality, even under the most difficult DVB-H reception conditions. An integrated pre-amp filter, unique to the Mobile MicroTuner architecture and based on Microtune's patent-pending ClearTune integrated filter technology, reduces interference from the mobile phone transmitter. The phone's own transmitter is potentially a major source of picture disruption.

The device supports international DVB-H networks, enabling manufacturers to build handsets for Europe, the U.S. or both markets using the same tuner and common software. The tuner operates in the 1670-1675 MHz band, the frequency range planned for a nationwide mobile broadcast TV service in the U.S. It also operates from 470-890 MHz to support the European UHF frequency range, the spectrum expected to be allocated for European mobile TV broadcast.

In addition, the tuner is designed to interface directly with leading DVB-H demodulators, providing handset manufacturers the design flexibility to choose the optimum tuner-demodulator combination for their needs.

Enter Microtune. This is a company that was founded on the technology for silicon TV tuners. They have been heavily involved with European manufacturers developing products for DVB-T, the European digital TV standard, and they are deep in the trenches with manufacturers working on TV systems for use in automobiles. These automotive systems face similar challenges to mobile handset TVs, including handling interference and receiving signals while in motion. But the mobile handset offered additional challenges, such as overcoming the interference of the nearby power amplifier, and not draining the handset battery.

DVB-H is a standard developed for mobile TV over broadcast; it is built on top of the DVB-T standard, and allows for high-quality full-motion TV on a smaller viewing screen. This approach to delivering TV to a mobile phone is gaining traction, with companies like Siemens, Nokia, and Samsung developing prototype phones and testing them in field trials. In the US, Crown Castle has acquired a license for L-band spectrum to support North American DVB-H services, and is currently offering field trials of its service.

For handset manufacturers, the bottom line is that the first broadcast DVB-H TV signals for handsets will either be in the 470-to-890MHz range in Europe or in the 1670-to-1675 MHz range in North America. This is a bit of a nuisance for system designers, who would need to build one system for Europe and another for North America. With clients on both continents, Microtune realized early on that "the first thing we needed to do was develop a dual-band tuner to enable design flexibility," explains Albert Taddiken, Chief Operating Officer at Microtune. "With a common design and a common set of software, manufacturers can simply use the appropriate input components for the band in which their product will be operating."

The design team recognized that the most efficient way to implement their new tuner was to use an integrated design, one that required no external low noise amplifier (LNA) or transformer balun. The result was the company's MT2260 multi-band silicon tuner that is compliant with the Mobile and Portable DVB-T/H Radio Access Interface Specification (MBRAI).

But what about the power? Recognizing the need for low power with power-down and sleep modes, the team took on the task of optimizing each block of the design for power consumption. The result is 20 to 40 mW typical consumption in viewing mode. "We have built in programmability that allows the device to be run at higher power consumption when signal reception environment is more severe," explains Taddiken. DVB-H transmits different channels in bursts, known as multiplex broadcasting using time slicing, so the device powers down to 9 mW in between bursts and slips to a few hundred μW in sleep mode when the TV functionality is not in use.

In terms of interference, you cannot use a fixed filter (like in cellular receivers) and expect to reject interferers across the TV band. The challenge was to design a tuner that could filter out interferers without blowing the power budget. In their case, the team at Microtune is using a specialized filter, and they have dubbed the approach "ClearTune" technology.

As the mobile TV market grows in Europe and North America, the focus of early generation handsets will be functionality, power, and cost. By hitting the MBRAI specs, the frequency bands for both markets, and addressing power issues, this new tuner from Microtune is definitely worth a close look.

The MT2260 is priced at $5.00 each in 10,000-piece quantities. It is sampling now.