Patent ID: 7526791

Claim:
In an interactive broadband set-top box receiving broadband signals from a headend, apparatus within a single IC chip to facilitate communications with an installed card within said set-top box, said apparatus comprising: a broadband digital signal processing module (BDSPM) residing on said single IC chip to process said broadband signals; and a PC-card/POD interface module (PPIM) residing on said single IC chip and interfacing to said BDSPM and capable of being configured to operate in a PCMCIA PC-card mode and a POD mode, along with said BDSPM, in order to communicate with said installed card by multiplexing PC card signals or POD-compatible signals to said installed card, wherein said PC-card/POD interface module is operable to: configure the single IC chip for operation in the PCMCIA PC-card mode in the absence of an installed card; detect presence of an installed card; identify whether the installed card is PC card or POD module; and re-configure the single IC chip to the POD mode if the installed card is a POD module.