Set against the backdrop of an increasingly crowded field of silicon tuner vendors, NXP’s introduction last week of the new TDA18272 worldwide silicon tuner manages to stake out some innovative, distinguishing turf, especially when it comes to designing multi-tuner devices such as dual-tuner DVRs and PIP-equipped TV sets.
This is NXP’s fourth-generation silicon tuner (they’ve already shipped over 400-million silicon tuners to date), and their experience shows, especially in the newly introduced master/slave feature that allows multiple tuner chips to run off the same crystal, saving space and BoM costs. The chip is intended for set top boxes, where silicon tuners are quite common, and for TV sets, where NXP estimates silicon tuner penetration is still at just a very small percentage, but they predict that will change as ultra-slim TVs demand smaller tuners, and as their fourth-gen silicon tuner performance finally matches traditional CAN tuners.
In a phone briefing with NXP, I learned of another reason, beyond performance concerns, why TV set manufacturers continue to use CAN tuners. Due to some peculiarities in European Union trade regulations, a straight monitor with no tuning is not subject to a 40% import tax that TV sets are subject to. So Asian manufacturers can ship the non-tuning “monitors” to Europe, and then once inside Europe, a tuner can be added in the form of a traditional CAN tuner, or a silicon tuner in a CAN package.
Although the TDA18272 is a highly integrated tuner SoC, NXP has chosen to leave the IF demodulation function off the chip, putting it instead on a companion daughter chip (the TDA8296). They say manufacturers prefer this, and some choose to add their own circuitry for demodulation.
The TDA18272 is designed for worldwide terrestrial and cable TV reception. The DVB-T2-enabled TDA18272 supports all analog and digital TV standards worldwide, NXP says, helping TV manufacturers get ready for the next- generation TV sets.
At about 750 to 900-mW, power consumption is low, NXP says, but not low enough for use in portable devices, where 250-mW is a more common power drain. (The difference is achieved with quality trade-offs that represent reasonable compromises in portable devices.)
Possessing a very small form factor, the TDA18272 comes in a 40 pin, 6mmx6mm package that facilitates the design of ultra-slim, flat TV panels. Featuring a high level of integration, the TDA18272 incorporates RF tracking filters, oscillators, IF selectivity and wide band gain control, eliminating the need for external components such as SAW filters or Baluns. With TDA18272, NXP introduces a unique Master/Slave architecture for optimizing the design of multi-tuner applications. The TDA18272 is manufactured under NXP’s zero defect program which they say enables manufacturers to simplify product assembly and supply-chain management.
“Production-proven silicon tuners such as the TDA18272 will swiftly replace CAN tuners, just as transistors replaced vacuum tubes during the 60s. TV broadcast tuners are evolving rapidly, replacing old radio RF analog circuits with silicon tuners. NXP’s silicon tuners speed up the design-in process, save production costs and improve performance. They also save space in multi-tuner systems and reduce energy requirements,” said Robert Murray, General Manager and Senior Director, Product Line TV Front End, NXP Semiconductors.
“Traditional STB and TV tuners have reached a stage of maturity in size and price, making further technological progress difficult. To overcome this, we are continuously looking at highly integrated solutions which meet attractive system cost. Silicon tuners which integrates the tuner function and channel filters are such building blocks. The NXP silicon tuner technology helps us to design products which meet current market requirements. Because of the high level of integration, they are also ideal for multi-tuner applications,” said Veit Armbruster, VP of development, NuTune, in NXP’s press release.
With the explosion of cable, satellite, terrestrial, and Internet content delivery technologies, TV and STBs have entered into a new digital era, says NXP. Tuners with highly integrated functions and small size are in great demand. With the TDA18272, NXP offers the TDA8296 IF demodulator as a companion chip for worldwide analog TV demodulation. The TDA8296 IF demodulator features integrated programmable group delay and video gain equalizers enabling system optimization in design. To reduce time to market, NXP also offers a complete family of reference design suites (boards, documentation and software package) for test and evaluation.
With its twenty years of heritage in TV reception technologies, NXP says they’re at the forefront of designing technologies which will enable TV manufacturers to switch to different tuner architectures to meet evolving consumer and technical demands. NXP has also introduced TDA18212 — a high performance silicon tuner for STB’s. The TDA18212 offers a unique Master/Slave architecture for dual tuner digital set-top boxes.
The key features of the TDA18272 are:
- Single 3.3 V supply voltage
- Small form factor 40-pin ROHs compliant ,HVQFN (6 x 6 mm)
- No need for external LNA and SAW filters
- Master and Slave versions simplifying multi-tuner applications
- Integrated RF tracking filters and fully integrated oscillators (no need for extra oscillators, IF selectivity, LNA, SAW filters)
- Fully integrated IF selectivity
- Low power consumption and RoHS green solution
- Integrated wideband gain control
- Best-in-class phase noise performance
- Crystal oscillator output buffer (16 MHz) for single crystal applications
- I²C-bus interface (3.3 V / 5 V )
- Easy programming and alignment free
- Low IF output ranges from 3 to 5 MHz
Standards supported
Analog - PAL, SECAM, NTSC
Digital- DVB-T/C, DVB-T2, ATSC, ISDB-T, DMB-T
Target specification
- CENELEC EN55020 (EU)
- NorDig 2.0 (EU)
- DTG 6.0 (EU)
- ATSC A74 (US)
- NorDig cable (EU)
- C-BOOK conformance (Cable, EU)
- E-BOOK and D-BOOK
- ARIB STD-B21
- OCUR (US)
The TDA18272 is available immediately and is priced at USD 1.5 per unit.
For more information, see the data sheet on NXP’s web site.
