NEC Announces SoC for Car Audio Systems

To perk up car audio requirements, NEC Electronics today announced the sampling of a new system-on-a-chip (SoC) for car audio systems, the µPD35502. The new µPD35502 SoC increases the processing of music data to realize playback of multiple songs, multiple sources, and multiple destinations, allowing the flexibility to play different songs in the front and rear seat.

To speed system development, a complete software package, including compressed audio decoding software (codecs) for standards such as MP3, WMA and AAC, as well as other necessary system software, will be offered in production-ready form. This device also has the further advantage of enabling field upgrades of key system characteristics, such as adding new human machine interface (HMI) features, new versions of existing audio codecs, and adding completely new codecs as they become popular in the market.

The device includes built-in USB and SD card interfaces to enable playback of music data via portable music players, USB memory devices and SD cards. Also included are several channels of I2S serial communication for inter-chip transfer of music data. An option for supporting Bluetooth® wireless technology makes it easy to build systems with hands-free calling and wireless music-transfer functionality. Multi-source decoding will enable the development of systems where drivers, and front and rear seat passengers can each enjoy different music at the same time.

(Source) Press