HD Flash video, which has a hearty appetite for CPU cycles, and Intel’s Atom, which doesn’t have huge surplus of said CPU cycles, have never made a great couple. So Adobe getting serious about Flash hardware acceleration on netbooks is great news! For some. Eventually.

The announcement comes in two parts: one from Nvidia; one from Broadcom. Both promise full hardware acceleration for Flash video, primarily by means of upgrades to Adobe’s plugin, which guarantees smooth playback of HD flash video, which is becoming the norm for online streaming content, and more importantly in my mind, much, much lower CPU usage during regular video playback.

The reason for this announcement strategy, unfortunately, is that the first wave of optimisation will only benefit hardware based on either Nvidia’s powerhouse Tegra solution, or Atom netbooks which have Broadcom’s Crystal HD video acceleration add-on, which must either be installed by the OEM (rare) or plugged into a PCI-E Mini port or ExpressCard port. In other words, current-gen netbooks, based on Intel’s chipsets, are kinda left out in the cold, unless Adobe pulls something out of their hat before release.

About that release: we won’t even see this Flash upgrade for Atom until “the first half of 2010″, though the release hints the Tegra will support it from the get-go. I expect more partnered announcement like this to drop before then, and for GPU-accelerated Flash to become the norm eventually, but for now: Adooobeeee!

Broadcom makes the Bluetooth chip spotted in the iPod touch. The company’s latest offering might show us what’s to come next on Apple’s platform.

Equipped with the latest Bluetooth 3.0 (reaching 24Mbps), unspecified Wi-Fi and FM radio, Broadcom’s BCM4325 is the first chip of its kind to receive the go-ahead from the Bluetooth Qualification Board. And were Apple to upgrade the semi-dormant Bluetooth chip in the iPod touch and stick with Broadcom as the manufacturer, logic would tell us that this is the chip they’d use.

But don’t get your hopes up about Apple activating that FM radio. The old version had that, too.

Broadcom’s Combo Chip and Software Achieve Bluetooth® Qualification to Newly Ratified Bluetooth v3.0 + HS Specification

New Specification Adds Enhanced Functionality to Broadcom® InConcert® Combo Chip Products by Enabling Bluetooth Profiles to Leverage High Speed Wi-Fi®

IRVINE, Calif. – April 22, 2009 – Broadcom Corporation (Nasdaq: BRCM), a global leader in semiconductors for wired and wireless communications, today announced that its leading Bluetooth® combo chip technology and associated BTE software have been qualified as compliant with the ratified Bluetooth v3.0 + HS (high speed) specification. The new standard significantly expands the capabilities of Bluetooth wireless technology in multimedia smartphones, netbooks and other devices by enabling the transmission of large files via Bluetooth profiles at speeds up to 24 Megabits per second (Mbps), or a 10 times increase in speed over the previous Bluetooth v2.1 + EDR (enhanced data rate) standard. With the company’s InConcert® BCM4325 Bluetooth + Wi-Fi® + FM combo chip solution (which was the first product in the industry to achieve qualification) and Bluetooth software, Broadcom is uniquely positioned to support the latest Bluetooth specification with proven single-chip solutions.

While competing implementations require multiple discrete components that raise cost and power requirements, Broadcom is able to provide a single-chip solution that includes both a qualified Bluetooth v3.0 BR/EDR (basic rate) controller and Wi-Fi CERTIFIED™ media access controller (MAC)/physical layer (PHY) device. When combined with Broadcom’s v3.0 + HS qualified host software solution, these products enable OEMs to add the convenience of high speed Bluetooth data transfer while reducing board space, power consumption and overall system cost in next generation Bluetooth-enabled devices. Broadcom’s high speed Bluetooth technology was recently demonstrated at the 2009 International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG) announced the formal adoption of its next generation Bluetooth v3.0 + HS wireless connectivity technology on April 21, 2009, at the SIG Annual All-Hands meeting in Tokyo.

In addition to enabling Bluetooth profiles to utilise high speed 802.11 data rates, Broadcom silicon and software solutions will further enable mobile devices to leverage the low power connection management features provided by Bluetooth wireless technology, increasing the valuable synergy between these already popular technologies. Broadcom is working together with other companies and various standards groups to standardize these additional capabilities.

“The new Bluetooth v3.0 + HS specification is a welcome step in the continuing evolution of Bluetooth technology, adding industry approved techniques for leveraging the high data rates of Wi-Fi with the ease of use, low-power and utility that Bluetooth wireless technology is recognised for,” said Craig Ochikubo, Vice President & General Manager of Broadcom’s Wireless Personal Area Networking line of business. “The new specification makes our combo chip products even more attractive to OEMs who seek to provide their customers with the most complete wireless user experience available.”

The Bluetooth products now qualified as compliant with the v3.0 + HS specification include the Broadcom® BCM4325 802.11b/ combo chip solution that combines Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and FM radio functionality on a single-chip design. Broadcom’s popular BTE software, the core Bluetooth software stack for which all Broadcom Bluetooth software is based (including BTW, BTW Mobile and embedded software for cellular handsets and other devices) has also been qualified as compliant with the new v3.0 + HS standard. The BCM4325 is also Wi-Fi CERTIFIED in a number of customer products.

In addition to enabling 10 times the transmission speed over previous Bluetooth specifications, v3.0 + HS provides other useful innovations that Broadcom combo chips and BTE software can utilise as well. This includes expanded capabilities for remote control applications featuring Unicast Connectionless Data (UCD) functionality that enables low power operation and reduced latency, making Bluetooth’s radio technology ideally suited for consumer electronics remote control applications. The Bluetooth v3.0 + HS specification also enhances the already powerful security capabilities of Bluetooth technology by including the new Read Encryption Key Size feature that allows Bluetooth applications to ensure an appropriate level of communications security.

Broadcom’s Bluetooth BR/EDR controller solutions, including the BCM4325 and BCM4329, further provide support for the Enhanced Power Control feature introduced in the Bluetooth v3.0 + HS specification. This feature provides improved control over transmit power levels on Bluetooth BR/EDR links, improving the robustness of communications and providing better optimised power consumption.

“The Bluetooth Special Interest Group is gratified that Broadcom has played an active role in helping drive the evolution of Bluetooth technology through its contributions to the standard and timely implementation of these new features,” said Michael Foley, Ph.D., executive director of the Bluetooth SIG. “With strength in multiple wireless technologies, the company is helping make the vision of high speed Bluetooth technology a reality.”

If there’s a must-have mobile technology this year, that’s Bluetooth over Wi-Fi. Easy-to-establish, peer-to-peer Bluetooth connectivity seamlessly coupled with Wi-Fi speeds. As the video shows, the experience is perfect. I want this in my iPhone.

The new Bluetooth specification—technically denominated alternate MAC/PHY—will be official this April. And unlike other technologies, it won’t be in limbo for a while before reaching consumers. In fact, your phone may support it right now, according to Broadcom’s Mukul Suth: Some of their current production chips already have this ability and they will only require a software upgrade to implement it.

The alternate MAC/PHY method is quite clever: The two devices discover each other and shake hands using Bluetooth (being mobile phones, computers, or any other shiny thing supporting the standard). When you start any file transfer, the communication gets passed to the Wi-Fi hardware layer, which will transfer your data at 54mbps. Once the transfer is over, Wi-Fi is disconnected and the control passes again to Bluetooth.

It just works. According to the Bluetooth Special Interest Group, the standard will allow you to easily:

• Wirelessly bulk synchronise music libraries between PC and MP3 player
• Bulk download photos to a printer or PC
• Send video files from camera or phone to computer or television.

Sounds good to me. Having this easy-to-use, straightforward ability to just connect to any device and transfer information in a fast way, without needing any wireless network or access points, will be great.

• Sharper Image is now selling four unlocked Windows Mobile cell phones. The top of the line model has a 2MP camera, touchscreen, Bluetooth, tri-band, and GPRS, but sadly no ionic air-purifier or back massager. [Uber Phones]
• Qualcomm has completed new chipsets that do not infringe on Broadcom patents. [Phone Scoop]