The latest celluar phone models, cellular phone digital TV terminal, and next-generation DVD were spotlighted at CEATEC JAPAN this year. As for net-enabled home appliances, DLNA attracted many people’s eyes.
DLNA (Digital Living Network Alliance) is an international industry consortium formerly called DHWG (Digital Home Working Group). The group attempts to ensure compatibility through common specification on the formats, technology and implementation about image, audio and video communication among AV equipments and PCs. Founding members are Fujitsu, IBM, HP, Intel, Kenwood, Lenovo, Microsoft, NEC, Nokia, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, STMicroelectronics, and Thomson, but it has grown to a large organization with more than 140 member companies.

This alliance showed interoperability among member company products based on Home Networked Device Interoperability Guideline v1.0 announced in June 2004 and plugtest event conducted in September (Photo 1). Participating companies included Atheros, AWIND, BridgeCo, DigiOn, Digital 5, Fujitsu, Hitachi, Intel, Kenwood, Microsoft, Mitsubishi, NEC, Onkyo, Panasonic, Philips, Pioneer, RealTek, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Texas Instruments, Toshiba, Victor and ViXS. Digital 5, a U.S. network AV software vendor, brought in Netgear MP115, slated for sales in mid October, and connected it with products from other vendors (Photo 2). Sony connected a prototype of its HDD media player device with wireless LAN capability (Photo 3).

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DLNA adopted JPEG, LPCM and MPEG2 as the basic format of exchanged data, and uses UPnP for device discovery(Photo 4). Products supporting Guideline v1.0 will start to appear soon towards next year, and certification program will be starting in the middle of 2005. DigiOn, a network AV software vendor with supply contract with several Japanese AV equipment and PC vendors, said they will support the guideline “very soon”. But Guideline v1.0 doesn’ t offer copyright protection, nor does it support RTP. These issues are left for future activities of the alliance.

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Echonet Consortium is an industry group mainly by the Japanese home appliances vendors, conducting standardization and promotion on dedicated protocols called ECHONET mainly for use in white goods (refrigerators, air conditioners, etc). The consortium demoed common remote control of air conditioners with ECHONET support, by 7 Japanese home appliances manufacturers (Daikin, Mitsubishi, Sanyo, Sharp, Panasonic, Hitachi, and Toshiba) (Photo 5). Sharp, Panasonic, and Sanyo displayed supporting home gateways and controller devices.

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Sanyo Goes for Home Networking

Sanyo set up a dedicated display cubicle for home networking in its own booth. Various companies are coming up with network-attached camera with motion sensor, reflecting increasing home security needs. The company will start selling “Home View Camera IPC-H1W” in November (Photo 6). This product is priced at 65,100 yen (about 600 US dollars) with wireless LAN card. The camera shoots 5 still images on trigger by the motion sensor, and sends these images to a service server operated by Sanyo, while notifying users by e-mail. The user can check the images by accessing URL specified in the mail. The camera also has infrared remote control function, for controlling home air conditioners and lightings from outside.

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Sanyo has a home builder as a group company. The company attempts to offer an integrated system that integrates air conditioners, electric locks, audio players, luminescence sensors, gurglar alarms and other devices.

Sony showed its latest VAIO PC which can record 6 TV channels simultaneously, and still can store a full one week of recorded video data. The company also showed that video stored on VAIO can be viewed from other connected PCs and TVs (Photo 7). Sony also displayed a model of Air Board, which enables access to user’s home from outside for video viewing. The company demoed access to various places around the world (Photo 8).

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Panasonic displays included an integrated system for home devices control (Photo 9), as well as c.LINK, a home networking technology that takes advantage of existing coaxial cabling for TV antenna signal distribution(Photo 10). This is a prototype of a product based on the specification by MoCA (Multimedia over Coax Alliance), launched by Cisco Systems, Comcast, Radio Shack, Motorola, Toshiba and others. Panasonic will market this product after MoCA specification is finalized.

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Human touch for data communication

Although not exactly home appliances, NTT Microsystem Integration Laboratories demoed what it calls Fureai Tsushin, or Touch Communication, which uses human body for data communication path (Photo 11). The demo sent video streaming data to a electrode mat at the foot of a human body and displayed the video on the terminal held by this person. Data communication through human body is led by inductive load, and receiving terminal applies delicate filtering at optical electric field sensor. Maximum 10Mbps TCP/IP communication is possible, the lab says. Matsushita Eelectric Works displayed a similar system, calling it “Touch Communication System” (Photo 12).

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