Domestic companies are scrambling to develop new digital video recording (DVR) systems, which have come into the spotlight as new security systems in the wake of the Nov. 11 terrorist attack on the US.

According to industrial sources yesterday, companies are gearing up for steep competition to get ahead in the rising DVR market, which is expected to grow to hundreds of billions of won in Korea only as DVR systems replace the current analog CCTVs.

KODICOM, the nation`s leading DVR maker, is planning to develop high-end, multi-functional DVR products based on its K-engine, which reduces the load of CPU to below 50% for video storing.

The company plans to unveil a 4.020 version of its DVR system that, adopting the K-engine, reduces the load needed for video recording by 75%, features strengthened communication, audio-video recording functions and provide auto tracking, sensor location display, 16-channel audio recording features.

With the development of a DVR system based on Windows 2000 to be completed in December, KODICOM is also developing a Windows NT-based DVR system.
Comart System offers a high-end DVR system that provides a 480 frame video display and a 120 frame recording based on its own solution instead of the BT 878 analog-digital conversion chip used by most other DVR systems.

The company plans to unveil a Linux-based DVR model early next year as well. Seol Chang-hoon, co-president of Comart System said, "Our Linux-based DVR system is superb in both reliability and ease to use. It doesn`t fall behind stand-alone DVR systems in both price and performance."

He added that the new model will combine the flexibility of PC-based products and the reliability of stand-alone products. Wooju Communications is making inroads into the DVR market with its low-price home DVR system. The company`s recently unveiled DVR model uses a software solution for compressing and retrieving MPEG video instead of using hardware solutions, making possible a deep cut in price.

Wooju`s DVR system is also highly scalable as it supports almost all operating systems including Windows Me and Windows NT, 2000, highly increasing the reliability of DVR systems which have often experienced malfunction due to the intrinsic defects of Windows 95, 98. Meanwhile, Comart System is planning to add to its current 7 DVR models 3 more using MPEG2 and MPEG4.