04 December 2008

VisualOn Multimedia Solution Optimized For ARM NEON

VisualOn, Inc., a member of the ARM Connected Community, has taken the wraps off a set of industry standard software multimedia codecs optimized for ARM NEON technology.

The performance of these software codecs now rivals costlier hardware-based multimedia solutions and DSP implementations, VisualOn said.

Developed for the ARM Cortex-A8 processor with ARM NEON technology, VisualOn’s multimedia codecs were optimized using the ARM RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools. Utilizing the benefits of ARM NEON technology, VisualOn video codecs perform three to six times better than an equivalent implementation for an ARM11 family processor, according to VisualOn. This enables handheld and other consumer devices to achieve performance targets for multimedia processing that previously required the use of dedicated hardware. VisualOn’ s suite of codecs will enable wider deployment of software based multimedia solutions in mobile and consumer markets.

“The ARM Cortex-A8 processor with NEON technology is meeting the processing demands of a wide range of multimedia applications, from smartphones and mobile computing devices to HDTV, ” said Ian Drew, VP marketing, ARM. “The highly efficient and optimized VisualOn codecs will further accelerate the adoption of NEON technology-enabled ARM processors."

“With the significant performance gains we have achieved on the ARM Cortex-A8 processor and NEON technology, we are rapidly accelerating adoption into new customer opportunities,”  explained Sean Torsney, World Wide VP Sales and Marketing at VisualOn. “Given the robustness of the RealView Development Suite 3.1 Professional tools, coupled with our world class R&D organization, we were able to port our software code base and see outstanding performance gains in a very short period of time".

"Our customers have been similarly impressed with this breakthrough as it clearly offers them new price / performance product capability. High-performance, low-cost video and audio on handsets and portable devices is a 'must have' in order to compete in the rapidly evolving consumer markets," added Torsney.