VIA KICKED OFF its Technology Forum in Taipei today with a glimpse of a living room convergence box based on its upcoming EPIA M Mini-ITX digital media platform. VIA's EPIA M mainboard is optimized for the digital media playback and is based on the VIA Apollo CLE266 chipset with an integrated MPEG-2 decoder and 2D/3D graphics with DVD playback, as well as Fast Ethernet, USB 2.0, IEEE 1394 Firewire and TV-out.
Named the Hi-Fi PC, the box containing the 17cm x 17cm board combines instant-on playback of all the digital video and audio formats, including CD, DVD and VCD in an aluminium-housed PC system.
The box sports a Flash memory BIOS combined with media playback code to support disk play at the touch of the remote control.
The device was unveiled by VIA President and CEO, Wenchi Chen in his opening address to the Tehcnology Forum. VIA says it expects to market the device in Q1 2003.
The company also unveiled a new RISC chip for PDAs and mobile phones, which it also expects to introduce early next year.
News source: The Inq
