Technologies for the Multimedia City

In this era of technological abundance everything is technically feasible, but the wide spread acceptance of the technologies for multimedia applications relies on the concurrent and coherent development of all the underlying technologies and the services, infrastructures. Personal Computers (PCs) have emerged as the multimedia engines of the 90's, closely followed by set-top boxes, game consoles, and personal digital assistants. This article provides a closer look at the media functions being integrated in to the PC platform and the role of semiconductor technologists towards meeting the demands of the PC industry. Low-power is, in general, emerging as an important requirement for almost all applications, but the major drivers are portables, and mobile communication equipments (PDAs). In the following, an attempt is made to sketch the importance and the need for co-development of the various expertise, rather than focusing on any specific technology or requirement.