Past Meetings

October 2009
DIGDIA - Gary Sasaki - Digital 3D Entertainment
A look at the digital entertainment value chain as it adds 3D to enhance the experience, and in the process create some new business opportunities.  A report is available on this subject at digdia.com.  Contact DIGDIA for a discount code.

September 2009
Palm - Mitch Allen - Introduction to Palm webOS
Copy of Presentation (large file)
Palm's Pre has been a market success.  Find out about the operating system behind this smartphone from the Software CTO of Palm.

August 2009
Marvell - Dr. Simon Milner - SheevaPlug and Plug Computing Initiative
Tiny Wall Plug Computer - SheevaPlug, along with its Plug Computing initiative. Targeted toward developers and small businesses, the new plug computer is small and powerful – it’s the size of a normal plug and even connects via an electrical wall socket. 

July 2009
Panasonic - Jean-Claude Junqua - User Centered Innovation for Tomorrow User Interfaces.
Highlight is a new remote control recently developed which has the potential  to disrupt the CE industry by providing a solution to the issue of overly complicated remote controllers with too many buttons.

June 2009
Tom Coughlin - Storing Your Life - Consumer Digital Storage - Personal, Shared, Hierarchical and Virtual. 
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Presentation discusses the drivers for consumer digital storage, the different mobile and static usage models for digital storage in consumer devices and the resulting consumer storage hierarchy.

May 2009
Opto - Calculators to Street Lights - Future of LEDs
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LED lighting is starting to show up everywhere, but making these lights is more than simply putting a bunch of LEDs and resistors in a light bulb package.  LEDs have their own limits and needs.  If done right, they can be used in most unusual places and same energy.

April 2009
Livescribe - Never miss a word
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A pen that records sound while you take notes so you can easily go back and hear exactly what was said by just pointing to your notes.  But, it is much more than this, with applications that range from a calculator to a translator.

March 2009
Eye-Fi - WiFi SD Card for your camera
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Imaging taking a picture with your camera and it is instantly seen by your friends and family without you doing anything.  Not only that, the photo tells you where it was taken.

February 2009
nVidia - The 2nd Computer Revolution (Phones)
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Michael Rayfield, Gneneral Manager of nVidia's Mobile Business Unit talks about how phones are the new computer platform and what this means to graphics technology.

January 2009
CES Download
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Our annual presentation of things we saw at CES, this year by Gary Sasaki (DIGDIA), Chris Pedersen (nVidia), Tom Coughlin (Coughlin Assoc.).

December 2008
Gigle – HomeGrid G.hn
Hendrik van der Meer of Gigle Semiconductor discussed the home networking industry and a solution which provides a network for HD video content.  The presenter also discussed the ITU and its G.Hn group is one standards organization that is leading the way in developing the a specification that would unify a fragmented industry.

October 2008
SOC's for Consumer Electronics
This meeting was a presentation by Wilfred Martis of Intel on their push into consumer electronics with a number of initiatives and products, including a System on Chip series aimed at cost and power effective embedded applications.

September 2008
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The Digital Home
This meeting was a discussion of “The Digital Home”, followed by a tour of Hewlett Packard’s demonstration home in their Cupertino campus  The speaker was Gordon van Zuiden, President of cyberManor, a company that designs and installs electronic systems for homes throughout the valley.

August 2008
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State of Ultra Wide Band
Serdar Yudakul of Wisair described how the UWB technology and the standard evolved since the FCC ruling that permitted this technology. Key technical aspects of the standard were covered along with state of the UWB industry, current and future applications and worldwide regulatory status.

July 2008
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Tivo - Proliferation of Broadband to the TV
The proliferation of broadband services direct to the TV screen has begun. A presentation was given on some of the recent product activity in this space and some of the technical hurdles that need to be overcome to make it a success.

June 2008
Use of Serial Flash in Consumer Electronics - Macronix
Michael Wang from Macronix and IEEE committee member gave a presentation that covered next generation Multi-I/O Serial Flash which not only provides the cost advantage of Serial Peripheral Interface, but it also provides outstanding access time, which enables system designers to consider Serial Flash for speed critical applications.

May 2008
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Java Technology: The Future of Digital Television
Bill Shepard of Sun Microsystems discussed how Java technology has emerged as the common platform for developing digital television applications and services for broadcast, cable, satellite, IPTV, and Blu-ray Disc. The talk included an overview of digital television standards and specifications, current and projected market deployment, and approaches used for authoring DTV content.

April 2008
H.264 Video Encoding Quality Optimizations
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Guy Cote of Mobilygen presented a systematic approach to optimize video encoding parameters for best video quality. The determination of optimal video encoding parameters is formulated as an optimization problem of maximizing the expected video encoding quality under a set of constraints that may include a video quality measure, a target bit-rate, computation, memory bandwidth, etc. We illustrated the approach to determine parameters to enable optimal MB level quantization parameter adaptation, as well as the optimization of quantization scaling matrices, in an AVC / H.264 encoder.

March 2008
Cyber Security
This meeting was a presentation from Ted Witham of GarrettCom and Joe Weiss, Applied Control Solutions regarding security challenges in the public utility networks.

Feb 2008
Notebook Display Trends
DisplaySearch presented their market research on trends in flat panel displays for the notebook and PC markets.  Please contact DisplaySearch directly for a copy of this presentation.

Jan 2008
CES Download
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This meeting was a presentation on observations from the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month in Las Vegas.

2007 Events

December 2007
"TV 2.0" - Digital TV in the Networked Home
Speaker was Paolo Siccardo, President of Digital Keystone

October 2007
Human in-the-Loop Simulation
Simulation permits researchers to test concepts without having to use the actual system being examined. Such simulations can involve proposed new vehicle controls, improved operating procedures, novel vehicle design concepts, pilot training, or any number of other scenarios. Additionally, simulation allows for investigation of emergency situations without any real risk to hardware or human life. To ensure the best-quality research data possible, NASA Ames’ Simulation Laboratories provide high-fidelity, human-in-the-loop customizable systems and powerful tools, offering scientists and engineers a path to generate quick and cost-effective solutions in both aerospace vehicle design and mission operations. The laboratories, systems, and supporting software that comprise the human-in-the-loop simulation facilities will be discussed.

September 2007
Completely Unsupervised Face Recognition Database
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This meeting was a presentation on a face recognition system that requires no interaction at all. The system detects persons, defines whether the persons are known already or not, and either updates the existing database of known persons, or establishes a new database if a new person is detected.

August 2007
Wireless HD
Copy of the presentation,  Copy of the spec summary
This was a presentation from the Wireless HD consortium on the 60GHz wireless high definition standard for connection of video devices to display devices.

July  2007
DisplaySearch
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This was a presentation from the company DisplaySearch which tracks consumer electronic display technology.  The presentation cover market data and forecasts for flat screen televisions.

June  2007
Validity Sensors
This was a presentation on new finger print technology that is being used for consumer electronic products.

May  2007
Novalux
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This was a presentation on Novalux's semiconductor laser technology which will radically change digital projection TV.

April  2007
DLNA
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This presentation reviewed Digital Home Standards (in particular DLNA), choosing and implementing the Right Ones

March  2007
Protecting Your Intellectual Property
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This presentation reviewed the responsible legal steps necessary to protect your intellectual property, the patent process and the difference between patents, trade marks and trade secrets.

Feb 2007
Free to Innovate - Liberating Electronic Product Development
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This presentation discussed some of the limitations inherent to today’s board-level system design process and introduced a new way of approaching electronic product development that readily accommodates change and eliminates the barriers to innovation.

Jan 2007
CES Download
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This meeting was a presentation on observations from the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month in Las Vegas.

2006 Events

Dec 2006
HP Tech Demo and Macrovision Presentation
HP had a technology demonstration and talked about; PC-to-TV connectivity over IP; NAS-to-TV connectivity over IP, High-definition video streaming over wireless, Internet-to-TV connectivity (Snapfish, Live365, Rhapsody, etc.).  Macrovision presented their technologies for consumer electronics and digital entertainment.

Oct 2006
Introduction to HANA
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Jack Chaney, Director of Digital Media Solutions Lab, Samsung America

Sept 2006
Advanced Digital Cable Architectures and Technologies
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Greg Thompson, Chief Video Architect, Cisco Systems
Hear about DCAS, NGNA, DSG, Digital Simulcast, Channel Bonding, Edge QAMs and a host of topics that the cable industry is working on right now and in the future to bring better services and be more competitive.

July 2006
Anywhere, Anytime High-Speed Multimedia Home Network
David Hunter and Chenyi Chiu, Panasonic R&D of America
Power line communication (PLC) is a technology which uses power line for data transmission. HD-PLC is one of the best PLC technologies enhancing performance, speed and stable transmission.
You can create a home network for internet, high definition video and audio, camera monitor, and more without extra wiring.

June 2006
ATSC 8VSB Over-the-Air HDTV
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Roy Trumbull - Chairman San Francisco SMPTE
All analog TV broadcasting ends after February 17, 2009. Digital Television is already broadcast in most major cities.  This talk will describe the technology behind DTV, with a little local flavor.

May 2006
Flash Memory
Eli Harary, President and CEO SanDisk Corporation
This presentation will cover Flash storage as seen through a history of SanDisk. We will cover the current market drivers for Flash demand, in particular in audio players and handsets.  We will discuss the competitive landscape from the semiconductor side as well as the perspective of consumer electronics.  SanDisk’s NAND Flash technology roadmap will be contrasted with future potentially disruptive technologies such as 3D semiconductor memory. We will briefly touch on the future outlook for HDD versus Flash as both reach scaling limits in the coming decade.

March 2006
Night of the Robots
Photos from the meeting
HomeBrew Robotics Club
While robots have long been used for industrial applications and have recently begun coming into homes as toys and small single function devices doing such diverse household tasks as vacuuming and mopping floors  there has long been a community of dedicated hobbyists building robotic  devices and extending our knowledge of how to create and control autonomous machines.  The Bay Area is the home of a dedicated group of robotic hobbyists, the HomeBrew Robotics Club (HBRC).  Come see, hear and touch the creations and inventions of a select group of these local robot hobbyists as they describe the various engineering principles and control issues in creating autonomous robotic mechanisms.  Consumer robots like these will revolutionize our lives and serve and entertain us in the near future.

February 2006
High-Definition Multi-Room DVR's and HDD's
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Jorge Campello and Donald Molaro, Hitachi GST
The ability to store and retrieve large amounts of data quickly is becoming a key feature of new consumer electronic designs. Virtually every device category from music players to multi-room digital video recorders relies on storage in some form.  In this talk we give a brief overview of how HDDs work focusing on the aspects that impact performance and quality of service for streaming applications. We will also describe the main challenges of integrating HDD's into high-performance consumer electronics devices such as High-Definition Multi-Room DVR's.

January 2006
Report from CES2006
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Bill Orner, Tom Coughlin Officers of the IEEE SCV-CE
The Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is largest technology trade show in the world!  More than 150,000 people each year attend this show.  Historically CES has been a window in advanced technologies for the coming years.  This meeting will be a presentation on observations from the show.

2005 Events

October 2005
Advanced Video Codec's - Profiles & Systems
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Ali Tabatabai, Manager, Sony Advanced Technology Center of America
AVC, also known as MPEG-4 Part 10 or H.264, is the latest in the family of video compression standards which has been developed as a result of joint effort between ITU-T’s VCEG  (Video Coding Experts Group) and ISO/IEC MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) called Joint Video Team (JVT). The first version of  this state of the art video compression technology was completed in May of 2003, and has acheived a significant improvement in compression effciency when compared with any other existing video coding standards such  as MPEG-2, H.263 and MPEG-4 Part 2. AVC is capable of supporting a wide variety of applications (e.g., video conferencing, broadcast and professional applications)  and is designed with a network-friendly video representation, in mind.

September 2005
Video Compression: Principles, Practice and Standards
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John Apostolopoulos, Principal Research Scientist, HP Labs
This talk will provide an overview of image and video coding, discussing both 
the basic principles of how compression is achieved as well as how these 
principles are applied in practice. We will also highlight the current and 
emerging image and video coding standards, including the recent H.264 / MPEG-4 
Advanced Video Coding (AVC) standard. By the end of this informal talk, the 
audience will know the basics of the JPEG and MPEG family of compression 
standards, as well as how these standards are used in applications such as 
Digital TV, DVDs, and video streaming over the Internet. This talk is designed 
for an audience with EE or CS background, but without requiring any prior 
compression expertise.

August 2005
Digital Living: Transition Themes
Gary Sasaki , President , Digdia.com
The Digital Consumer Electronics industry has hit an inflection point – it is entering a new phase.  
This presentation explains the phases a market such as “Digital Living” goes through, and highlights 
six of the industry’s transitions.

July 2005
Home Infotainmnet Networking
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Mike Stauffer, Director of Business Development, Atheros
This presentation will describe how home networks are evolving from simply sharing Internet access and printers into comprehensive home infotainment networks that enable consumers to consume Any Content Anytime and Anywhere, with No New Wires. After introducing the overall concept of home infotainment networking and several possible networking solutions, the presentation will focus on wireless networking solutions, primarily 802.11 solutions. The discussion will describe key requirements for home infotainment networking and how the various 802.11 technologies meet these requirements. Emerging technologies such 802.11n will be included.

June 2005
CE-ATA Interface for Small Form Factor Drives
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Gianfranco Scherini, Marketing Manager, STMicroelectronics
I'll be talking about the advantage of the CE-ATA interface for Small Form Factor drives.  In particular I will tackle cost, performance, power dissipation and  flexibility in handheld application - MP3, JPEG and video application.
Consumer Electronics Disk Drive Innovation
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John Osterhout, Director of Worldwide Retail Business, Hitachi Global Storage Technologies
Disk drive manufactures must innovate to meet new consumer electronics demands, such as: security, cost, reliability, performance, interface, power, acoustics, shock, capacity and portability.  Mr. Osterhout will focus his discussion on HDD interfaces, storage capacity and reliability.  He will also address the latest advancements in small-form-factor disk drives in furthering the exploding CE growth.

May 2005
The impact of content protection on the home media ecosystem
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Florian Pestoni, Program Manager, Strategic Relations and Policy group, Microsoft
The convergence of several key technologies is enabling users to experience digital media with flexibility that was inconceivable just a few years ago. However, content protection is frequently the gating factor for widespread adoption of new business models. In order for the home media ecosystem to grow beyond a niche market, several industries must agree on mechanisms for content protection interoperability. In this talk, I will discuss various models for interoperability and will touch upon some current developments in this area.
DRM: Roadblock to Enabler
Knox Carey, Director, Technology Initiatives, Intertrust Technologies Corporation
Digital Rights Management (DRM) technologies have historically focused on prevention of certain undesirable activities. In so doing, DRM technologies have created islands of technology that do not work together, prevent consumers from using content in intuitive ways, and generally increase the incentives for users to circumvent content protection. The media and technology industries are now beginning to recognize the central role of DRM technology as an enabler, making it easier for consumers to enjoy digital content in the medium, time, and place of their choosing. This approach respects the rights of consumers and content creators and opens the way for new business models appropriate for our increasingly interconnected society. In this talk, Dr. Carey discussed some of the recent developments in DRM and show how these new technologies can be used to create flexible, secure content distribution ecosystems suitable for a wide range of devices and systems, from mobile phones to set-top boxes to high-end servers. He will also touch upon the fundamental importance of interoperability in such systems and introduce some of the initiatives in which Intertrust is participating to foster the development of consumer-friendly, interoperable rights management.

April 2005
Display Technologies for HDTV
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Dr. Norman Bardsley, Director of Display Technology, DisplaySearch
Rapid evolution in display technology is being driven by the advent of HDTV, convergence of CE and IT capabilities, and consumer demand for more stylish large screen TVs.  The battle for HDTV is being fought between liquid crystal displays (LCDs), plasma display panels (PDP), microdisplay-based rear projection televisions (MD-RPTVs) and slim cathode ray tubes (CRTs). The technological status of each will be reviewed, with emphasis on the optical components rather than the drive electronics.  Opportunities for new materials and fabrication processes will be highlighted.  Speculative forecasts will be given on production costs and market shares for the competing technologies.
Recent Trends in Design of Multimedia SoCs
Dr. Santanu Dutta, Design Manager and Architect, Philips
The talk focuses on recent trends in designing large SoCs for multimedia applications. The talk has three parts. The first part addresses the digital revolution.  The second part talks about the market dynamics. The third part describes how the market dynamics drive the design trends. The design trends are classified into two categories: high-level abstractions and low-level design details. The talk concludes with a quick look at the Philips Nexperia digital video platform.
Digital Television Architecture and Front-end Considerations
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Brian D. Mathews, Marketing Manager for DTV Front-end Products, ATI Technologies
This presentation will open with a brief examination of the DTV industry, current status, and market trends.  The presentation will then provide an overview of the elements of a digital television block diagram from a high level.  The front-end elements of tuner, IF section, and demdodulator will be examined in more detail discussing functional aspects, critical performance parameters, and application considerations.  Finally some upcoming technology and market trends will be presented in the area of Digital Cable Ready (aka Plug and Play) applications.

March 2005
Video-on-Demand
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Home Networking of Digital Entertainment: Virtual Video on Demand
Anton Monk, Ph.D., VP Engineering, Co-Founder, Entropic Communications
Digital Video Recorders (DVRs) and Video on Demand (VoD) are two important technologies that allow consumers flexibility and enhanced choices on how to view their video and broadcast television content.  We will describe the differences in these two technologies, and why they are complementary.  We will also discuss the emerging need for Any Room Access to ALL your home entertainment content, and the need for Home Networking of Digital Entertainment to service this emerging need.  The "killer app" driving this consumer need is multi-room DVR capability.  We will also describe how an emerging trend of providing "rich media" content via virtual VoD over the Web will drive a need for high speed networking of entertainment from the PC or a Media Center PC to the various TVs in the house.  We will also describe how this home network for digital entertainment will coexist with WLAN and other networking technologies.
Steve Shannon
Founder and Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing, Akimbo
The convergence of Internet, Media, and Entertainment with telephony services is resulting in a "single pipe and multiple services" model, where voice, video, Internet and value-added services are delivered over a single broadband connection to a residential customer. This is creating new opportunities for content providers and video on demand services. Akimbo, a pioneer in Internet based Video on demand market, provides range of video programming services including CnnFn, A&E, National Geographic, History, and a wide variety of special interest programs. The presentation discusses the solution and emerging trends for VOD services over Internet. 

February 2005
AV Networking: DLNA and OSGi
Eugene Shteyn, Philips
DLNA – Digital Living Network Alliance – is an organization aimed at clarifying which AV Networking standards to use in the Digital Home.  Members come from the Consumer Electronics, Computer and Mobile industries.  The first specification was recently published, and they are now working on improvement.  The panel will describe what DLNA is and where it is going.
OSGi
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Damien Inglin, Product Manager for OSGi Products, Echelon
OSGi - Founded in March 1999, the OSGi Alliance specify, create, advance and promote wide industry adoption of an open service delivery and management platform.  The OSGi Alliance serves as the focal point for a collaborative ecosystem of service proficers, developers, manufacturers and consumers.  The panel will describe OSGi and discuss current activities.

January 2005
The Content of Storage
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Thomas M. Coughlin
The capture, editing, archiving, distribution and reception of digital entertainment content is a huge driver for the growth of digital storage.  Between 2004 and 2008 digital storage capacity for capture, editing, archiving, distribution of digital entertainment content is expected to grow by about 290 times!  Likewise the growth of digital consumer electronic “reception” devices utilizing significant digital storage for this digital content is expected to grow by at least 3 times over the same time period.  The various markets for creating, archiving, distributing and using digital content constitute a “digital content value chain.”  The figure illustrates how each part of this value chain helps drive growth in all other parts of this value chain.
Different storage devices work best for particular applications and environments.  This talk will discuss the digital storage device requirements for each of these markets including specifications and a storage hierarchy.  It will also give a projection for these products vs. time.  We will also discuss the developing understanding of reliability requirements of disk drives for consumer applications. Critical to the growth of consumer electronic storage is an understanding of how the pricing pressure in the consumer electronics market will drive the integration of disk drives and other storage devices and their host products.   Mobile storage with increasing small storage devices will eventually  lead to new interconnection technologies.  The organization and recovery of digital storage content and the requirements of networking this content in the home will be discussed.  Finally, the presentation will give projections for various form factor disk drives and other storage devices serving the digital content storage markets.

2004 Events

November 2004
Digital Living 2010
Gary Sasaki , President Digdia.com
Change is driving new opportunities in the "Digital Home" market.
"Digital Living 2010" gives a strategic overview of some of the forces
driving this change, where the market is now, where it is going, some 
of the roadblocks, and who is involved.

June 2004
First IEEE SCVCE Meeting
The first meeting of the Chapter was attended by over 40 people. The highlight of the meeting was a talk by Arup Gupta, CTO Consumer Electronics Group, Intel Corp titled Convergence of CE and Compute Industry: A Tsunami of Digital Revolution.