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ATI Avivo on the XBOX 360

ATI announced today that Microsoft has chosen its implementation of H.264 decoding for the XBOX 360 console. Microsoft has been alluding to the release of HD DVD play back and expansion for the console for some time now, although there was recent skepticism about a HD DVD drive being available for upgrade. Microsoft announced however that there would be an external add-on for playing back HD DVD. According to the press release:

To enable the smoothest H.264 video playback possible, the ATI decoder technology makes use of the Xbox 360's graphics processing unit (GPU) to accelerate video processing. The unified shader design of the GPU enables high-end processing techniques such as comb filtering and automatic gain control to ensure that video artifacts such as blockiness or color bands don't disrupt playback.

ATI says that the H.264 codec that will be used in the XBOX 360 will be part of ATI's Avivo technology. The codec will take advantage of the features inside the XBOX 360's ATI-based GPU. According to ATI, GPU features such as shaders will be used to process techniques such as comb filtering and gain control.

Microsoft choice to go with HD DVD was a topic of much discussion when the announcement was made. Despite user disagreements, Microsoft says that HD DVD media is cheaper to implement and because of this, playback devices will penetrate the market more quickly, thus driving down prices. Microsoft says it believes "HD DVD is the clear winner for consumers."

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Heh heh...
By segagenesis on 7/12/2006 10:01:55 AM , Rating: 2
Or this would be like how Coca-Cola has announced the use of Coca-Cola based flavoring in Coca-Cola derived product that tastes very similar to Coca-Cola.

Really, is it that painfully obvious?




RE: Heh heh...
By obeseotron on 7/12/2006 10:13:06 AM , Rating: 1
Using ATI's graphics chip doesn't mean MS had to buy anything else from them, they could have written a decoder themselves or bought one from someone else. What are you talking about with the coke stuff?


RE: Heh heh...
By mforce on 7/12/2006 10:30:14 AM , Rating: 2
Actually he's quite right . With an ATI GPU inside it's not like they were going to use an nVidia codec . ATI knows best what they have in there .


RE: Heh heh...
By Aganack1 on 7/12/2006 10:47:49 AM , Rating: 2
i thought i remember reading that microsoft didn't use ATI's dvd decoder for the 360.


RE: Heh heh...
By segagenesis on 7/12/2006 10:59:21 AM , Rating: 2
Im sorry :( My attempt at humor fails at life. I was trying to make a joke like how it would be pretty unusual if say Dell started using Gateway cases and IBM motherboards. So... it's kind of obvious that a company will usually eat thier own dogfood!


RE: Heh heh...
By littlebitstrouds on 7/12/2006 12:39:17 PM , Rating: 2
No, it was funny, this guy is an idiot.


RE: Heh heh...
By Staples on 7/12/2006 10:58:52 AM , Rating: 2
Plus ATI can now integrate it into the GPU to save even more manufacturing costs.


RE: Heh heh...
By tuteja1986 on 7/13/2006 2:37:45 AM , Rating: 2
Thank god ;) I hope its the same team that did AVIVO implementation. Should make the xbox 360 have high IQ playback for HD content.


Regular DVD
By epsilonparadox on 7/12/2006 10:12:02 AM , Rating: 2
Wish they'd implement Avivo in their regular DVD playback. Still can't believe how horrendous it is compared to a standalone dvd player.




RE: Regular DVD
By z3R0C00L on 7/12/2006 10:21:55 AM , Rating: 2
It is implemented. You need to use the ATi DVD Decoder available on your BBA ATi x1K series driver CD.
It's the best quality DVD playback in the industry.


RE: Regular DVD
By Vertigo101 on 7/12/2006 10:53:32 AM , Rating: 2
He mean on the 360. It's atrocious.


RE: Regular DVD
By Rolphus on 7/12/2006 11:13:55 AM , Rating: 2
Before the last system update, I'd have agreed with you... I had loads of problems with it... jerky playback, flickering on some scenes, all sorts.

Since the big dashboard update, though, I've found the playback to be very reasonable.

Admittedly, I'm running a standard-def CRT over RGB SCART though, so I'm hardly pushing the bounds of image quality.


By UNCjigga on 7/12/2006 9:26:47 PM , Rating: 2
I'm pretty sure that eventually MS will just include HD DVD playback in a future revision of Xbox 360--though they won't do this until late 2007/2008 at the earliest. By then it'll be smaller, generate less heat, include HDMI (though Engadget already has pics of a new system board with HDMI??) etc.

Basically, its how the console should've been done, but MS can't fix it now because all the early adopters would be up in arms and demand a refund, so MS has to wait until the likelihood of a class action lawsuit drops further.




By Alexvrb on 7/13/2006 12:15:29 AM , Rating: 2
How exactly would adding HD-DVD to a future revision of 360 be the basis for a class action lawsuit? :/


By pjladyfox on 7/12/2006 3:12:18 PM , Rating: 2
Does anyone know if this will carry over to allow .h264 streaming via a Windows Media Center 2005 system? If so, this would prompt me to convert all of our media library, especially our DivX/Xvid ones, over to .h264 ASAP.




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