Clearly, there's no way to access the Internet without DSP technology, though not all of the access products use programmable DSP chips or cores. With 400+ million wireless handsets shipping in 2000, it's clear that the cellular market is consuming tons of semiconductors, including not only DSP cores for baseband and vocoding functions but also RISC cores-along with mixed-signal and memory chips. DSP-based MP3 stereo playback and DSP-based global positioning capability along with WAP browsers are being added to 2001-model cell phones, enticing us all to discard our old units for the new ones.

With broadband Internet access as a driver, an estimated billion handsets will ship in 2003, and 65 percent of those will be replacement units. It's clear that the largest chip house in the world, Intel, is moving headlong into wireless, expecting to ship millions of DSP cores that will likely mate with the company's own Xscale RISC cores. The promise of DSP-enabled MPEG-4 video on our third-generation cell phones will engender even greater wireless demand later in the decade.

Another Internet focus by chip venders is on Internet appliances. Access may be through a home network based on wired or wireless technology, and you can't get there without DSP. To minimize cost, the DSP modem data pump function will likely be executed on the host processor, whether it's a Pentium-class chip with DSP-enabling MMX or streaming SIMD instructions or a RISC engine with a DSP-enhancing multiplier-accumulator bolted on.

Consumer electronics constitute a huge market for DSP functionality. If consumer electronics were on a PC platform, we'd call it "multimedia." The Napster-driven MP3 phenomenon has engendered a huge ramp for DSP-based portable players but also for (DSP-enabled) CD-R/W drives, MP3 jukeboxes, and flash memory cards. The predicted convergence of computers, communications and consumer electronics has occurred. Though many saw it coming, few realized that DSP would enable our multimedia future and would drive new technology for the semiconductor industry.

Will Strauss is an Industry Analyst and the President of Forward Concepts (www.forwardconcepts.com).