The TV rumored to be under development by Google Inc. of the US has finally been revealed: Google TV, announced at the Google I/O developer's conference on May 20, 2010. It is a TV platform designed for Internet-based content viewing.
Sony Corp. of Japan is handling Google TV-compliant television sets and Blu-ray Disc players, while Logitech International SA of Switzerland is developing an external box that will allow conventional TVs to be used for Google TV (Fig. 1). The processor is the CE4100 Atom-based system-on-chip (SoC) from Intel Corp. of the US. These products are all expected to be released in the US market in fall 2010.
Google TV system software consists of the Chrome Web browser and Flash 10.1 from Adobe Systems Inc. of the US, running on Android 2.1. Equipment control will be implemented with the help of satellite broadcasting firm DISH Network LLC of the US. Product sale will be handled by Best Buy Co., Inc. of the US.
One of the key features of Google TV is the "Quick Search Box" search function, which seamlessly searches both TV programming and Web sites (Fig.2). A semi-transparent Web browser is displayed over the TV program imagery, so that users can view them simultaneously. The bookmark concept has been expanded to handle not only Web sites, but also TV channels (Fig.3). An audio content download service is also provided: Google Listen.
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