Classifications

• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H01—ELECTRIC ELEMENTS
  • H01Q—ANTENNAS, i.e. RADIO AERIALS
  • H01Q21/00—Antenna arrays or systems
  • H01Q21/30—Combinations of separate antenna units operating in different wavebands and connected to a common feeder system
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N21/00—Selective content distribution, e.g. interactive television or video on demand [VOD]
  • H04N21/40—Client devices specifically adapted for the reception of or interaction with content, e.g. set-top-box [STB]; Operations thereof
  • H04N21/41—Structure of client; Structure of client peripherals
  • H04N21/422—Input-only peripherals, i.e. input devices connected to specially adapted client devices, e.g. global positioning system [GPS]
  • H04N21/42204—User interfaces specially adapted for controlling a client device through a remote control device; Remote control devices therefor
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N21/00—Selective content distribution, e.g. interactive television or video on demand [VOD]
  • H04N21/40—Client devices specifically adapted for the reception of or interaction with content, e.g. set-top-box [STB]; Operations thereof
  • H04N21/43—Processing of content or additional data, e.g. demultiplexing additional data from a digital video stream; Elementary client operations, e.g. monitoring of home network or synchronising decoder's clock; Client middleware
  • H04N21/436—Interfacing a local distribution network, e.g. communicating with another STB or one or more peripheral devices inside the home
  • H04N21/43615—Interfacing a Home Network, e.g. for connecting the client to a plurality of peripherals
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N21/00—Selective content distribution, e.g. interactive television or video on demand [VOD]
  • H04N21/40—Client devices specifically adapted for the reception of or interaction with content, e.g. set-top-box [STB]; Operations thereof
  • H04N21/43—Processing of content or additional data, e.g. demultiplexing additional data from a digital video stream; Elementary client operations, e.g. monitoring of home network or synchronising decoder's clock; Client middleware
  • H04N21/436—Interfacing a local distribution network, e.g. communicating with another STB or one or more peripheral devices inside the home
  • H04N21/4363—Adapting the video stream to a specific local network, e.g. a Bluetooth® network
  • H04N21/43637—Adapting the video stream to a specific local network, e.g. a Bluetooth® network involving a wireless protocol, e.g. Bluetooth, RF or wireless LAN [IEEE 802.11]
• • H—ELECTRICITY
  • H04—ELECTRIC COMMUNICATION TECHNIQUE
  • H04N—PICTORIAL COMMUNICATION, e.g. TELEVISION
  • H04N5/00—Details of television systems
  • H04N5/64—Constructional details of receivers, e.g. cabinets or dust covers

Definitions

• the present invention relates generally to embedded wireless modules (chipsets) and associated antennas for network TVs.
• Home networks are provided in which information including multimedia is shared among networked components.
• a TV might access a disk player or central server to play multimedia programming stored on disk or at the server.
• the TV might also access a hard disk drive to play recorded TV programming, display digital photographs, etc.
• TVs also evolve, and presently relatively large flat panel display TVs can be mounted on walls as beautiful pieces of art work in which unsightly wires (network cables, video cables, etc.) are removed from view. This is often accomplished using wireless technology, wherein TVs wirelessly receive multimedia information from other components in the network.
• compressed high definition (HD) video requires between twenty and fifty megabits per second of bandwidth
• USB universal serial bus
• the USB driver that must be executed by the TV processor still consumes a great amount of processing capacity in the TV.
• such adapters often result in poor reception because the adapter must be plugged in behind the TV 5 reducing received wireless signal strength.
• the customer must install the electrical connections behind the TV and mount the antennas on the TV, which is not only inconvenient but which also may result in unsightly appearance as well as poor wireless performance.
• a TV includes a chassis, a TV display on the chassis, and a TV signal processing board supported on the chassis, A wireless module is on the signal processing board and likewise a TV processor is on the signal processing board in communication with the wireless module using, e.g., standard communication buses. Network applications in the TV can stream audio and video as well as transfer data using the wireless module from a home network or the Internet. Additionally, a TV tuner receives TV signals from a TV signal source, As set forth further below, at least one antenna element is inside the chassis and sends the audio-video signals, which are received from a home network, to the wireless module, as well as, if desired, sending audio and/or video and/or non-audio/video data back to the network.
• the wireless module and antenna can be configured for, e.g., WiFi, Bluetooth, etc.
• a bezel surrounds the chassis and a display shield is in the chassis and is disposed between the TV display and the signal processing board.
• the display shield defines an outer periphery, and the antenna element is juxtaposed with the bezel beyond the outer periphery of the display shield.
• an electrical lead connecting the antenna element Io the wireless module is also juxtaposed with the bezel beyond the outer periphery of the display shield.
• at least first and second antenna elements are provided, with the first antenna element being disposed parallel to a first edge of the chassis and the second antenna element being disposed parallel to a second, perpendicular edge of the chassis.
• the signal processing board defines first through fourth edges respectively facing first through fourth edges of the chassis.
• the TV tuner can be juxtaposed with the third and fourth edges of the signal processing board and the antenna elements can be juxtaposed with the first and second edges of the chassis, i.e., opposite the tuner relative to the signal processing board.
• an apparatus has a wireless chipset integrated into a TV chassis. At least one wireless antenna element is in the chassis for feeding the chipset.
• a TV processor in the chassis causes signals from home network components received through the antenna and chipset to be displayed on the TV.
• a system for facilitating presentation, on a TV in a home network, audio-video content wirelessly received from the home network without requiring antenna wires extending outside the TV to receive the content.
• the system includes means for displaying video content and means for holding the means for displaying.
• Antenna means are inside the means for holding and are configured for wirelessly receiving the audio- video content from the home network.
• FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the front of a wall-mounted flat panel TV. showing network components schematically;
• Figure 2 is a rear elevation view of the rear of an example embodiment of the TV with the outer skin removed to expose internal components.
• a home network 10 may include one more TVs 12 (only a single TV shown) with a TV chassis 13 holding a TV display 14.
• a plastic frame-like bezel 15 frames the display 14.
• ⁇ TV 12 may be mounted by means known in the art on a surface 16 of a dwelling, such as a wall or ceiling.
• the TV 12 may be an analog and/or digital TV with a flat panel (matrix-type) standard definition and/or high definition (HD) display 14, although other types of displays may be used.
• the network 10 may include various components that communicate audio-video information wirelessly to the TV 12 using, e.g., WiFi principles, Bluetooth principles, or other wireless principles known in the art.
• the TV 12 may receive compressed or uncompressed HD video from a computer server 18, a disk player 20, a personal video recorder (PVR) 22, and a personal computer (PC) 24, as well as other information such as digital photographs for display on the TV 12.
• PVR personal video recorder
• PC personal computer
• Other network components such as game players or indeed other TVs may be provided in the network 10
• a hand-held remote control device 26 may be manipulated by a person to input wireless command signals to the TV 12 and/or to various network components in accordance with principles known in the art.
• a metal display shield 28 such as a liquid crystal display (LCD) shield typically is registered with the display 14 to be generally flush therewith, to shield the display elements of the display 14 from interference that might be generated by the components on the opposite side of the shield 28 from the display 14.
• LCD liquid crystal display
• a TV power module 30 for powering the TV and a TV signal processing board 32 for holding sub-components. Both the TV power module 30 and TV signal processing board 32 typically are mounted to the shield 28.
• a display power inverter 34 may also be mounted on the shield 28 for purposes known in the art of, e.g., LCD displays.
• the TV signal processing board 32 may hold, among other things, a TV tuner 36 and a wireless module 38 such as but not limited to an 802.1 1 a/b/g/n chipset made by Broadcom, Marvell, Atheros, or Ralink with a peripheral component interconnect (PC3) or PCI express form factor (e.g., RaSink 2880) and which consequently may communicate with a TV processor 40 on the signal processing board over a mini PCI bus or PCI express bus or other appropriate communication buses.
• the wireless module 38 may further include a Bluetooth transceiver, in which case such a combination chipset may assume a secure digital input/output fSDIO) form factor and communicate with the TV processor 40 over an SDIO bus or a USB bus.
• wireless modules that have the capability to offload processing onto the wireless chipset are preferred. Such processing offloading chipsets place very little load on the host processor.
• one or more wireless antenna elements may be included within the TV 12.
• a first elongated antenna element 42 may be disposed near a top edge 44 of the TV 12 and parallel thereto (i.e., horizontally), while a second elongated antenna element 46 may be disposed near a left edge 48 (or right edge) of the TV 12 and parallel thereto (i.e., vertically).
• the antenna elements 42. 46 are disposed between the edges of the display shield 28 and the plastic bezel 15 that frames the TV, and may be co-planar with the bezel as shown.
• the antenna elements 42, 46 are mounted near opposite counterpart edges the TV 12, in this case, near the top and left edges of the TV 12,
• the antenna elements 42, 46 may be dual-band multiple input-multiple output (MIMO) antenna elements that are configured for reception of 2.4GHz signals and 5GHz signals. Furthermore, as can be appreciated from the dashed line 50, connecting wires from the antenna elements 42, 46 ⁇ only the line from the first antenna 46 shown) to the wireless module 38 may be routed in the space between the outer edges of the shield 28 and the bezel 15. To reduce the radio frequency signal loss of antenna extension cables, a bus extension cable (when using USB) can be used to extend the wireless module closer to the antenna.
• MIMO multiple input-multiple output
• a MIMO antenna may be implemented in separate antenna elements, and it can be advantageous to separate the locations of those elements for diversity gain (a benefit of 802.1 In using MlMO technology).
• the antenna element placement and positioning shown in Figure 2 can produce optimal reception and diversity and minimize interference to the TV tuner 36.
• mounting the antenna elements inside the plastic bezels at the edge and outside the metal shield can produce improved reception, it being understood that the exact antenna positions can be determined based on different TV model configurations.
• the lines 50 connecting the antenna elements to the wireless module may be mini coaxial cables (with Hirose U.FL type connectors) to minimize signal loss and they can be wired along the edge of the TV inside the bezels as shown to promote network performance.
• a SDIO controller may be included, e.g., on the signal processing board 32 to allow the TV 12 to access a secure digital media card (not shown) to display photos or other media
• the wireless module 38 may be implemented by a USB WlFi with the capability to offload certain CPU functions.
• a Broadcom 4323 chip may be used.
• the TV 12 receives, through the TV tuner 36, TV signals from a source 52 of TV programming such as a set-top box, a cable TV source, a satellite TV receiver, a conventional terrestrial TV broadcast antenna, etc.
• a source 52 of TV programming such as a set-top box, a cable TV source, a satellite TV receiver, a conventional terrestrial TV broadcast antenna, etc.

Landscapes

• Engineering & Computer Science (AREA)
• Multimedia (AREA)
• Signal Processing (AREA)
• Computer Networks & Wireless Communication (AREA)
• Human Computer Interaction (AREA)
• Support Of Aerials (AREA)
• Two-Way Televisions, Distribution Of Moving Picture Or The Like (AREA)
• Radio Transmission System (AREA)
• Circuits Of Receivers In General (AREA)

Priority Applications (6)

Applications Claiming Priority (2)

Publications (2)

Family

ID=42173012

Family Applications (1)

Country Status (8)

Cited By (3)

Families Citing this family (11)

Family Cites Families (27)

• 2008
  • 2008-11-19 US US12/273,771 patent/US20100125878A1/en not_active Abandoned
• 2009
  • 2009-10-13 KR KR1020117011324A patent/KR101250652B1/ko not_active IP Right Cessation
  • 2009-10-13 CN CN2009801462359A patent/CN102217302A/zh active Pending
  • 2009-10-13 WO PCT/US2009/060479 patent/WO2010059313A2/en active Application Filing
  • 2009-10-13 MX MX2011004987A patent/MX2011004987A/es active IP Right Grant
  • 2009-10-13 CA CA2742795A patent/CA2742795C/en not_active Expired - Fee Related
  • 2009-10-13 JP JP2011537455A patent/JP5342008B2/ja not_active Expired - Fee Related
  • 2009-10-13 EP EP09827941.7A patent/EP2353288A4/en not_active Withdrawn

Non-Patent Citations (2)

Also Published As

Similar Documents

Legal Events