Vweb Brings DVD-Quality Personal Video Recording to PC Market

Nov. 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Vweb, a leader in MPEG compression and broadband video networking technologies, today announced general availability of its USB MPEG-2 A/V Capture and Compress reference kit. The kit functions as a low-cost, DVD-quality personal video recorder (PVR) by leveraging the hard drive already embedded in a PC. By creating a market-ready reference kit, Vweb significantly reduces the time-to-market for PC and consumer electronics OEMs to deliver low-cost, high-quality USB capture and compress devices. The USB MPEG-2 A/V Capture and Compress reference kit captures video and audio from a TV, VCR, camcorder, satellite receiver or cable receiver. In conjunction with streaming software or an email application, the compressed and encoded video can be distributed over a network as well as stored on a hard drive for future viewing. The reference kit is powered by Vweb's VW2000 MPEG-2 video encoder chip and Analog Devices, Inc.'s Digital Signal Processor (DSP). The VW2000 performs real-time MPEG-2 video encoding while Analog Devices, Inc.'s Melody(TM) MPEG encoder, powered by the ADSST-2189M DSP, performs MPEG audio encoding and program stream multiplexing.

"According to Cahners In-Stat Group, the market for personal video recorders will grow from 2.7 million units shipped in 2001 to 28 million units shipped by 2004. By enabling consumers to easily capture and compress DVD quality video and transmit it over the Internet, Vweb is uniquely positioned to fully leverage this opportunity," noted Dr. Sho Long Chen, President and CEO of Vweb. "We are proud to engineer a reference kit with Analog Devices, Inc. to implement our goal of empowering digital video over the web."

Prior to the USB MPEG-2 A/V Capture and Compress reference kit, video editing was primarily the domain of professionals. Expensive stand-alone equipment has traditionally been required for editing video clips and adding special effects. Now, by combining the USB MPEG-2 A/V Capture and Compress reference kit with the ubiquitous PC, consumers have a low-cost, high-quality video-editing alternative. Consumers can rapidly capture, compress, and edit wedding, vacation and holiday videos. The reference kit can readily convert these personal videos to DVD-quality, MPEG-2 video clips for either storage or distribution over a network. As a result, these personal videos can be easily shared with friends and family. Furthermore, the reference kit functions without affecting the simultaneous use of other PC applications such as word processing or Internet browsing.

"This new reference kit puts PVR and high-quality, video editing capabilities at a consumer-price level," said Mike Haidar, product line director, software & systems technology, DSP & system products division of Analog Devices, Inc. "This reference kit will certainly enable OEMs to make available a range of products to a large and diverse audience."

The USB MPEG-2 A/V Capture and Compress reference kit operates on Windows 98, ME, 2000, or XP. Vweb will sell the kit to PC OEMs, from whom consumers can buy it as an after-market device. Sample quantities of the USB MPEG-2 A/V Capture & Compress kit are available today and all of the components are currently in production. The reference kit is priced at $10,000 and the VW2000 is priced at $20 in quantities of 10K. Vweb will demonstrate this product at Comdex at the Las Vegas Convention Center in the Vweb booth #L3039, LVCC. For more information, please contact Vweb at http://www.vwebcorp.com/ .

About Vweb
Founded in January 1998 by Dr. Sho Long Chen, Vweb is focused on being the leading provider of solutions for the most efficient distribution of digital video and audio, using MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 compression, over wired and wireless networks. The Vweb solution enables video distribution through network routers and switches, video servers, set-top boxes, personal video recorders, digital camcorders, security cameras and Internet video creators.

Vweb Corporation is headquartered at 5300 Stevens Creek Boulevard; Suite 320, San Jose, CA 95129, E-Mail: info@vwebcorp.com and please visit our web site at www.vwebcorp.com for more information.

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SOURCE Vweb