Quicklogic, the antifuse programmable logic company, has turned to making ASSPs and has produced a range of ICs which interface Qualcomm chip-sets to smartphones, MIDs, netbooks and laptops.
Called the ArcticLink II VX4 family of platforms, they have: a hardwired version of VEE 2.0 PSB; a MDDI Type 2 client with PHY PSB, backwards compatible with MDDI Type 1; an embedded CellularRAM framebuffer PSB, supporting up to Wide SVGA (1024x600) resolution at 24-bit colour depth; a low-power programmable fabric for implementing customer-specific features and use cases such as controlling sensors, haptic devices, touchscreen and LCD backlight control keyboard control, touchpad or mouse control, as well as enabling dual display functionality
The idea of ArcticLink II VX4 is to provide programmable platforms for a range of end-products that are not yet precisely defined.
VEE aims to improve the visual experience by adaptively processing each video frame on a pixel-by-pixel basis. VEE also adapts to the effects of ambient lighting, which saves power compared to simply boosting display backlight intensity levels for daylight viewing.
Having an embedded CellularRAM framebuffer is said to increase handset battery life and reduce the BOM by enabling the mobile processor to transmit display information into the framebuffer quickly, and then go to sleep while the display controller autonomously refreshes the display.
Furthermore, the embedded CellularRAM framebuffer enables OEMs and ODMs to use lower cost RGB displays without framebuffers, therefore lowering the system BOM cost.
The ArcticLink II VX family and customer specific ICs based on them will begin sampling in August 2009, with general samples in September 2009, and production in December 2009.
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