Asustek Computer has teamed up with IC designer C-Media Electronics and launched a new high-end sound card on March 17, and is also cooperating with Realtek Semiconductor to launch a new multimedia player under its O!Play series targeting the smart TV market.
Asustek has launched its new Xonar Essence ST/STX-series high-end sound card, jointly developed with C-Media and featuring a signal-to-noise-ratio (SNR) of 124dB to offer a sound quality 64 times better than the built-in sound cards on a standard motherboard, the company claimed. In addition, the card also features a built-in headphone amplifier, EMI mask, as well as Dolby surround sound.
Asustek pointed out that its Xonar series sound cards are priced between NT$1,290-8,490 (US$45-295) and the company is even planning a model with a price over NT$10,000 in the future, targeting the high-end gaming market.
The revenue contribution of Asustek's sound card business in 2010 was about N$800-900 million and with the strong demand of its Xonar series, the company expects its revenues from the business to grow more than double in 2012. The company already shipped about 80,000 sound cards in the first quarter of 2011.
In the future, the company is planning to push its Xonar audio technologies into notebook and motherboard products for the high-end market.
As for its multimedia player business, Asustek has shipped about 200,000 O!Play series multimedia players since it started cooperating with Realtek a year ago. Asustek is currently also in cooperation with US-based multimedia websites such as Hulu and Netflix to integrate their services onto its products.
Article translated by Joseph Tsai
