Brian's Brain

Regular visitors to Brian's Brian know that I've been a long-time enthusiastic follower of trends in the HDV video camera market. Over the past several years, a steady stream of videocams targeting both consumer (single-sensor, fixed lens) and professional (three-sensor, interchangeable lenses, etc) applications has trickled out of the factories of Canon, JVC and Sony, with each generation iteratively improving the bang-for-buck ratio of its precursor. The current low-price champion, Canon's HV10, has notably dipped below the all-important $1000 threshold according to Froogle.

Yet, ever since late 2005, my outlook for HDV has dimmed. That's because, as my post-briefing writeup indicated, I sat down with Ambarella and found out that the company was poised to begin shipping a low power image processor capable of encoding and decoding high profile, high-definition MPEG-4 AVC (aka MPEG-4 Part 10, aka H.264) video. MPEG-4 AVC, being much more bit-efficient than MPEG-2, is amenable to other, user-friendlier recording media, not just HDV's inexpensive tape....tape which is also, quoting from my Ambarella writeup, "Easily damaged. It eventually wears out and, unlike with VHS, when you drop a bit in the digital era, you've got big problems. It requires large, heavy, power-hungry motors, along with expensive precision transport mechanisms. And it's not random-access (that is, unless you have lots of patience)."

An MPEG-4 AVC-based video format competitor to HDV called AVCHD has emerged, and both Sony and Panasonic (the latter, interestingly, a historically staunch HDV detractor, and a historical promoter instead of its proprietary DVCPRO HD format) are now shipping cameras based on AVCHD. The videocams record to media such as flash memory, optical discs and hard drives. Sony's single-sensor HDR-SR1 is below $1500, with Panasonic's three-sensor competition undercutting Sony's pricing and ramping into production this month. And I think it's important to point out, from an infrastructure compatibility standpoint, that MPEG-4 AVC is a specified, required format for both Blu-ray and HD DVD.

Not surprisingly, Ambarella's also no longer the only silicon engine game in town; last month, EDN's Ron Wilson covered the premier offering from the freed and rejuvenated 3Dlabs (who, it's important to note, for the moment at least is only targeting D1 i.e. standard-def resolutions, and isn't therefore an option for AVCHD apps). I recently had the opportunity to chat with Fujitsu, who'll be demonstrating its high def-capable MB86H50 video processor at the Consumer Electronics Show in a few weeks. And speaking of CES, stay tuned as I'll have more to say about this fast-growing technology segment once I'm free of a few more embargo date constraints.

Fujitsu's device draws an estimated 600 mW (at 1.2V) when recording (encoding), and around 450 mW in playback (decode-only) mode. The company chose an interesting packaging scheme for the chip; within the 650-bump FBGA (15mm² with 0.5mm bump pitch) you'll find not only the MB86H50 die but also two 256 Mbit FCRAMs. I wondered if I'd ever see another FCRAM come from the technology's originator! ,

Fujitsu's quoted pricing ($60-$75, at quantities ranging from 50,000 to 100,000 units) might give you pause, until you see what Ambarella was quoting just one year ago (and remember, that quote didn't include the DRAM). And while MPEG-2 processors might still be less expensive today, the video codec they're based on is also far more mature (or, if you prefer, archaic). MPEG-4 AVC finally has a full head of industry steam behind it, and with the fuel of Moore's Law powering Fujitsu and its competitors, I 'spect we'll see some amazing MPEG-4 AVC price and feature accomplishments in the months and years to come. And HDV? Alas, it'll probably fade into the celluloid sunset as did its full-size cassette precursor, D-VHS.

Followup: It appears that JVC may have also caught the AVCHD wave. The press release doesn't explicitly mention the format, but the HDD presence tips me off that it's not HDV.

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