With Blu-ray and HD DVD players soon to hit the market, Santa Clara, Calif.-based programmable graphics processor provider Nvidia Corp. said today it is now shipping its PureVideo technology, aimed at allowing support for high-definition video including hardware acceleration for content based on the advanced H.264 specification.

H.264 is also known as the Advanced Video Codec (AVC) specification or MPEG-4 Part 10, and is one of the digital video codecs specified for the Blu-ray and High Definition DVD (HD DVD) formats, Nvidia explained.

The H.264 spec is meant to deliver two to three times the compression efficiency of the MPEG-2 standard, which is used to create current DVD videos. H.264 has been adopted by both the DVD Forum for HD DVDs and the Blu-ray Disc Association for Blu-ray Discs. VC-1 has also been adopted by the DVD Forum for HD DVDs.

Nvidia said its PureVideo technology allows hardware acceleration for decoding H.264, VC-1, WMV and MPEG-2 movies and performs post processing techniques on the decoded high definition content, including spatial-temporal de-interlacing and inverse telecine so that consumers can view precise images that have up to six times the detail of standard DVD movies. The PureVideo discrete video processing core also offloads the CPU and 3D engine of complex video tasks, freeing the PC to run multiple applications simultaneously.

Nvidia said consumers with PCs built with the following of its products will be able to watch high-definition videos and DVDs with a high level of visual quality and performance: GeForce 7-series of GPUs for the desktop and notebook PC; GeForce 6-series of GPUs for the desktop and notebook PC and nForce 6150 family of integrated GPUs.

“With the introduction of our latest version of PureVideo technology, Nvidia is enabling a new era of high-definition movie and television viewing on a PC,” said Scott Vouri, general manager of multimedia products at Nvidia in a statement.

“While it seems as if the rest of the industry focuses on improving standard definition processing capabilities, we are providing consumers with the high- definition video processing and acceleration,” he added.

Nvidia said it has been working closely with InterVideo, CyberLink and Nero software to include the PureVideo acceleration and post-processing in their H.264 codecs, leveraging the company’s algorithms to deliver high quality and performance on today's PCs.

CyberLink Corp. CEO Alice H. Chang concluded, “As desktop and notebook PCs are being relied on to deliver the best video experience, you will have to ensure that you have the right combination of hardware and software. It was only natural for us to work with NVIDIA, for the company’s depth of experience in developing video and graphics technologies will enable us to bring high- definition video content to consumers worldwide.”

By: DocMemory
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