ViXS Announces 3D-Ready Dual HD Transcoder SoC for IPTV PVRs

ViXS® Sets a New Industry Standard by Delivering the World’s Most Advanced Network Multimedia Processor; XCode®4210, the First Fully Integrated Dual HD Transcoder HD DVR SoC for IPTV Set-top Boxes, encodes, decodes and transcodes HD video up to 1080p60/50 simultaneously

TORONTO — ViXS Systems Inc. announced today a new family of advanced networked multimedia SoC solutions. The XCode® 4210, the first device of the new family, is a highly integrated processor designed for IPTV set-top boxes. Setting a new benchmark in application and communications processing, the XCode®4210 has the highest application CPU performance and boasts the highest sustained networked data throughput in a single chipset. The product, whose highly integrated design eliminates the need for a media co-processor, will be showcased at IPTV World Forum, Meeting Room 18, Olympia National Hall, London, March 23 – 25 2010.

Integrating all of ViXS advanced media-processing technology into a new architecture, the ViXS® XCode®4210 offers unparalleled performance and feature rich differentiation for best-in-class multimedia user experience. The XCode®4210 is the only set-top box SoC able to encode, decode and transcode multiple HD streams up to 1080p60/50 simultaneously, setting a new industry standard.

“ViXS continues to lead the competition by delivering industry-leading products for each of its target markets,” said Sally Daub, President & CEO ViXS Systems Inc. “With the introduction of the XCode®4210, ViXS has met the challenges of emerging advanced set-top box applications. This product reduces the system cost of high performance set-top boxes by eliminating the need for a media co-processor. The XCode®4210 will truly enable what have been niche media applications to become the mainstream capabilities for any class of consumer entertainment device.”

The XCode®4210 can transcode up to two HD streams, taking advantage of the Smart XCode™ technology based on sophisticated algorithms, dynamically switching between a highly efficient smart transcode and a full decode re-encode approach. The XCode®4210 incorporates a dual HD 1080p30/25/24 decoder that supports picture in picture and the latest H.264 Scalable Video Coding (SVC) decoding standard for content transition to 1080p60/50 broadcasting and an additional media processing engine for flexible decoding of multiple Internet formats. The XCode®4210 has the ability to transcrypt and transcode any multimedia content to any multimedia and container formats allowing seamless streaming, downloading and sideloading to a multitude of connected consumer entertainment devices, such as set-top box, PC/laptop, TV, game console, DLNA client, wireless tablet, consumer electronics, and wired or wireless portable or smart phone.

The XCode®4210 delivers user performance in excess of 3,200 DMIPS distributed over a main MIPS 74k applications processor and two ARC 750D offload processors, all simultaneously running their own real time operating systems. This level of performance has set a new benchmark in application and communications processing with the highest sustained networked data throughput over 400 Mbit/s in a single chipset. Moreover, the XCode®4210 architecture produces the best-in-class power consumption for network multimedia processor SoC integrating dual HD transcoding.

An internally architected OpenGL ES 2.0 3D graphics engine provides 1080p graphics rendering on multiple overlays/surfaces as well as on tiled, mosaic and 3D TV content. The 3D graphics performance on the XCode®4210 is currently the only solution that passes the Futuremark™ benchmark in the set-top box market.

To provide the best image quality to consumers, the XCode®4210 supports advanced video processing including high quality de-interlacing and scaling, edge adaptive sharpening, adaptive contrast enhancement, color management, noise reduction and powerful compositing engines all at 1080p60/50 HD resolution over HDMI and component outputs.

Specifically designed for 3D TV applications, the XCode®4210 includes full 3D TV display formatting capability, 2D/3D graphics rendering, and the latest H.264 Multi-view Codec (MVC) 3D TV decoding standard.

In addition to bringing the next generation of smart network multimedia processor chipsets, ViXS continues to provide its customers with the rich Xtensiv™ software suite including certified DLNA 1.5 stack developed internally, complete DVR stack, WebKit browser, Qt, Adobe Flash Lite, Java/JavaScript support, Linux DVB, DirectFB and other software tools and applications to accelerate the development of advanced multimedia solutions. The XCode®4210 will also support Adobe embedded Flash 10.1, Android and Win CE 7 that will be announced throughout this year.