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LAS VEGAS - LG Electronics Inc. showed working silicon of its first-generation digital TV chip set and detailed plans for the chip set's future at the recent Comdex show here. The Vestigial-sideband Super Star (VSS) chip set is sampling now for a whopping $1,000, a price the company hopes to trim to below $200 by the end of next year.
"This chip set is too expensive, but that is its only problem," said Hee-Bok Park, a senior research engineer in LG's DTV group (Seoul, South Korea).
The first-generation set consists of five chips: two handle the vestigial-sideband (VSB) decoding and three deal with video signal processing. The set decodes all 18 formats defined by the Grand Alliance but displays only high-definition, 1,080 interlaced output.
The VSB parts were developed in cooperation with Zenith Electronics, which holds key VSB patents. LG has a majority interest in Zenith.
The LG chip set will be used by Zenith in a set-top box slated to ship with a projection TV monitorin the second quarter of next year....