Plenty of modern cell phones have HD-quality screens on them, but few can manage any sort of high-definition video content at a respectable frame rate. That's set to change with the release of the Renesas SH7370, a chip we first
got wind of back in December with its promise to offer 1080p video at 30fps in a package small (and efficient) enough to be included in a handset. The first units are now shipping to manufacturers, and while the size has increased (it's about 1cm square vs. the 6.4 x 6.5mm package previously discussed) it's still impressively small given its functionality: 1080p H.264 video decoding
and encoding along with on-chip Dolby Digital 5.1-channel output. Overkill? Maybe for now, but you might change your mind when the first head-mountable satellite speakers with subwoofer seat cushions hit retail.
posted May 5th 2009 6:59AM
what small device does a HD playback? Or am I thinking of a different scale altogether? Cellphones?
Coming soon to a cellphone? How about on laptops first? My nVidia 8400M can't even handle full-screen youtube, let alone 1080p... hear that nVidia?!
Many Youtube videos are flash based, not h.264, so a better GPU won't help - it's CPU decoding only. Have a look at the Acer AspireRevo. It has an nVidia ION 9400M which supports 1080p playback, but still has difficulty with YouTube because of its feeble Atom processor. http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/28/acer-aspirerevo-review/
The card is most likely perfectly capable, but Dell (and other OEMs I imagine) underclock them for 2D stuff to improve battery life...
Youtube videos are decoded by the CPU, so it isn't your GPU's fault. You need around a 2.0 core 2 duo to get playback in full screen mode.
hopefully more companies start flocking to silverlight 3 when it comes out(full GPU support) to finally force adobe to implement a halfway decent graphic acceleration API.
ALL Geforce 8xxx series cards have H264 HD/VC1 decode functionality.. Your problem is flash video -- despite now supporting H264 --- doesnt' offload video processing...
@NOB: I wonder, why is YouTube (flash video) so CPU-intensive in fullscreen mode relative to normal playback? Couldn't they just decode at 1:1 size and then use standard graphics acceleration to scale it? I mean, maybe they get better quality by doing it the current way, but for a slower CPU, it should be able to just do basic scaling like that...
Sounds like something Adobe ought to fix, rather than processor manufacturers.
Like Cunthor I think this is a bit premature. And who watches 1080p movies on their cell phone? iPhone, maybe but even that's a bit ridiculous. I'd love to see more cheap laptops/notebooks be able to play 1080p so I'm with Cunthor on this one.
Seriously, no cell phone has HD quality screens. The best is 800 by 480. We are no where close to HD quality.
Yep.
But if you put HDMI-out, you can connect the cell phone to the TV and use it instead of a HD player. No need to copy movies no more, no need for TVs with latest codec support either!
Yeah because people want to be stuck with their cell phone connected to a TV to watch HD content, that's convenient....
The new Sidekick LX has a 852 x 480 screen. Is that currently the highest resolution on a cell phone screen?
But yeah, it seems like we should first be making even higher resolution screens before we make them capable of watching 1080p video.
The prospect of an LTE phone with this chip, a fast cpu, LiPo battery, ANDROID and a OLED 1080p multitouch screen just blows my mind...
Name a cell phone that has even CLOSE to a HD screen...720p is 921,600 px, and most pixels on a mobile phone display is 384,000 (800*480)... Still got a LOOOOONG way to go.
This is for Japanese mobile phone.
For ex, this Japanese mobile phone(F-03A) display has 960*480.
http://www.fmworld.net/product/phone/f-03a/color.html?fmwfrom=f-03a_index
http://www.nttdocomo.co.jp/english/product/foma/prime/f03a/spec.html
Next summer and winter models will have more pixels than it.
What cell phone has HD quality? Last I heard, the minimum resolution to be considered HD was 720p. What phone has a resolution of x720 or higher?
Last time I checked, 240 x 320 wasn't HD. Unless there are some mobiles out there packing cathode ray tubes, I'm fairly certain that there aren't plenty out there...
Holy Crap your avatar is actually your name. I just checked it with my phone.
whoa, i dint beleive you, so i checked myself, did you do that yourself or a program or something?
http://mobilecodes.nokia.com/
'cept my Engadget account is screwed up. My avatar won't stick no matter how many times I've uploaded it, and it keeps sending me commentt validation emails >_
awesome
Such an awesomely useless feature!
That would probably combine neatly with a built-in Pico projector
Standard projectors don't do HD. Those that are HD capable cost in the thousands, so 1080p wouldn't be that helpful. In 5-10 years' time, maybe.
I agree, projectors could benefit from this. Best buy sells $600 projects that do 720p, thats HD. 5-10 years from now 1080p will be more like a standard. The 1080p projectors are $1k+ but imagine the boost in resolution in portable projectors and that type of market.
Phones are starting to ship with HDMI out .. so thats probably the first use ..
exactly, i'd love to be able to use my phone as a mobile movie library, having loads of 720p/1080p rips on my phone would be great if i could plug it into a mates setup and output 1080p 5.1ch surround
Wow. With the battery performance my cell phone typically gets, I imagine I could watch a 1 minute HD video before either my cell phone's battery dies or it catches fire.
well the post says the renesas' 1080p chip is small and "efficient", whatever that means. but assuming it is relatively efficient, you should be able to watch the same amount of video you watch now on an iphone or comparable device (4-5 hours) but it'll be in HD.
I could really use 1080i playback off my cellphone.
My computer is 30ft and three rooms away from my HDTV. If I could put TV shows on my microSD card and play them back over a mini-HDMI out on the phone, someone would make a lot of money off me.
Let's hope that either SDHC expands beyond the pretend 32GB limit or SDXC gets on the bandwagon soon. Even IF a phone had 720i and used H264, the files would be massive for the relatively small storage capabilities of the best of phones. Storage capacity would have to grow significantly to handle the "30fps" that this chip boasts.
Next up, much bigger SDHC or any kind of storage for 1080p.
but cell phone are small....
Combine this with wireless HDMI, then you can beam HD + 5.1 wireless to any tv (that would support it). WIth a few hundred GB's of storage, you can carry (most of) your entire movie (porn) library in your pocket and watch it anywhere.
Seems reasonable within 5 years I think...
I think this would work better in a video game system then a cellphone
...of course the creative zii chip can do all this and more...
...but it gets bashed by engadget...
It'll take two years until actual handsets have this chip
You better have unlimited cheap download on your phone or one movie will kick you off the net for a year.
"Plenty of modern cell phones have HD-quality screens on them"
==> What is this guy smoking? There are exactly ZERO phones I've ever heard of that have 1280x720+ resolution displays?