piSmasher HDMI Version?

[Greye Smyth]

The CrowdSupply page refers to the piSmasher as being capable of 1080p@60 3D video on both of its HDMI ports, which would indicate v1.4, but could someone please confirm the version?

[Cousins]

That's correct, Greye - piSmasher supports HDMI v1.4. We are using an NXP TDA19971 receiver (HDMI in) and an NXP TDA19988 transmitter (HDMI out). Product flyers are attached.

-Ryan

[Greye Smyth]

Great, thanks a lot. Out of curiosity, how capable are the Snickerdoodle versions' respective ARM cores at pushing that kind of resolution and framerate? I'm afraid I don't really have much frame of reference for ARM devices; I know some of the Android TV boxes you can find on Amazon and eBay go all the way up to 4K@60 output on Cortex-A9 cores, but those are much higher-clocked quad-core parts and usually add GPU cores as well.

[Cousins]

You'll likely need some hardware assistance/acceleration on the decoding to hit 4K/60. For reference: http://www.carnica-technology.com/download/ace/AceThought_H264_Decoder_ARM_CortexA_processors.pdf

[Greye Smyth]

Oh, I'm sure video decoding would take some extra muscle, but for tasks like overlaying an interface or some such onto an incoming signal, you think it could keep up with the limits of HDMI 1.4?

For that matter, I had just meant to bring up the 4K@60-capable devices as one of my only reference points for what some higher-end Cortex-A9 parts can manage, but you think that the Snickerdoodle might actually be able to manage that as well with the right implementation? Would you have any plans to release an updated piSmasher at some point with HDMI 2.0 ports to support that?

[Cousins]

I wouldn't expect any issues with an overlay being provided by the ARM core/s.

We'd have to take a closer look re: handling 4K on the current snickerdoodle, but practically speaking you'll probably want to be using a Zynq part with transceivers... 

[Andrew Bolin]

Hi Ryan,
I know this is an old thread, but seemed the most relevant place to ask - do you have data sheets for these chips?
I can't find them on NXP's site... Trying to do some reading so I can get started before having the snickerdoodle in hand.

[Cousins]

Hi Andrew,

Digi-Key has the datasheet for the transmitter: http://media.digikey.com/pdf/Data%20Sheets/NXP%20PDFs/TDA19988_DS_21_july_2011.pdf

The receiver might require some digging (can't immediately recall if that one was provided to us confidentially). Avnet's link leads to a non-existent NXP page: https://products.avnet.com/shop/en/ema/tda19971bhn-c1-557-3074457345627006923?CMP=EMA_Octopart_inventoryfeed_VSE

:(

-Ryan