Scientists from the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and A*STAR’s Institute for Infocomm Research (I²R) have invented a novel chipset that can transfer data 1000 times faster than Bluetooth.
VIRTUS Microchip packaged with antenna
The new VIRTUS microchip has the capability to transfer 250 MB of data or 80 MP3 song files within a second between mobile devices, wirelessly. It transmits at the speed of 2 GB/s.
This speed will be equivalent to transferring a 8 GB DVD movie within 30 seconds, which will normally take around 8.5 h for transfer on Bluetooth. The new integrated 60 GHz chipset utilizes low-power consuming millimetre-wave (mm-wave) technology that allows it to transmit big packets of information. This will allow data transmission between platforms such as TVs and projectors, with smart phones and tablets.
The VIRTUS chipset is made up of a baseband processor, a full radio-frequency transceiver and an antenna. The transceiver and the antenna are connected which causes the signal to be filtered, amplified and sent to the baseband processor. Here the signal undergoes non-linear analog signal processing and digital parallel processing and decoding. This enables low power consumption.
The scientists have demonstrated the chip’s technology as a high-definition wireless video stream. The chipset has received 16 international patents. It has also won two best chip design awards, two best paper awards and has been featured in more than 51 international journal and conference papers.
The founding director of NTU’s VIRTUS IC Design Centre of Excellence, Prof Yeo, states that the mm-wave IC technology will find use in real-time interactive multi-user gaming, live high-definition video streaming, mobile-distributed computing, wireless display and other applications.