NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology revealed

NVIDIA and industry leading I/O board partners such as AJA, Blackmagic Design, Bluefish444, Deltacast, DVS, and Matrox are providing unprecedented real time video production capabilities leveraging NVIDIA® GPUDirect™ for Video. The technology provides application developers and their customers seamless, fast accessibility of the graphics and image processing power of NVIDIA Quadro® and Tesla™ professional graphics processing units (GPUs), with ultra-low latency input and output across a wide range of I/O devices.

NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology is the fastest, most deterministic way to get video data in and out of the GPU. Software vendors are now capable of harnessing the graphics and image processing power of GPUs without the latency, often as many as ten frames, previously associated with 3rd party video I/O boards. With this wide range of I/O vendors, customers can choose the best system for meeting their needs.

“The wide range of I/O devices now using GPUDirect for Video makes the power of the GPU that more accessible to the broadcast market,” said Greg Estes, industry executive, Media & Entertainment, NVIDIA. “No longer does a broadcaster or post house need to choose between the imaging capabilities of a GPU or low latency—they can have both when pairing our Quadro and Tesla professional graphics with a GPUDirect for Video enabled I/O board.”

GPUDirect for Video technology eliminates delays of as many as ten frames—an amount easily visible to the naked eye—when transferring video from an I/O device to a GPU, by enabling synchronized communications between the two. Developers no longer have to manage complex buffering schemes, which historically has led to unnecessary CPU overhead and increased latency.

AJA Video Systems, (Booth #SL3305) is a leading manufacturer of high-quality and cost-effective digital video interface, conversion, acquisition and desktop solutions supporting the professional broadcast and post-production markets. AJA is incorporating NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video in its I/O hardware.

“We’re planning to support NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video functionality for our OEM customers on both Windows and Linux through new SDK drivers,” said Nick Rashby, president, AJA Video Systems. “This technology implementation developed in partnership with NVIDIA will enable faster, more efficient communication between the GPU and our video I/O.”

Bluefish444 (Booth # SL9309), manufacturer of the industry’s highest-quality uncompressed 4K/2K/HD/SD SDI video cards, has also announced immediate availability of an extension to its Windows 7 64-bit SDK to support NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video. The extension to the Bluefish444 SDK is available for the entire range of Bluefish Epoch video cards.

“The applicability of low latency transfer leveraging NVIDIA GPUs provides a great benefit to Bluefish444 Epoch SDI I/O developers,” said Craige Mott, managing director of Bluefish444. “Our Epoch customer base can develop and broadcast better graphics using NVIDIA GPUs by an NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video extension to our Windows and Linux SDKs. It’s a tremendous advancement in video technology, and one we know will truly benefit our end-users.”

Deltacast (Booth #SL 8006) recently announced support for NVIDIA® professional graphics processing units (GPUs) available as an official extension of their VideoMasterHD OEM SDK. The SDK extension is now available in release v5.09 of VideoMasterHD on Windows 7 64-bit, and leverages NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video.

“This is another built-in solution, elegantly integrated within our popular VideoMasterHD SDK,” said Christian Dutilleux, CEO of Deltacast. “We continue to provide flexible and universal solutions to meet our customers’ needs, in order to minimize their software development and achieve the performance and specifications that their own customers, in turn, might require.”

DVS (Digital Video Solutions; Booth # SL6815), is a leading manufacturer of high-quality hardware and software for broadcast, digital film and video post production, including the Atomix HDMI, the ultimate video I/O card for handling high resolution video, and the Atomix LT two-channel 3G I/O video card. These DVS Atomix video cards now support NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video via a new SDK.

“We have over twenty-six years of experience in the professional video industry, and we know NVIDIA has the same ‘passion for perfection’ that we do,” said Juergen Heger, senior product manager, DVS. “Adding NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology to our high-performance Atomix I/O cards is the perfect combination for delivering high resolution video streams at extremely low latency, streaming video to and from the GPU at sub-frame transfer times. DVS and NVDIA are redefining what’s possible using workstations in real-time video production.”

Matrox (Booth #SL5115) is a market leader in the field of HD and SD digital video hardware and software, providing technology that powers a full range of content creation and delivery platforms used by broadcasters, post facilities, corporate communicators, videographers and A/V professionals worldwide.

“Matrox supports NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology in the Matrox DSX Developer Products, which are renowned among broadcast equipment manufacturers the world over for 24/7 hardware reliability, a feature-rich SDK, and superior applications engineering support,” said Alberto Cieri, senior director of sales and marketing from Matrox. “The combination of NVIDIA Quadro and Tesla GPUs with Matrox video I/O hardware and software development tools gives our OEM customers’ broadcast graphics systems unbeatable performance.”

NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology is advancing the growing adoption of GPUs in film, live broadcast, and video production. Video I/O manufacturers, companies who make their own proprietary hardware, and even companies making video switchers are able to take advantage of these sub-frame, low latency transfers in their own SDKs and commercial solutions for no additional cost.

NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology is available free of charge, directly from NVIDIA for video I/O manufacturers, proprietary hardware providers, and video switcher manufacturers. Video I/O hardware developers can request information and access to the SDK via e-mail: GPUDirectForVideo-registration@exchange.nvidia.com, or they can visit the NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video registration page at http://developer.nvidia.com/gpudirectforvideo. NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video is supported on Windows 7 and Linux, and is designed to work with NVIDIA Quadro 4000, Quadro 5000, and Quadro 6000 GPUs, and NVIDIA Tesla C-Series GPUs.

AJA, Bluefish, Deltacast and Matrox are demonstrating NVIDIA GPUDirect for Video technology during the 2012 NAB show from April 16-19, 2012. To learn more, visit: http://developer.nvidia.com/gpudirectforvideo.