Abstract: An electrical insulation device for bidirectional connecting lines is proposed which operates reliably at high frequencies and can be integrated easily on a chip. In accordance with a first embodiment, for the purpose of electrical isolation, two separate optocouplers are provided per bidirectional connecting line. A control unit evaluates the control signals which are output by one of the two circuit units, and thereupon activates one of the two optocouplers while the other optocoupler is simultaneously deactivated, in order, in this way, to allow transmission of signals via the associated connecting line in one direction. In a second embodiment of the invention, only a single optocoupler is provided per bidirectional connecting line.

Abstract: The invention deals with a wireless extension of the IEEE 1394 bus. Considered is a scenario where two clusters of 1394 devices are linked to each other by means of a wireless bridge (9). The devices of one cluster shall communicate with devices of the other cluster without being bridge-aware. The wireless bridge, however, provides for a bus reset isolation. This causes a problem each time a bus reset occurs in one of the clusters. To solve this problem it is proposed to implement a buffer memory (22) for self-identification packets in the 1394 interfaces (11) of both boxes of said wireless bridge (9). In particular these buffer memories (22) shall be implemented in the physical layer section (21) of the 1394 interfaces (11).

Abstract: The circuit arrangement comprises an input section (IS, DC) for receiving a band of digital television channels, a signal processing section (uP, LLC, TLC), a power supply (PS), and an output section (PHY) for supplying one or several television receivers (TV1-TV3, PC) with one of said television channels. The output section (PHY) comprises an IEEE 1394 port for a connection to television receivers (TV1-TV3, PC) for providing data transmission in both directions, and the circuit arrangement comprises a power down mode in which at least parts of the input section (IS, DC) and the signal processing section (uP, LLC, TLC) are switched off, when none of said television receivers is active. In this power-down mode the circuit arrangement is in a standby mode in which advantageously only the power supply (PS) and the physical layer (PHY) of the output section are active. The circuit arrangement (SAR) is in particular a digital satellite receiver or a settop box.

Abstract: Method for connecting an IEEE1394 remote device (1) to a cluster of IEEE1394 devices through a wireless link (3) comprising a first wireless device (WBox1) connected to the cluster and a second wireless device (WBox2) connected to the remote device (1), wherein the remote device and the first wireless device for a first wired bus and the device cluster and the second wireless device form a second wired bus. The method comprises the steps of, representing the remote device (1) on the cluster through the first wireless device (WBox1) and representing the devices of the cluster to the remote device (1) through the second wireless device (WBox2), such that the remote device and the devices of the cluster function as if these devices were part of a single IEEE1394 bus.

Abstract: In a digital bus, such as the IEEE 1394 serial bus, the procedure for sending data from a link layer IC onto the data bus is that the link layer IC requests access to the bus and then waits until the physical layer IC grants the desired access. Upon detecting the grant status, the link layer IC is free to send data onto the bus. But if in the meantime the link layer IC refrains from sending data onto the bus, the granted bus access will not be given up. As a consequence the bus is blocked for an indefinite time period because the bus access granted cannot be overwritten by the physical layer IC. According to the invention an additional timer function is implemented in the link layer IC. This ‘bus grant missed’ timer function controls the link layer IC in such a way that it automatically gives back the bus control to the physical layer IC after a predetermined time period has elapsed during which the link layer IC has sent no data onto the bus.

Abstract: Method for reserving isochronous resources in a wireless network comprising at least a wireless source device and a wireless sink device, said wireless network being based on a TDMA frame transmission scheme, said method comprising the steps of: providing an output plug in said wireless source device, said output plug being associated with an output plug register, wherein said output plug register defines a maximum amount of data output by said output plug during a wireless frame; reserving an amount of bandwidth corresponding to said maximum amount of data to be sent in a wireless frame with an isochronous resource manager of the wireless network.

Abstract: Method for isochronous data packet transport over a wireless network, comprising the steps of: collecting a plurality of isochronous data packets at a service specific convergence sublayer (SSCS) of a wireless source device; posting said plurality of isochronous data packets as a whole to a common part convergence sub-layer (CPCS) of the wireless source device, wherein said plurality of isochronous data packets posted to the common part convergence sub-layer corresponds to the amount of isochronous data packets generated by a transmitter over a 2 ms period.

Abstract: The output bitrate of an MPEG-2 video encoder depends on the source data rate, the content or detail or degree of motion in the source pictures, the prediction type and on quantiser settings. The control of the encoder output bitrate is based on the filling level of a buffer containing VLC words. Corresponding to the actual filling level of this VLC buffer the quantiser settings are adapted in order to achieve a constant-bitrate encoder output. DVD-RAM devices are now on the market that are capable of storing such MPEG-2 video encoded video sequences. The bitrate control algorithm used has a severe impact on the achievable visual picture quality of the encoded video sequence. Therefore the current filling levels of two further buffers in the processing chain are additionally taken into account for the bitrate control: for the application with DVD-RAM, the mechanical buffer of a DVD recorder and the therein loaded DVD-RAM disc itself.

Abstract: Proposed systems for encryption and copy protection of digital video or audio data use known data stream encryption algorithms and require a significant amount of additional hardware for the encryption and decryption of the video and audio data. MPEG-2 video uses VLC code tables to generate the encoded data. The receiver has to know about the code tables that have been applied at the encoder in order to be able to decode the VLC-encoded data stream. As long as the encoder VLC code tables are not known the transmitted data cannot be decoded. Therefore the use of any non-standardized non-public VLC code tables when encoding the VLC words is a powerful protection for such MPEG-2 video data. According to the invention several different VLC code tables or several different sets of VLC code tables are used in the encoder and decoder. At regular or irregular time instants a different VLC code table or set of VLC code tables is selected synchronously in the encoder and decoder.