30-07-2012, 10:28 AM
DLNA TECHNOLOGY
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Two obstacles help explain why so few consumer electronics (CE) devices are networked. First, home networks are less widely deployed than one might imagine. Second, standards to allow disparate CE devices such as TV sets and stereos to communicate have been slow to arrive.
The Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) is changing that game. Founded in 2003 by Sony and Intel and originally called the Digital Home Working Group, DNLA aims to promote wired and wireless interoperable networking of PCs, CE and mobile devices.
Some 220 member companies support the Alliance, including the top 10 CE manufacturers and the top five chip manufacturers. Twenty-five companies serve as "promoter members," including Comcast, whose New Media Development Group joined in March 2007. Time Warner Cable is listed as a member company.
The Alliance has matured to the point where several CE devices in 2006 were certified with DLNA logos, meaning these products will work with other DLNA-certified products of other manufacturers. The Alliance also has four test labs, located in the United States, Japan, Belgium and Taiwan, and seems to have geared up for an onslaught of new devices seeking the certification.
What is DLNA?
As a CE communications standard, DLNA represents the content negotiation and sharing portion of a much broader Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) standard that deals with the lower level intercommunications between disparate networked devices.
A DLNA device works like any other network device by discovering other DLNA-enabled hosts, but then goes on to learn their capabilities and exposes these features on the device's control display. Through DLNA, a media server can be located and then summoned to play or display a stored family photo, movie, music file, etc. That is the extent of the v1.0 DLNA specification.
Think of a DLNA server as a multi-room digital video recorder (DVR) on steroids. Moreover, it's one that a subscriber can buy in interchangeable devices from a host of vendors. In fact, DLNA's second specification (v1.5), released in late 2005, defines 10 new device classes.
In the future, as DLNA's technical capability and vocabulary expand, the spec will add digital media printing and the ability to push images to a network attached storage (NAS) device, manage media with a mobile device, and leverage quality of service (QoS) between devices. Already, however, a consumer who purchases, say, a DLNA-certified Blu-ray Disc (BD) player and exposes it to a home media server can easily switch between a high definition (HD) movie and some other media accessible over a home network.
So what?
For decades, CE devices haven't worked together, so why should that change now? For one, it's already changing. Consider the high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI). (See the May 2007 issue of Communications Technology for more on HDMI.) Before HDMI, each manufacturer developed its own proprietary cables and signaling (e.g., Panasonic's HDAVI and Pioneer's SR) that none could ever agree upon.
With DLNA, the CE industry is working together again, using standard networking (Ethernet) and requiring interoperability testing to use the DLNA logo. Using Ethernet allows CE manufacturers to build upon existing standards, silicon and know-how to enable rapid development
DLNA's vocabulary and installed base should expand dramatically in the coming years because of the rising interest in networking CE devices in the home, especially because DLNA is a desirable feature of any new CE device that hosts either an Ethernet jack or has built-in Wi-Fi.That makes it something that cable operators - and broadband service providers of all stripes - will put on their near-term radar.
[attachment=29452]
Two obstacles help explain why so few consumer electronics (CE) devices are networked. First, home networks are less widely deployed than one might imagine. Second, standards to allow disparate CE devices such as TV sets and stereos to communicate have been slow to arrive.
The Digital Living Network Alliance (DLNA) is changing that game. Founded in 2003 by Sony and Intel and originally called the Digital Home Working Group, DNLA aims to promote wired and wireless interoperable networking of PCs, CE and mobile devices.
Some 220 member companies support the Alliance, including the top 10 CE manufacturers and the top five chip manufacturers. Twenty-five companies serve as "promoter members," including Comcast, whose New Media Development Group joined in March 2007. Time Warner Cable is listed as a member company.
The Alliance has matured to the point where several CE devices in 2006 were certified with DLNA logos, meaning these products will work with other DLNA-certified products of other manufacturers. The Alliance also has four test labs, located in the United States, Japan, Belgium and Taiwan, and seems to have geared up for an onslaught of new devices seeking the certification.
What is DLNA?
As a CE communications standard, DLNA represents the content negotiation and sharing portion of a much broader Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) standard that deals with the lower level intercommunications between disparate networked devices.
A DLNA device works like any other network device by discovering other DLNA-enabled hosts, but then goes on to learn their capabilities and exposes these features on the device's control display. Through DLNA, a media server can be located and then summoned to play or display a stored family photo, movie, music file, etc. That is the extent of the v1.0 DLNA specification.
Think of a DLNA server as a multi-room digital video recorder (DVR) on steroids. Moreover, it's one that a subscriber can buy in interchangeable devices from a host of vendors. In fact, DLNA's second specification (v1.5), released in late 2005, defines 10 new device classes.
In the future, as DLNA's technical capability and vocabulary expand, the spec will add digital media printing and the ability to push images to a network attached storage (NAS) device, manage media with a mobile device, and leverage quality of service (QoS) between devices. Already, however, a consumer who purchases, say, a DLNA-certified Blu-ray Disc (BD) player and exposes it to a home media server can easily switch between a high definition (HD) movie and some other media accessible over a home network.
So what?
For decades, CE devices haven't worked together, so why should that change now? For one, it's already changing. Consider the high-definition multimedia interface (HDMI). (See the May 2007 issue of Communications Technology for more on HDMI.) Before HDMI, each manufacturer developed its own proprietary cables and signaling (e.g., Panasonic's HDAVI and Pioneer's SR) that none could ever agree upon.
With DLNA, the CE industry is working together again, using standard networking (Ethernet) and requiring interoperability testing to use the DLNA logo. Using Ethernet allows CE manufacturers to build upon existing standards, silicon and know-how to enable rapid development
DLNA's vocabulary and installed base should expand dramatically in the coming years because of the rising interest in networking CE devices in the home, especially because DLNA is a desirable feature of any new CE device that hosts either an Ethernet jack or has built-in Wi-Fi.That makes it something that cable operators - and broadband service providers of all stripes - will put on their near-term radar.