DisplayPort Alt Mode rides the wave of growing DisplayPort adoption in mobile display applications including smartphones, tablets, ultra high-definition displays, and virtual reality headsets

SAN JOSE, Calif. – February 15, 2017 – The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA ^®) today announced that, thanks to escalating adoption by OEMs and chipmakers, the DisplayPort™ standard is continuing to gain momentum in the mobile consumer electronics space. Much of this recent growth stems from adoption of the DisplayPort Alternate Mode (“Alt Mode”) that is supported by dozens of commercially available products to date using the new USB Type-C™ connector. This adoption is being fueled by the industry-leading display performance, robustness, versatility, system integration and interoperability that DisplayPort enables. Moreover, recent developments such as the completion and release of the  DisplayPort Alt Mode Compliance Test Specification (CTS) and the establishment of the DisplayPort  High Bit Rate 3 (HBR3) Early Product Certification Program for video source and display products are expected to further ecosystem growth and drive adoption for these advanced technologies.

According to market research firm Strategy Analytics, more than 110 million handsets and tablet devices have been sold as of Q4 2016 that include native DisplayPort, DisplayPort Alt Mode and MyDP. “There is a perfect storm which will boost consumer demand for 4K/HDR video and VR/AR applications through the rest of this decade,” stated Eric Smith, senior analyst, Tablet and Touchscreen Strategies at Strategy Analytics. “Displays have higher resolution, wireless connections are faster and have lower latency, physical connectors are smaller and provide higher bandwidth, and high-quality video content is more ubiquitous. Consumers continue to use more video on mobile devices as enabling technologies develop. More than a third of smartphones sold in 2017 already have the ability to capture 4K video – Strategy Analytics forecasts that percentage will increase to over half by the beginning of the next decade. Consumers will not hesitate to take advantage of this ever greater capability and will capture and consume ever growing amounts of high-definition content.”

DisplayPort Alt Mode Supported in Qualcomm® Snapdragon™ 835 platform

Among the latest developments with DisplayPort, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc., a subsidiary of Qualcomm Incorporated, confirms that the Snapdragon 835 platform—its latest mobile chipset unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show last month—includes DisplayPort Alt Mode video transport. The Snapdragon 835 is designed to enable thinner and lower-power premium-tier consumer devices such as smartphones, virtual reality/augmented reality (VR/AR) head-mounted displays, IP cameras, tablets and mobile PCs. Inclusion in Qualcomm Technologies’ newest and most advanced mobile system-on-chip (SoC) will further support DisplayPort adoption within the phone and wireless device industry.

“DisplayPort Alt Mode over USB Type-C allows delivery of 4K60 video with audio, USB data and USB Power over a single cable and reversible connector,” said Salman Saeed, director, product management, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “We’ve chosen to integrate this technology into the Qualcomm Snapdragon 835 to support emerging, mobile productivity and virtual reality applications, while also reducing our customers bill of materials, design-in time and time to production.”

VESA will showcase new mobile products incorporating DisplayPort Alt Mode as well as some of the first products utilizing DisplayPort v1.4 capability at the upcoming Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, from February 27 to March 2. Product demos on display at the VESA booth include:

• USB Type-C with DisplayPort Alt Mode Ecosystem – VESA will showcase some of the latest commercially available mobile devices utilizing the USB Type-C connector with DisplayPort Alt Mode. DisplayPort Alt Mode is the only Alt Mode video transport adopted in the marketplace and used today by most video sources utilizing USB Type-C. It enables the highest display performance available, combined with USB Type-C’s high-speed data transfer and power delivery functions.

• 4K 60 Hz High Dynamic Range (HDR) – VESA will demonstrate how DisplayPort’s support of HDR can be utilized by a DisplayPort-to-HDMI adapter to fully support the capability of HDMI 2.0b, including 4K 60 Hz with HBR3.

• Dual 4K 60 Hz Displays from a Single DisplayPort Output – VESA will demonstrate a single DisplayPort output driving dual 4K 60Hz displays via the DisplayPort Multi-Stream Transport (MST) feature, which is enabled by the increased data rate (up to 8.1 Gbits/sec on 4 lanes or 32.4 Gbits/sec total) available from DisplayPort’s HBR3 capability. HBR3 also enables the support of 4K at a 60Hz frame rate using only two lanes. When used for DisplayPort Alt Mode across the USB Type-C connector, this frees up the other two lanes for a simultaneous USB 3.1 interface for
  10 Gbits/sec data transfer.

• 8K Monitor – VESA will showcase the new Dell UltraSharp 32 Ultra HD 8K 60Hz monitor (UP3218K), which offers 33.2 million pixels at 7680×4320resolution and is interconnected to the host PC using DisplayPort 1.3. The latest version of DisplayPort (version 1.4) can enable 8K 60 Hz HDR deep color with a single cable using VESA’s Display Stream Compression (DSC) standard.

• Display Stream Compression in 4K – The latest version of DSC (v1.2), developed by VESA with one of the objectives being to enable a consumer 8K display segment, will be demonstrated in 4K with compressed vs. uncompressed video side-by-side to showcase the visually lossless performance of this standard. DSC enables transport flexibility, power savings, and resolutions beyond what is possible today.

• Multimedia headset and Virtual Reality enabled by DisplayPort Alt Mode – VESA will showcase an Avegant Glyph personal theater headset connected to the USB Type-C connector of a smart phone using a DisplayPort Alt Mode-to-HDMI protocol adaptor. The emerging headset segment is embracing DisplayPort Alt Mode because of its high-performance, multi-screen video capability and compatibility with the mobile ecosystem.

“When developing the Glyph, one of our chief design objectives was that our personal theater work seamlessly with all major content sources and standards,” said Joerg Tewes, CEO at Avegant. “Using DisplayPort Alt Mode, our HDMI interface accepts inputs from a wide spectrum of sources from existing home entertainment systems to portable devices.”

“With each new DisplayPort incarnation, we are seeing growing interest from an industry eager to implement a standard that enables the highest video performance, versatility and integration on computers, smart devices and displays,” stated Bill Lempesis, executive director of VESA. “We look forward to giving Mobile World Congress attendees an opportunity to ‘test drive’ DisplayPort’s breakthrough capabilities for a variety of applications, including high-performance gaming, VR/AR, and digital television, through the interactive demos we’ll have in our booth.”

To view these demos and learn more about DisplayPort, please visit VESA at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, February 27 – March 2, 2017, at Hall 2, Stand 2B13MR. More information on DisplayPort is also available at  http://www.displayport.org/.

About VESA

The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) is an international, non-profit standards association representing a global network of more than 230 hardware, software, computer, display and component manufacturers committed to developing and promoting the electronics industry. VESA has an established 25-year track record of creating and supporting simple, universal and cross-product solutions for today’s video and electronics industry. The association’s standards include DisplayPort™, the industry replacement for DVI, LVDS and VGA. DisplayPort utilizes a state-of-the-art digital protocol and provides an expandable foundation to enable astonishing digital display experiences. For more information on VESA, please visit  http://www.vesa.org/.