NXP, the independent semiconductor company founded by Philips, today announced that it is improving the consumer PC TV experience with inbox driver support from Windows Vista. With the upgrade to Windows Vista, consumers can now automatically install over 100 NXP-based PC TV tuner products, eliminating difficult and time-consuming installation problems. Previously, the installation process took several steps, but with the inbox drivers included in Windows Vista, the computer takes care of the complicated process in seconds instead of countless minutes, allowing consumers to use NXP-based PC TV tuner products straight from the box. Consumers using an NXP-based PC TV tuner card will enjoy the unparalleled picture quality offered by the combination of NXP hardware and the Windows Vista operating system.

“Consumers should not have to think about finding drivers or other software to enable their hardware to work with Windows Vista — they should be able to use their hardware straight out of the box,” stated Chris Matichuk, program manager of Entertainment and Devices Division at Microsoft Corp. “With the upgrade to Windows Vista, we wanted everything to be as smooth as possible, including the installation of hardware, and to ensure consumers had seamless access to the latest working drivers without having to search Web sites or CDs. To ease the process for consumers, NXP has delivered inbox drivers that ship in Window Vista, enabling automatic recognition of NXP-based PC TV tuner products.”

“Pinnacle Systems offers a wide range of TV tuner products powered by NXP technology, and the inbox driver support of our Pinnacle PC TV products will ensure the highest performance and most robust experience with Windows Vista,” said Joern Lembke, Director of Product Management TV Viewing Group, Pinnacle Systems. “This will significantly ease the installation process and provide the consumer with an even better PC TV experience from the very beginning.”

“We are in the midst of a home entertainment revolution in which consumers want access to content anytime, anywhere. PC TV is an important component of this revolution, and we need to be sure to meet consumer demands,” said Martin Maloney, marketing director and manager, BCT PC Video, BU Home, NXP Semiconductors. “Ease of use is a large part of consumer demand, and NXP is meeting that demand by eliminating consumers’ main frustration point – the time consuming installation procedure – via the Windows Vista inbox drivers.”

NXP went through an extensive testing process in order for the drivers of its PC TV tuner products to be supported by Windows Vista inbox drivers. Developers and consumers reap the benefits of this thorough testing process because the inbox drivers are certified, reliable and more robust. Also, for the first time, Microsoft provided the inbox drivers for the NXP-based PC TV tuner products to developers globally to test with Windows Vista before releasing to the public.

NXP is powering the revolution in the TV viewing experience by not only improving picture quality, but also enabling a variety of audio, video, data and images to be available anytime, anywhere throughout the home and on-the-move. The TV, including PC TV and TV-on-mobile, will soon be the window to a world of new content, and NXP is unique in supporting these developments with a full range of semiconductor components, system solutions and connected systems based on industry standards.

Availability

Over 100 products based on NXP PC TV tuner solutions have inbox driver support for Windows Vista including products based on the NXP family of PCI and PCI Express PC TV SoCs, SAA713x and SAA716x, are currently available. For a full list of products, please visit: www.nxp.com/applications/pc_pda/pc_tv/index.html

About NXP

NXP is a top 10 semiconductor company founded by Philips more than 50 years ago. Headquartered in Europe, the company has 37,000 employees working in 26 countries across the world. NXP creates semiconductors, system solutions and software that deliver better sensory experiences in mobile phones, personal media players, TVs, set-top boxes, identification applications, cars and a wide range of other electronic devices. News from NXP is located at www.nxp.com.