MIPI Alliance Announces CSI‑2 v3.0, C-PHY v2.0, and D-PHY v2.5

BusinessWire: MIPI Alliance announces enhancements to MIPI Camera Serial Interface-2 (MIPI CSI‑2), the most widely used camera specification in mobile and other markets.

MIPI CSI‑2 v3.0 introduces three key new features:

• Unified Serial Link (USL), for encapsulating connections between an image sensor module and application processor—This capability is crucial for reducing the number of wires needed in IoT, automotive and client products for productivity and content creation, such as all-in-one and notebook computers.
• Smart Region of Interest (SROI), for analyzing images, inferencing algorithms and making better deductions—This capability could enable machines on a factory floor, for example, to more quickly identify potential defects on a conveyor belt, or it could enable medical devices to more surely recognize anomalies such as tumors.
• RAW-24, for representing individual image pixels with 24-bit precision—This capability will enable machines to make decisions from superior quality images. An autonomous vehicle, for example, could decipher whether darkness on an image is a harmless shadow or a pothole in the roadway to be avoided.

“Innovation of MIPI CSI‑2 never stops; we aim to remain at the frontier of providing end-to-end imaging conduit solutions for emerging vision and real-time perception and decision making AI applications mapped to mobile, client, IoT, medical, drones and automotive (ADAS) product platforms,” said Haran Thanigasalam, MIPI Camera Working Group chair. “In fact, work is already well underway on the next version of MIPI CSI‑2, with a highly optimized ultra-low-power always-on sentinel conduit solution for enhanced machine awareness, data protection provisions for security, and functional safety, as well as MIPI A-PHY, a forthcoming longer reach physical layer specification.”

MIPI C-PHY v2.0 was recently released to support CSI‑2 v3.0 capabilities, including support for 6 Gsps over the standard channel and up to 8 Gsps over the short channel; RX equalization; fast BTA; medium channel lengths for IoT applications; and an in-band control signaling option. MIPI D-PHY v2.5, with alternate low power (ALP), which uses pure low-voltage signaling instead of legacy 1.2 V LP signaling and a fast BTA feature for support of CSI‑2 v3.0, will be released later this year.