Anatomy of Smart TVs Whitepaper 1 Abstract While televisions became omnipresent a long time back, technologies TVs have evolved to become truly connected devices and have begun that revolve around it have gone through an immense makeover by utilizing user-TV interactions for semantic analysis. The now popular changing the way we perceive a TV’s quality, quantity and features via ‘smart TV’ can not only give you an enhanced home networking which content can be viewed, generated and distributed. Unlike Cell entertainment experience but also act as a window to world of online phones and mobile devices where the shelf life is quite short (less services and information. This article will take you through some than two years), owing to its highly volatile ecosystem, the Television of the most popular smart TV services and technologies along with has managed to stick around its shelf for longer periods (typically exploring the challenges faced within the TV ecosystem and finally 7-8 years). From the era of CRT screens to plasma/LCD/LED screens, introducing the Android TV. the Television has changed not just in its physical appearance but has managed to instill a sense of intelligence within itself too. From a traditional Analog broadcasting to set-top boxes for a digital entertainment experience, it has evolved to a level of ‘smartness’ that has changed the way people access digital content and entertainment. With the advent of the Internet information explosion, Authors: Karthik Kumar Parthasarathy and Dorairaj Vembu, Senior Product Manager & Evangelist, Automotive, Consumer Electronics & IoT 2 Table of Content Keywords— Smart TV; DLNA; Android; HDR; UHD ....................... 04 Smart TV Components and Design Considerations .................... 05 Android Based Smart TVs ................................................................. 08 Conclusion ............................................................................................ 09 About The Author ................................................................................ 10 About Sasken ....................................................................................... 11 3 Anatomy of Smart TVs Keywords - Smart TV; DLNA; Android; HDR; UHD Smart TVs have a higher focus on channel, or on a local storage drive. online interactive media, Internet TV, While content providers have been User interface over-the-top content, as well as on- busy digitizing data, Smart TVs have IP-EP G and experience demand streaming media, and home evolved to a point of convergence networking access, with much less of broadband and broadcasting focus on the traditional broadcasting technologies management, on-board media that traditional television entertainment, and much more. sets and set-top boxes offer. These Users are also demanding the latest Input Control Smart TV Digital Video devices allow viewers to search and surround sound technologies such as Framework Components Broadcast view videos, movies, photos and Dolby Digital and DTS to accompany other content on the Web, on a local their superior visual experience. cable TV channel, on a satellite TV Internet streaming DLNA & Apps CRT TV PLASMA TV LCD TV LED TV Smart TV Features Figure 1: TVs have come a long way from CRTs to OLEDs Figure 2: Elements of a Smart TV 4 Anatomy of Smart TVs Smart TV Components and Design Considerations Internet services and Apps which was traditionally meant only for PCs a larger display. The UI must be designed The smartness of the TV lies in its ability and handheld devices, can now be seen on a keeping in mind that the user is going to be to connect to and utilize internet services. larger screen. at least 10 feet away from the screen. Also, Internet connectivity remains the core the user brings in specific expectations feature which opens up a whole new world of UI Design while watching TV as compare to a phone possibilities for users. Many new TVs come Phone and tablets have dominated the or tablet. Rich contrast ratios facilitate the preloaded with popular apps to deliver on- application development space and for long need for visually appealing graphics and demand streaming video, music, and news. have dictated the terms and conditions for UI skins. A visually engaging design must often Users can now catch up with their favorite TV design and development. However, with TVs be accompanied with simplicity for a true shows, rent and watch online movies, stream coming into the fray, application and features enjoyable user interaction. videos on demand, connect with family and that drive the user experience and design friends via Skype or social networking sites must consider the increased screen size of Electronic Program Guides (EPG) and such as Facebook and Twitter, play games, the display. Social media interaction needs to Interactive Program Guide (IPG) and even browse the internet. Some of the be blended seamlessly into the TV interface. These provide users of television, radio, and most popular VOD applications are YouTube, For this reason, application development for other media applications with continuously Netflix, BBC-I player, Live TV, etc. Through TVs has to move towards designing icons, updated menus displaying broadcast the power of internet streaming content, buttons and various UI parameters that suit programming or scheduling information 5 Anatomy of Smart TVs for current and upcoming programming. used in DVB is MPEG-TS which is less reliable and codecs. Most device manufacturers have By tuning into an EPG channel, a menu is and is used for transmission and storage proprietary software that includes demuxer/ displayed that lists current and upcoming of program system info, audio and video decoder software and custom media television programs on all available channels. data. While this area has been the traditional frameworks to provide support for multiple IPG on the other hand is a form of enhanced focus point for providing core video services, audio-video formats. Standard operating TV that offers an advanced onscreen display a lot of it is nowadays being influenced systems like Android are now changing this to locate content. Just as people use search by the operating system capabilities. For landscape by providing support for most of engines and portals to locate content on the example, Android’s multimedia framework the basic formats as part of their software web, viewers need powerful IPGs to help them (e.g. Stagefright) may be used to demux platform itself. with what they want in regard to television. and decode MPEG-TS streams, something As the TV gets integrated into the internet, we that was traditionally done using custom Home Entertainment Network: DLNA/ are now moving into an era of IP-EPG where hardware/software as part of the vendor Miracast the program guide is generated by mashing platform capabilities. Hybrid broadcast The home networking feature signifies up EPG data over IP. broadband TV (or “HbbTV”) is a global the power of a connected TV. With wired initiative aimed at harmonizing the broadcast (Ethernet) or wireless (Wi-Fi) connectivity, it DVB Content Playback and broadband delivery of entertainment utilizes the power of content sharing through Device manufacturers are responding to the services to consumers through connected plug and play devices within a network. By digitization of content by integrating set-top TVs, set-top boxes and multiscreen devices. a simple tap of a button or motion, one can box features within the TV itself. This helps push content to a television or control media the TV work with an additional capability of Extended Media Format Support play-back on the TV through a smart phone supporting EPG and AV content decoding/ All smart TVs come with an inbuilt support application using Miracast. Using DLNA, rendering. Therefore, smart TVs need to have for playback of stored content. This means one could discover devices providing similar an inbuilt ability to play media content that is the TV must have an extended codec support services within the network and subscribe obtained via DVB. The most common format in order to play different container formats to them. Content discovery and rendering 6 Anatomy of Smart TVs of content on the display can be controlled through different device classes. Once content is discovered, playback happens in a HDMI streaming fashion with a client and server. Set-top Boxes Input Control Framework For long, the main interface between the user and the TV has been via the IR remote and it continues to do so. With enhanced internet features, it is imperative to provide a mechanism via which data/text can be fed into the TV in a much easier way. Smartphone apps are now being used to replace the remote unit by simulating a remote like user inter-face on the app window. While majority Smart TVs of the smart TVs still stick to IR based remote controls, several smart TV manufacturers have moved to voice commands and gesture recognition for input and control. Smartphones/Tablets Laptops/Computers Figure 3: Home entertainment networking components 7 Anatomy of Smart TVs Android Based Smart TVs While traditional smart TVs were The shelf life of televisions is usually dependent on device manufacturers greater than five to seven years, to dictate the various apps and which is a long period considering features, Android TVs gave control that platforms like Android evolve and power to the users and the continuously. This exposes a major developer community. By providing challenge of upgrades with respect specific