UDDC: seamless transmission of image data to microdisplays

The new UDDC will be presented for the first time at the joint booth of the Fraunhofer Society in Hall B4, Stand No. B-141, at electronica 2024 in Munich.

A data converter is an electronic circuit that transforms data from one form to another. Such converters are crucial for making different data formats compatible with various applications and systems.

The newly developed UDDC converts various standard video interfaces to a standard to drive various microdisplays and offers system developers and integrator adaption to video sources which are already available in their systems. This facilitates and accelerates the development of new products using Fraunhofer IPMS microdisplays in Augmented Reality (AR), Virtual Reality (VR), and other applications.

A Field-Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) serves as the central component of the system. The challenge in development was to create a system concept that allows maximum flexibility of the FPGA on the complex central system circuit board while occupying minimal space to simplify integration into prototype systems.

The microdisplays developed at Fraunhofer IPMS can now easily utilise established video protocols from the industry, including D-PHY+DSI from the MIPI Alliance in the mobile device sector (developed in the BMBF-funded project “EdgeVision”) and SMPTE SDI from the professional broadcasting area. The UDDC is also a universal and modular platform for easily adapting microdisplays to custom video protocols, such as those based on LVDS.

Advantages of the new UDDC

Florian Schuster, a scientist in IC and system design at Fraunhofer IPMS, explains the advantages of the new UDDC: “The flexible UDDC electronics platform allows for simply replacing the video input circuit board. In the simplest case, only replacing a connector for the respective video interface is necessary. Additionally, the overall system is only minimally larger than the microdisplay itself, making it easy to integrate into customer applications.”

In complex video protocols, adding additional video ICs may be necessary. In all cases, the circuitry for operating the most complex system component – the FPGA – remains unchanged. This means that the entire circuit board development effort for using an FPGA, such as creating the schematic and the intricate wiring of signals on the circuit board, is eliminated since the system circuit board can be used with any video input circuit boards. The power supply circuit board can be universally used in all circuit board combinations.

The scientists are ready for custom adaptations of the microdisplays and now also the interfaces for use in new products.