Oki Launches a New Swing'nRinger™ Sound Generator LSI for Mobile Phones
- Offering Natural Sound with 64 Polyphonies Compliant with Industry Standards in the World Smallest Footprint -
Tokyo, Japan, November 27, 2003 -- Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd. (TSE: 6703) today announced that it has developed a new PCM (Pulse Code Modulation)-based sound generator LSI, the ML2864, which plays 64 polyphonies simultaneously with eight octaves. The ML2864, the third product of the Swing'nRinger™ sound generator LSI series, provides high quality sound with the PCM method and supports global standards including GM (General MIDI) System Level 1, which allows easy download of various sound contents. By adapting Oki's unique W-CSP (Wafer level Chip Size Package) technology, the chip offers the world smallest footprint of its kind. The company will begin sample shipment of the product in December 2003.
"Oki has been providing Swing'nRinger sound generator LSIs for years. These chips have received high appraisal from the GSM (Global Service for Mobile Communications) market thanks to their high sound quality and their compliance to GM and SMF (Standard MIDI File) industry standards," said Hiro Matsubara, General Manager of the Speech LSI Business Unit at Oki Electric. "The newly added ML2864 further enhances the sound quality, raising the competitive advantages of our sound generator LSIs. A number of mobile phone vendors have already expressed interest in adopting the chip - as it meets their exact requirements."
The demand for feature-packed mobile phones is increasing, especially in China, the world's largest GSM mobile phone market. One of the fastest-growing requirements demanded by users is a high quality musical ring tone, and this is made possible through provision of a large number of polyphonies by PCM-based sound generator chip. To meet the challenge, Oki, with the collaboration of Casio Computer Co., Ltd., has developed the ML2864.
The new chip, ML2864, doubles the number of polyphonies, from 32 to 64, which gives musical ring tones of mobile phones much higher and deeper sound quality. The product implements a wavetable ROM and supports GM and SMF standards. By inheriting major features of the existing sound generator LSIs, the new chip is compatible with the existing chips, so music contents can be shared between them. Analog characteristics, including signal/noise ratio and power supply rejection ratio, were also improved. Alongside the enhanced functionality and quality, Oki has also managed to reduce the footprint of the device to a world best of its kind, at 5 x 5 mm, achieved using unique W-CSP packaging technology.
The company intends to introduce the chip to China, Europe, US, Korea and Japan, especially focusing on the GSM and CDMA mobile phone markets. Volume shipping of the new chip is scheduled to start March 2004.
Characteristics of the ML2864:
- Implements PCM sound generator technology for natural reproduction of sounds from musical instruments such as piano and drum
- Supports 64 simultaneous polyphonies
- Complies with GM System Level 1
- Supports 128 timbres and 47 percussion sounds, as specified by GM, for a total 175 tones
- Reproduces sound effects and speech, using the embedded PCM and 2-bit/4-bit OkiADPCM synthesizers
- Supports SMF, Faith, Inc.'s original music format, as well as Oki's original music format
- Embedded LED driver with brightness control
- Supports 1.8V low-voltage CPU interface
Comparison between existing and new product:
ML2870A (existing) ML2864 (new)
Timbres 175 timbres (128 timbres + 47 percussion sounds)
Number of simultaneous notes 32 polyphonies with 16 timbres 64 polyphonies with 16 timbres
Sound range 8 octaves
SMF Supported
GM System Level 1 Supported
ADPCM synthesizer Built-in
ML2864 specifications:
- Number of polyphonies: 64
- Operating frequencies: 2.7 MHz to 34 MHz
- Operating voltage: 2.7V to 3.3V
- Sequencer: Built-in
- FIFO memory: Three types built in - for music playback, for real-time playback, for ADPCM playback
- Package: 49-pin W-CSP
Shipment schedule and sales plan:
- Sample shipment: December 2003
- Volume shipment: March 2004
- Evaluation board shipment: December 2003
- Production volume: 2 million units per month
About Swing'nRinger:
Swing'nRinger is the name of Oki's sound generator LSI series, reproducing music with a natural rhythm that makes people want to dance.
Glossary:
- PCM (Pulse Code Modulation)
The most common method to digitize sound signals. This is done by sampling the analog signal with a constant sampling rate or frequency, and then expressing the sampled values as digital data.
- Polyphony
In the musical ring tone of mobile phones, polyphony represents the number of sounds generated simultaneously.
- MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface)
MIDI is a protocol designed for communicating music data between MIDI-supporting devices, such as electronic synthesizers. Rather than representing musical sounds directly, it transmits information about how music is produced. The command set includes note-on, note-off, key velocity, pitch bend and other methods of controlling a synthesizer.
- GM (General MIDI)
A widely accepted industry standard that enables playback of the same musical composition in the same way, regardless of the MIDI-compliant device it is played with. Complying with GM allows access to a large amount of GM-supported contents, since most of the currently available electrical musical instruments and Karaoke systems support GM.
- W-CSP (Wafer level Chip Size Package)
Unlike the conventional CSP, the technology allows shrinking the footprint of LSI packages to the size of the chip itself.
- SMF (Standard MIDI File)
The Standard MIDI File was developed to allow musicians and audio file developers to transfer their sequenced MIDI data from one software application to another. Many music composition software and music players use the SMF format, which is suitable for exchanging data between different editors, and for disclosing data to an unspecified number of people. Almost all music data made with GM supports the SMF format.
- Wavetable
The sound generation method widely used by MIDI sound and electronic musical instruments. Sound data sampled from real sound is stored as a ROM file, and replayed by digital/analog conversion. Sound quality depends on the ROM capacity, sound data creation method, sampling frequency, and sound generation method.
- Signal/noise ratio
Ratio of signal to noise. The larger the figure, the higher the sound quality.
- PCM sound generator
Sound generation method created by sampling the analog wave or signal of sounds. Compared to the method of synthesizing sound from sine curves or rectangular curves, the PCM method excels in expressing natural and deep sound. Also known as a wavetable sound generator.
- ADPCM (Adaptive Differential Pulse Code Modulation)
Voice compression technology that uses the differential value between consecutive pieces of sampling data. OkiADPCM is a proprietary method developed by Oki.
Notes:
Swing'nRinger is a trademark of Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd.
Names of companies and products are trademarks or registered trademarks of the respective companies.
About Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd.
Founded more than a century ago in 1881, Oki Electric Industry Co., Ltd. is Japan's first telecommunications manufacturer, with its headquarter in Tokyo, Japan. With the corporate vision, "Oki, Network Solutions for a Global Society," Oki Electric provides top-quality products, technologies and solutions to its customers through its telecommunications systems, information systems and electronic devices segments. All three segments are integrated into one effective organization that functions as a collective force to create exciting new products and technologies, including information and telecom converged solutions. Through its business activities, Oki Electric satisfies a spectrum of customer needs in various markets.