What if you could transmit video from your mobile device to an external display at HD resolution? It’s happening now at Nokia Research Center Bochum.

The noBounds Project from Nokia Research Center Bochum in Germany is working on a Python-driven app that wirelessly transmits content to external displays at 30fps, in full HD and with very little battery consumption.

In essence, this project will enable us to carry a small device that we can connect to any computer monitor or flat screen if we have a need for a larger display. They’ve literally decoupled the computing power of small devices from their screens.

How could this be used?

Productivity - You have a document in your phone you would like to edit, but the screen is too small. No problem. Connect your device to your nearest LCD monitor and keyboard, and it becomes a full-fledged computer.

Entertainment - You have a great collection of movies and games in your device. Take it to your friend’s house, connect wirelessly to his plasma TV and watch the movie directly from your device and in Full HD. When you’re done, disconnect and off you go.

Take a look at this video of noBounds in action on the N810 and read the description of the project from Bernd Steinke - noBounds innovator and Project Manager.

Bernd writes:

noBounds! - blast Smartphones display bounds!

Available mobile devices are now empowered to utilize huge external displays with native high definition efficiently and seamlessly via USB or WLAN. The noBounds project of the Nokia Research Center Bochum in Germany enables this breakthrough in mobile usability.

Smartphones have a tiny display, since they need to be pocketable. PCs and Notebook do not suffer from this restriction, but they are by far not that mobile. Since many years PCs are shrinking: Notebooks, UMPC and MID have been introduced. The opposite trend has started in the Smartphone world. The desire is to have more content, more details, thus more pixels on the display. The human eyes, especially of elderly people are limited in useable pixel-density. Thus, the size of the display increases. The physical dimensions of mobile devices are not allowed to increase further due to the pocketability constraint. Therefore the display resolution of the built-in display will remain limited. This leads in comparison Smartphone to PC to a disappointing feeling: Overview is still too limited! Alternative form factors such as rollable, foldable and any other kind of flexible display still need to mature for future deployment.

noBounds demonstrates the optimal way out of this dilemma to have a tiny Smartphone, AND utilize high definition (HD) displays by introducing a versatile and highly efficient interaction with external high resolution displays!

This intelligent object on demand transport based approach uses not modified USB / WLAN hardware and provides a fully interactive link even for very high resolutions (e.g. HD-Ready FullHD, 1920×1080p or more). The solution can sustain high frame rates (30 frames/sec or more) and has a very low power consumption. It outperforms other solutions significantly even in worst case conditions. This lead increases even more for partial display content changes. We have negligible latency (under 30 ms, i.e less than a frame) also for previously problematic screen export use cases such as GUI, office applications, web browsing, and 3D scene rendering for gaming.

This evaluation concentrated on mobile Linux devices (e.g. Nokia N800, N810) having comparable performance to recent Smartphones, which feature a similar powerful CPU (OMAP2420, ARM11) and USB / WLAN hardware architecture. noBounds requires the installation of our SW in the mobiles and a firmware update for the display devices, provided that USB or WLAN is available. Alternatively, the mobile devices can connect to a dongle accessory via USB or WLAN. The dongle is attached to existing external displays via traditional display interfaces such as DVI, or SubD VGA.

noBounds allows not only to attach an external high resolution display to a mobile device very efficiently, but allows also to seamlessly use available input devices such as a keyboard or a USB mouse. Thus, it can act as a complete Laptop or PC replacement for the majority of PC applications. Since the solution has a ultra low power dissipation (no fans needed & longtime battery powered) it has the potential to revolutionize the classical IT environment (Green IT): The users have all their data and processing capabilities in a mobile device, yet are able to use the ergonomic peripherals they are used to in a PC environment.

A fully mobile usage with a single 1200mAh phone battery powering the phone, USB and a Near to Eye Display (NED) estimates to allow more than 6 hours typical office application usage time without a power supply.

Special thanks and credit to Reggie and the rest of the folks at Internet Tablet Talk - the best online community for Nokia Internet Tablet users - for bringing this project to my attention.

What do you think about the noBounds project? Share your thoughts in the comments.

Related articles:
Inside Nseries: Q&A with Urho Konttori, Project Manager, Nokia N810
On the Go: Nokia N810 WiMAX Edition in the news
Apps & Services: Q&A with David Wood, EVP Research, Symbian

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