SBIR-STTR Award

The Closed-Captioning consumer decoders (Tele-Caption I and II) are highly developed units that have been made in quantity production. Tele-Caption II has been marketed at about $200 retail. Cost reduction for a replacement decoder will require cost reductions in each of the sub-unit components such as tuner, IF-demodulator, in the decoder circuits and in the power supply and package. The decoder must pass FCC and UL approvals as well.The use of a consumer/video decoder to interface with a previously owned VCR or a TV monitor-receiver will also be explored.Anticipated Results and

Potential Commercial Applications:
a) Design and build a decoder which can be retailed for $150.00. b) Design and pilot produce a decoder chip set which can be sold for $15.00 or less. c) Design and build a video decoder that will retail for $100.00 or less.Key Words: Closed Captioning, Decoder, Television, Hearing-impaired, Line 21Topic 15: Development of Low-cost Television Closed-captioned Line 21 Decoders

The Closed-Captioning consumer decoders (Tele-Caption I and II) are highly developed units that have been made in quantity production. Tele-Caption II has been marketed at about $200 retail. Cost reduction for a replacement decoder will require cost reductions in the closed-caption decoder circuits (usually referred to as the "decoder module") and in the overall package design and assembly.The Phase II effort will be directed towards reducing the ideas developed in the Phase I study to a practical design for a single integrated circuit capable of performing all of the decoder module functions and then producing sample quantities of the integrated circuit (ASIC).A prototype closed-caption decoder will be designed and fabricated using the resulting ASIC and incorporating all the cost reducing package features we have proposed.Anticipated Results and

Potential Commercial Applications:
This Phase II development program's goals are to design and pilot produce a single ASIC solution for the decoder module which can be made for $5.00 and to design and build a decoder which can be retailed for $150.00. The key to broadening the availability of closed-captioning to the hearing impaired community is cost reduction and the key to any cost reduction is lowering the cost of the "decoder module". A $5.00 ASIC makes a low cost decoder possible AND opens the door to the ultimate cost reduction, namely building the decoder function directly into the TV receiver itself. Key Words: Closed Captioning, Decoder, Television, Hearing-impaired, Line 21Topic 15: Development of Low-cost Television Closed-captioned Line 21 Decoders