ARM Releases AAC, MP3, MPEG-4, H.264 and FFT OpenMAX DL Libraries, Highly Optimized for Cortex-A8/NEON and ARM11 Processors

June 6, 2008

WHAT: ARM has released highly optimized source code versions of the OpenMAX DL (Development Layer) libraries for decoding the AAC and MP3 formats in the audio domain, and decoding the MPEG-4 and H.264 formats in the video domain. These functions can be downloaded free-of-charge from the ARM website http://www.arm.com/products/esd/openmax_home.html , and the license granted to these functions entitles the user to integrate them into their own products at no cost.

These functions have been hand-optimized to exploit the NEON™ technology instruction set on Cortex™-A8 processor and the SIMD instruction set on the ARM1136J-S™, the ARM1156T2-S™, the ARM1176JZ-S™ and the ARM11™ MPCore™ processors.  The functions are not complete codecs, but can be used as building blocks to add codec functionality to a product.  The OpenMAX DL API has been designed to enable rapid implementation and seamless portability of video, image and audio codecs to a variety of hardware implementations.  The availability of these optimized functions will reduce time-to-market and decrease development costs for companies wishing to provide codec functionality on ARM's latest processor families.

This release updates the previous release of the H.264 and AAC functions.

In the future, ARM will add optimized functions for JPEG decode, as well as optimized versions of the Signal Processing domain functions including FIR and IIR filters.

WHERE: Further information can be found on the ARM website at: http://www.arm.com/products/esd/openmax_home.html

The OpenMAX DL specification, and further OpenMAX information can be found at: http://www.khronos.org/openmax/

WHO:  ARM designs the technology that lies at the heart of advanced digital products, from mobile, home and enterprise solutions to embedded and emerging applications. ARM’s comprehensive product offering includes 16/32-bit RISC microprocessors, data engines, graphics processors, digital libraries, embedded memories, peripherals, software and development tools, as well as analog functions and high-speed connectivity products. Combined with the company’s broad Partner community, they provide a total system solution that offers a fast, reliable path to market for leading electronics companies. More information on ARM is available at http://www.arm.com.