Thomson Grass Valley unveiled an advanced digital video signal processing chip design at NAB2006. The new Grass Valley Advanced Compression Processor, developed by a large team of Grass Valley and Thomson engineers over three years, is tuned to the specific needs of real-time video processing without compromising quality.
The first application for the new chip will be in the Grass Valley ViBE HD MPEG-4 encoder. Working in combination with unique, highly powerful compression algorithms, the development team has demonstrated HD MPEG-4 encoding at premium quality levels in bandwidths as low as 4Mb/s. This ability to deliver HD in the same bandwidth as today’s MPEG-2 SD is a key enabling technology for the rapid growth of HD.
Design and performance verification of the new chip is now largely complete. Manufacturing quantities are expected to be available in September. The first ViBE MPEG-4 encoders based on the new chip will be delivered early in 2007. Those ordering ViBE MPEG-4 encoders today will be able to upgrade to the faster dedicated processor via simple board swap.
For more information, visit www.thomsongrassvalley.com.