APSIPA Transactions on Signal and Information Processing > Vol 7 > Issue 1

The origin of digital information devices: the Silicon Audio and its family

Industrial Technology Advances

Akihiko Sugiyama, NEC Corporation, Japan, a.sugiyama@ieee.org , Masahiro Iwadare, NEC Corporation, Japan
 
Suggested Citation
Akihiko Sugiyama and Masahiro Iwadare (2018), "The origin of digital information devices: the Silicon Audio and its family", APSIPA Transactions on Signal and Information Processing: Vol. 7: No. 1, e1. http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/ATSIP.2017.16

Publication Date: 15 Jan 2018
© 2018 Akihiko Sugiyama and Masahiro Iwadare
 
Subjects
 
Keywords
Audio codingAlgorithmMPEGSemiconductorMemorySolid stateDigital information device
 

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This is published under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence.

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In this article:
I. INTRODUCTION 
II. CONVENTIONAL AUDIO PLAYERS 
III. THE SILICON AUDIO 
IV. CHALLENGES TOWARD A SUCCESSFUL COMMERCIAL PRODUCT 
V. THE SILICON AUDIO FAMILY FOR OTHER APPLICATIONS 
VI. IMPACT OF THE SILICON AUDIO ON AUDIO PLAYERS AND DIGITAL INFORMATION DEVICES 
VII. CONCLUSION 

Abstract

This paper presents the origin of digital information devices, the Silicon Audio, and its family. The Silicon Audio is the digital counterpart of the Walkman and the ancestor of the iPod. It employs the MPEG / Audio Layer II algorithm for data compression, which was standardized by ISO (International Standardization Organization)/ IEC (International Electrotechnical Commission). A semiconductor memory card is equipped with to store the compressed signal. Since it has no mechanical movement, it is robust against shocks and vibrations that had been a serious problem for portable audio players. The background of the development, implementations, challenges toward a commercial product, and impact on audio players as well as personal information devices are discussed with its family including a video derivative, the Silicon View.

DOI:10.1017/ATSIP.2017.16