CSR Bluetooth chips get HD voice and low energy support

Bluetooth chipmaker CSR has unveiled its latest silicon, adding support for high-definition (HD) voice, and integrating the Bluetooth low energy standard for low-power sensor applications for the first time.

The CSR8000 series of chips is available immediately, and expected to appear in at least two production smartphones before the end of this year, but CSR declined to identify the vendors in question.

New features of the chips include support for HD voice, which has already been launched in the UK by Orange, and integration of Bluetooth low energy for communication with small battery-powered devices like watches.

HD voice support will enable users to benefit from clearer voice calls on Bluetooth car kits or headsets, according to Tim Palmer, product manager of CSR's handset business unit.

"At the moment, the wider bandwidth of HD voice is lost if you are using a car kit or headset. We're extending the link to the periphery, which makes it easier to understand what people are saying compared with a standard GSM call," he said.

However, CSR was unable to confirm when a version of the chips designed to fit in headsets will be available, so potential HD headset users will have to wait a while longer yet.

The silicon announced today consists of separate chips for phones, PCs and in-car equipment, the CSR8810, CSR8510 and CSR8311 series, respectively.

These are supported by CSR's Harmony software stack for PCs, and the Synergy stack for phones and embedded applications.

As well as HD voice, these are the first dual-mode Bluetooth chips to integrate support for Bluetooth low energy (formerly Bluetooth Ultra Low Power) alongside existing Bluetooth communications.

This capability is intended to drive new applications that revolve around small devices, which will typically be powered by small button-cell batteries.

"For example, you could have a Bluetooth watch that displays text messages from your phone and lets you accept or reject calls at the touch of a button," said Palmer.

Other applications could allow a smartphone to serve as an intelligent remote control for a PC, letting the user browse the programme guide on the phone's screen.

However, the first application for the technology is likely to be proximity sensing, Palmer said, such as a key fob that automatically unlocks your PC when you approach or warns if you are leaving your phone behind.

Other features of the CSR8000 silicon are a built-in digital signal processor, which is provided to support HD voice but which also offloads audio transcoding functions from the host processor.

The new chips also support the Bluetooth 3.0 + HS standard, which enables two devices to use a Wi-Fi connection to exchange large chunks of data. The CSR8000 series can do this only when combined with a separate CSR Wi-Fi chip, however.