Jan 11, 2011 13:59 GMT  ·  By

Intel has, for some time, had a technology capable of streaming multimedia wirelessly, in real time, and it seems that one of the assets of the latest Core processors is the support for its second incarnation, WiDi 2.0.

Intel developed the WiDi technology as a means to stream high quality multimedia to TV from a PC without the need for many cables.

This means that WiDi utilizes the wireless bandwidth of WiFi to transmit a video feed, while a receiver picks up on it.

Originally, only Netgear made such receivers, but it is now revealed that the Santa Clara, California-based CPU maker has gained and aims to keep signing up more such partners.

The newest iteration of the WiDi technology, WiDi 2.0, utilizes the Quick Sync engine developed by SNB, as revealed by a recent report.

This engine encodes the frame buffer in real time and also sends it, 802.11n, to compatible WiFi receivers attached to a TV.

In other words, consumers need only possess such a SNB laptop with an Intel WiFi controller in order to take advantage of the feature.

The main advantage is that the central processing unit itself is the one performing all the video encoding, unlike in the case of wireless HDMI.

Thus, one need only pay for the WiDi receiver, meaning that the overall cost is far lower than for wireless HDMI.

No at all surprisingly, Intel demonstrated WiDi 2.0 at the 2011 International Consumer Electronics Show, last week. The setup was made up of a SNB notebook and a D-Link WiDi receiver.

The technology is impressive even on its own, but an even greater use for it is now available, thanks to the Sandy Bridge support for HDCP and 1,080p video quality.

Basically, Blu-ray content can now be streamed to a WiDi-connected TV set form a SNB mobile computer.