In-Stat/MDR has released a report, Digital TV Coming Home on PC-TV Tuners and digital Terrestrial Set Top Boxes, that projects the overall worldwide value of PC-TV and terrestrial DTV set-top boxes will grow to move than US$3.8 billion in 2008.
The report says the convergence of PCs with TVs is now taking shape. Gerry Kaufhold, a Principal Analyst with In-Stat/MDR explained, "PC-TV Tuners and digital terrestrial set top boxes open up new options for consumers. The new e-Field antenna, by Dotcast, provides a major breakthrough, because it greatly improves how well consumers can tune in local analog and digital broadcast signals, making TV services more reliable and driving new markets. In the next step for this market, E-PCs will define a class of PCs that include a PC-TV tuner and a hard disk drive, and then evolve to include multiple PC-TV tuners, different types of tuners (analog, digital, cable TV, satellite), massive disk storage, DVD recording capabilities, High Definition (HDTV) video and surround sound audio outputs, HD-DVD recording capabilities, in-home network capabilities, and broadband external network capabilities. The sky truly will be the limit."
The report said that terrestrial DTV set-top boxes will consume US$1.6 billion worth of semiconductors and other components during 2008. It also said today's PC-TV tuner market, which is based on add-in cards, will evolve to include tuners included on computer motherboards. According to the report, Intel, Microsoft, HP, Toshiba, NEC, Sony, Dell, Gateway, Shuttle, MSI, and other PC manufacturers "will push multiple PC-TV tuners for both analog TV and digital TV reception onto motherboards of E-PCs, and also on to portable notebook PCs."
This information was obtained from the July 1 In-Stat/MDR press release, In-Stat/MDR Sees the Convergence of PCs with TVs in PC-Tuners, Set Top Boxes.
