High-Definition Networking Alliance Formed

Leading companies across a variety of converging electronics sectors have formed the High-definition Audio-Video Network Alliance (HANA) in an attempt to create “guidelines” that will increase capabilities and ease of use for networked high-definition components throughout the home, and include robust copy protection.

HANA’s founding members include Charter Communications, JVC, Mitsubishi, NBC Universal, Samsung and Sun Microsystems. Samsung’s Dr. Heemin Kwon referred to the formation of this group as a milestone, “Since HANA is a cross-industry effort with members from each of the impacted HD industries we can achieve the ‘win-win’ necessary to commercialize HD networks.”

HANA plans to leverage existing technologies such as IEEE1394 (FireWire) to accomplish a number of stated goals, including allowing consumers to view and record five or more HD channels at once, view and record HD anywhere in the house using just one set-top box, securely share content among networked PCs and AV devices, connect any device to the network with a single cable, and control all devices and access content using just a single remote control per room. HANA-compliant products are envisioned to include HDTVs, next-gen HD optical disc players, and set-top box DVRs, cable boxes and other home theater components.

HANA’s inaugural press release states that the organization is already in discussions with The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the Advanced Television Systems Committee (ATSC), and the 1394 Trade Association. It also said that it plans in the first half of 2006 to work with the Advanced Access Content System (AACS), which is a copy protection scheme that will be employed by both Blu-ray and HD DVD. Future focal points for HANA will be video compression technologies, OpenCable Applications Platform, and wifi applications.

If some of this rhetoric sounds familiar it’s because we’ve heard the same thing before regarding HAVi and i.LINK. HAVi was formed in 1999 and stood for Home Audio Video interoperability, calling itself a “common, openly-licensable specification for networking digital home entertainment products.” Mitsubishi, Samsung and Sun Microsystems, among others, were members. An IEEE 1394 interface was the base of HAVi networking, and FireWire and i.LINK were cited as compatible interfaces. But HAVi didn’t gain widespread acceptance, and even now it’s not clear that i.LINK products from different manufacturers are compatible. The last update to the “News and Events” section of the HAVi web site is dated April of 2000.

While it’s swell that HANA is already communing with such important organizations as the MPAA and AACS, unless there is widespread acceptance among consumer electronics manufacturers the idea of a single cable and a simple remote control connecting and controlling our whole systems will remain a dream. I’d be far more optimistic right now if HANA had announced that they were talking with Toshiba and Sony for example, since those two companies are leading the way developing the standards for the next-gen HD optical disc formats. So, let’s just hope that in 2010 we’re not reporting that the last update to www.hanaalliance.org was in 2005!

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