Renesas Electronics Corporation, a premier supplier of advanced semiconductor solutions, announced the automotive industry’s first full HD 1080p LCD video controller to include a 4-lane MIPI-CSI2 input. The RAA278842 LCD video controller’s 4-lane (or dual 2-lane) MIPI-CSI2 input supports up to 1 Gbps per lane to interface with the latest generation of automotive cameras, application processors and graphics processors. The controller also supports a 150 MHz single-channel OpenLDI interface, and a variety of video interfaces and LCD panel sizes with resolutions up to 1920 x 1080. The RAA278842 is ideal for automotive central infotainment displays (CIDs) and head units, instrument clusters, head-up displays (HUDs), and mirror replacement display applications that are essential for the growing needs of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS).
“The RAA278842 LCD video controller helps automotive system manufacturers develop versatile and reliable display systems that provide superior HMI graphics for analog and digital video content,” said Niall Lyne, Senior Director, Automotive Mixed-Signal/Power and Video, Renesas Electronics Corporation. “Our strong heritage in video signal processing for backup cameras along with highly differentiated new technology is valued by automakers and Tier-1 suppliers worldwide.”
The RAA278842 LCD video controller has 10-bit per color processing built into the image enhancement engine to provide near-zero latency, high quality video. Its integrated video diagnostics detects if the incoming video is frozen or corrupted and can provide a direct path for the rear camera video to be displayed on the LCD. This significantly improves rear camera display reliability, virtually eliminating the possibility of a software related problem causing the rear camera video to be displayed incorrectly or not at all. And because some application processors take several seconds to boot up (depending on the OS), the RAA278842 can display the camera image on an LCD in less than 500 milliseconds, thereby addressing the fast boot requirement of many OEMs.
The RAA278842 with MIPI-CSI2 output and RAA278843 with traditional BT.656 output work with the system’s main processor to monitor the camera and the video data coming from the SoC or GPU. After vehicle ignition, while the instrument cluster boots up, the RAA27884x controller can display the carmaker’s logo or live camera video. The controller’s on-screen display feature can also simulate traditional tell-tale warning lamp checks in an instrument cluster application. Both controllers enable compliance with the FMVSS-111 safety law requiring the blind spot area behind the vehicle is displayed in less than two seconds after the driver places the vehicle in reverse gear.
Key Features of RAA278842 and RAA278843
- Two input measurement engines with frozen/abnormal image detection diagnostics to monitor input from the SoC/GPU and camera
- EEPROM/SPI flash fast boot allows register programming without requiring an external microcontroller
- SPI flash-based on-screen display (OSD) capable of presenting bit-map graphics in nine windows
- Arbitrary horizontal and vertical scalers for outputting up to 1080p (1920 x 1080) resolution
- Proprietary smooth input switching eliminates flicker when switching between sources
- AEC-Q100 Grade-2 qualified and specified for operation from -40°C to +105°C
- The RAA278842 and RAA278843 can be combined with Renesas’ R-Car SoC family, RH850 MCU family, and RL78 MCU family, as well as the ISL78302 dual LDO, ISL78322 dual 2A/1.7A synchronous buck regulator, and ISL78228 dual 800mA synchronous buck regulator to provide power rails for the RAA27884x and other ICs on the automotive infotainment system board.
For more information, visit: www.renesas.com
