CES 2023: LoRa®-enabled Sensors Deliver on Smart Industry Promise

We’re grateful to be at CES 2023, where the momentum around solutions with Semtech’s LoRa® devices and the LoRaWAN® standard is incredibly strong. This morning, we had the pleasure of connecting with a wide range of customers, LoRa ecosystem partners and industry experts to discuss the powerful impact of low power, long range Internet of Things (IoT) technologies on enabling a smarter, greener and more resilient future for our planet. The journey to lower carbon emissions — and, more broadly, help the enterprise achieve its environmental, social and governance (ESG) goals — is a cornerstone to Semtech’s innovation for a better world. 

BlueRiver® Applications Part 5: BlueRiver & SDI

In this fifth and final installment of the BlueRiver applications blog series, we’ll look at how two Semtech products lines – Semtech’s BlueRiver® ASIC platform for Pro AV and SDVoE™, and broadcast Serial Digital Interface (SDI) – can enable a unique set of “SDI-over-IP” products and applications.

The Perfect Holiday Wearables and Hearables 

Buying the perfect holiday gift for friends or family is challenging enough but trying to buy the perfect tech gift can be even more difficult. Between sifting through the flood of new products and then ensuring the gift arrives on time, figuring out the exact gift is a moving target. Plus, how do you know if the wireless headphones or smartwatch you’re buying will really perform as promised?

Complete Protection for HDMI-SDI/SDI-HDMI Converters

Whether you are watching an action replay of a baseball game on a giant screen at a stadium, a movie on your large-screen TV or streaming a video on your laptop computer, a high-quality audiovisual (AV) experience is always expected. Ultra-High-Definition Serial Digital Interface (UHD-SDI) and High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) are two standards for digital AV transmission. UHD-SDI standardizes the transmission of uncompressed and unencrypted digital AV signals over coaxial or fiber optic cables. HDMI is a digital interface for transmitting high-definition, high-speed digital multi-track audio and uncompressed video signals from HDMI-compliant sources to AV displays. Even though they both can transport ultra-high-definition AV signals from a source to a display, HDMI is preferred to connect consumer gadgets such as computers, gaming consoles, Blu-ray/DVD players, televisions, projectors, etc. UHD-SDI is preferred for high-end applications such as professional indoor/outdoor video production and television broadcasts because it supports long-range transmission and a rugged connection with the help of a physical lock mechanism at each end of the cable. UHD-SDI coaxial cable can transfer signals up to 300 feet, whereas HDMI cables struggle with excessive signal degradation even within 50 feet. These two interfaces can be used together via an HDMI-SDI or SDI-HDMI converter. For example, as shown in figure 1, an HDMI display would be used for confidence monitoring of an SDI stream to avoid the need to use specially calibrated SDI-specific displays.

Protecting the Health of a Fitness Tracker

Not too long ago, my only fitness tracker was a pedometer in my pocket to measure my daily step count. Things have since changed very quickly. I now have a smartwatch on my wrist to track my daily activities, including steps completed, distance covered, calories burned, heart rate, and breathing pattern. I also receive alerts for messages, take calls, listen to my favorite podcast, and check the weather via my smartwatch. These are all in addition to seeing the accurate time of the day. Due to all these innovative features, wearing a smartwatch and using it as a fitness tracker is the trend for the health-conscious population worldwide. While these wearables help people remain fit, extra care needs to be taken by the manufacturers to protect these wearables from electrical overstress (EOS) and electrostatic discharge (ESD) generated from the body of the person wearing these devices.

Solving SAR Compliance Concerns on Mobile PCs

Laptop and tablet users want the same lightning-fast connections and long battery life as smartphone users. Whether they are on a video conference for work or playing a AAA game for fun, they expect nonstop performance — and their already-high expectations are only increasing with the emergence of new technologies and wireless protocols like 5G and Wi-Fi 6/6E.

Stal Data Monitors Environmental Conditions and Pig Health With LoRaWAN®

Intensive pig farming, also known as the ‘intensive piggery system’, has become the primary method of farming in the pig industry. According to this method, pigs are housed indoors and confined in individual stalls or straw-lined sheds at high stocking density, while keeping pigs of similar ages to live together in large crowds under common environmental settings. By doing so, feeding efficiency is significantly improved, and emerging technologies are often employed to maintain pig health and safeguard pig growth - monitoring various environmental parameters inside the barns with wireless temperature and humidity sensors is an exemplary case in point.

HotSwitch® – The eFuse For Your Next Design

HotSwitch® is a new product line of devices from Semtech with an integrated load switch or eFuse that protects electronics systems against typical electrical transients and steady-state fault conditions. Primarily, the HotSwitch device turns on or off the current flow to a power rail as-needed. It detects electrical surges and secures the downstream subsystem by disconnecting the load from the power source. At the same time, the devices in Semtech’s HotSwitch portfolio provide an enhanced shield against inrush current, overvoltage, under voltage, reverse current, short circuit, and over-temperature faults. Figure 1 shows how a system is protected by a HotSwitch device.

BlueRiver® Applications Part 4: End-product Integration

Throughout this blog series, we’ve looked at how Semtech’s BlueRiver® ASIC platform enables a broad range of Pro AV applications, and as the core chip technology that powers Software Defined Video over Ethernet (SDVoE™), is accelerating the adoption of AV-over-IP in the professional AV industry. (Read Parts 1, 2 and 3.) In part four of the BlueRiver applications for Pro AV blog series, we’re going to continue the theme around the lower power and reduced footprint of the BlueRiver ASIC solution, which makes it ideal for integration directly into end equipment, HDMI wall plates and Smart Display Modules, while also reducing equipment costs and the environmental footprint of the final AV system.

Milesight’s 5G AIoT Network Camera Demonstrated the Integration Potential of 5G and LoRaWAN®

According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology of the People's Republic of China, China's 5G network coverage continues to expand. Large-scale deployment of the 5G network strengthens the Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem, extending IoT application scenarios to diversified fields including manufacturing, agriculture, medical care, security, and smart cities.