Aricent (News - Alert), a communications software company, has announced it has been successful in developing high-definition video and audio encoders and decoders (codecs) for OMAP3430 processor-based mobile phones manufactured by Texas Instruments (News - Alert).

 

Aricent will be demonstrating the high-definition software at the Mobile world Congress taking place in Barcelona, Spain. This software offers new applications for the mobile consumers, enabling them to use their mobile phones as a HD quality player with which high resolution HD content (720p) can be downloaded.

 

The content can be played back on a HDTV screen and users can use the mobile phone as a DVD-quality camcorder capable of recording at high-resolution of 720p.

 

Aricent said that the software enables decoding the 720p MPEG-4 Simple Profile video in real-time. Further Aricent offers DVD-quality record and playback for different mobile devices like mobile handsets, portable media players and automotive entertainment systems.

 

The multimedia codecs have been especially designed for TI’s OMAP3430 processor. This is a mobile platform which is capable of combining PC and consumer entertainment system for good performance and low power consumption.

 

The Aricent MPEG4-SP 720p video and AAC audio codecs make use of the OMAP3430 processor’s capabilities like the IVA 2.2 hardware accelerator and ARM (News - Alert) CortexTM-A8 superscaler microprocessor core. These enable the codecs to offer high-resolution encoding and decoding of video streams.

 

Aricent confirmed that the multimedia software on the OMAP3430 processor will be suitable for different mobile platforms like Linux, Symbian (News - Alert) and Windows Mobile.

 

Markus Tremmel, worldwide wireless ecosystem manager at Texas Instruments said, “The next generation of mobile phones will support multimedia features previously available only with high-end consumer electronics. Using the processing power of the OMAP3430 processor, for the first time companies like Aricent are delivering better-than DVD-quality record and playback capabilities for mobile handsets.”

 

Commenting on his company’s achievement, Sajal Gupta, head of products at Aricent said, “The Aricent high-definition codecs for the OMAP3430 processor will drive a completely new class of mobile multimedia experience. This software will allow consumers to record and play high-definition 720p video from their mobile phone, automotive entertainment system or personal media player.”

Shamila Janakiraman is a contributing editor for TMCnet. To see more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.