SMSC unveils first USB 3.0 graphics technology

The company's ViewSpan USB 3.0 remote graphics technology is designed for multiple displays. USB 3.0 or 'SuperSpeed USB' offers a 10x data transfer speed increase and for the first time enables consumers to stream uncompressed high definition content to their display via the USB port. "As the personal computer evolves into more non-traditional form factors, the ecosystem of peripherals that surrounds it is evolving too," said Dan Luster, vice president of SMSC's Computing and Connectivity Products group. "USB 1.1 sparked a revolution in human interface devices 15 years ago and replaced serial and PS/2 ports for connecting keyboards and mice. USB 2.0 brought us a 480 Mbps data pipe to the pc and proliferated digital photography, consumer video and portable storage. The next evolution in USB technology, USB 3.0, is capable of transferring data at 5Gb/s and is expected to change how displays are connected to mobile and portable computers." ViewSpan consists of a discrete USB device controller and enabling software running on a USB host system. It will be offered as ViewSpan and ViewSpan 5G for USB 2.0 High Speed and USB 3.0 SuperSpeed applications respectively. Powered by content aware, bandwidth aware, and resolution optimised video processing algorithms, ViewSpan and ViewSpan 5G are designed to deliver high definition video, static images and text to large consumer and commercial displays up to 2048 x1152 resolution.