Folx,
At work, we encode tons of video and some/most have fairly short TTM requirements. It is all Web-destined and sooner we get it out, the better it is for us and consumers alike.
So we use SW that supports variety of video format and encode video in Flash/WM and other formats.
Now the problem statement: it is dead slow. We use latest-greatest in computer tech (latest AMD and Intel CPUs), but still even @ lower Web rez, the encoded happen at slower than real-time. By now, the video compression algorythms are prolly well perfected and it is unreasonable to expect any breaktrhoughs there. The situation will improve somewhat as Intel's Woodcrests/Conroe become available, but still.
So about the only way one can accelerate the process is by HW acceleration. As suprising as it is, there doesn't appear to be any products out there ! While most cell phones these days have HW-accelerated video DEcodes, there's nothing for encoding.
I know some folx here have pretty good idea as to what might be possible with FPGAs, as far FFT/DCTs are concerned. Do you think a board can designed (price does NOT matter) that can rediacally improve the situation ?
the market is ripe for something like that. Of course, one would need to make sure there is a clear API and major vendors enable their codes to work with it.
Something like PCI-X or PCIEx4, with (a few of ?) Virtex4 on it, may be
512MB of fastest SRAM for buffering.Input would be say DV25 or MPEG2, output: MPEG4, Flash 8, WM 9/10, in
500x300 rez or thereabouts.So ... put it together and laugh all the way to the bank :) Market is
10s of thou, easily. You can ask 15-20K for something like that, assuming it radically cuts encoding time.Ideas ?