A Marriage of Computers and TV : Technology: Intel introduces components that will make it easier to bring video images to the computer screen.
Computer designers have long struggled to integrate video images with the words, numbers and primitive graphics that normally appear on a computer screen. Such a marriage of computers and television would open up broad new technological horizons for businessmen and consumers alike, revolutionizing everything from film editing to game playing.
And now, after several fitful moves toward the altar, it appears that the marriage made in technology heaven is ready to be consummated.
On Monday, Intel Corp. introduced a set of components that should make it far easier and cheaper to build a multimedia computer, and a number of other companies are pushing ahead with products that bring the computer world into the video age.
By next year, analysts and industry officials say, most major personal computer companies will have multimedia machines on the market. These computers will allow full-motion video, high-resolution still pictures and stereophonic sound to be manipulated and stored just like text, and they will cost only $1,000 to $2,000 more than traditional PCs.
Already it’s possible to give a personal computer or desktop workstation multimedia capabilities. C-Cube Microsystems, a start-up company in San Jose, markets an advanced video processing circuit board that’s used on Next Inc.’s computer, for example.
But the new Intel product, a pair of microprocessors that will be sold to computer vendors for integration into new products, should help bring multimedia into the mainstream. The chips are actually a further refinement of a technology that Intel purchased form General Electric in 1988 and had previously sold as a set of expensive circuit boards.
“Up to now, we’ve only had an add-on approach,” said Tim Bajarin, vice president of the research firm Creative Strategies. “Now we’re finally going to get (complete) hardware platforms for multimedia. I expect to see significant movement.”
The key to bringing video into the computer lies in image compression, where the enormous number of digital signals that a computer uses to represent a picture can be condensed. The only way a computer can manipulate and store an image is for all the information to be condensed by representing it in mathematical formulas.
A multimedia machine would include processors to carry out the compression and decompression calculations and control a high-resolution monitor, as well as a compact disk to store all the information. New types of high-capacity storage systems, such as the experimental holographic memory device under development at Bell Communications Research, could also play an important role in the future.
Although Intel has the support of International Business Machines for its technology, called digital video interactive (DVI), it doesn’t have the field to itself. A competing format, called compact disk interactive (CDI), is being pushed by N. V. Philips and Sony Corp., though CDI does not yet have full-motion video capabilities.
Apple Computer is also expected to introduce multimedia features for its Macintosh computer sometime within the next year, though the company is vague about exactly how it will do so.
For some types of video applications, moreover, it remains more effective to use laser disks that do not actually convert the image into the digital language of computers. The images cannot be manipulated as effectively, but the image quality is better.
“The problem with DVI is that the video quality is much worse than what you get from a laser disk,” said Peter Bloch, president of Interactive Arts, a Santa Monica-based firm that develops multimedia programs.
Bloch suggested that different technologies will win out for different applications. For consumer products such as games, for example, it might be CDI and laser disks. For many of the programs Interactive Arts develops, such as a system at the J. Paul Getty Museum that provides an interactive look at illuminated manuscripts, laser disks might remain the medium of choice.
For mainstream corporate applications, though, it appears that DVI has a significant leg up. Computer vendors are expected to begin selling DVI machines in quantity as early as the middle of next year, and that will stimulate software companies to write programs that will allow users to take advantage of the new capabilities. Intel expects retail stores to use multimedia to display and demonstrate products at electronic kiosks. Bank teller machines could include audio and video cues. Real estate agents will be able to preview entire neighborhoods for their clients.
The technology may also prove important in the film and video production world, where it could be used as a low-cost tape editing and special effects system. “The whole area of production and post-production has been moving towards the PC,” said Rockley Miller, chairman of the Interactive Multimedia Assn. in Washington.
He noted that the video quality of DVI was still not good enough for final editing, but it could be used to create the final editing plan, and insert effects and titles at far lower cost than many existing production systems.
