Barco Silex launches OEM board for pro AV market, enabling 4K/UHD HDMI transport over IP

Louvain‐la‐Neuve, Belgium ‐‐ February 4th, 2016 ‐‐ Barco Silex, the leading provider of FPGA-based video solutions – is breaking new ground with the introduction of an OEM board for the professional audio-visual market. The board enables the transport of HDMI video/audio over IP networks, including high-resolution video up to 4K/UHD over a single 1 Gb Ethernet cable. The built-in hardware compression/decompression (SMPTE 2042 VC-2) combines lossless quality with ultra-low latency. Designed for seamless integration and configuration, the new board supports a wide range of network topologies with multiple sources and displays.

The world of professional AV is witnessing a sea change with the accelerating adoption of IP-based transport networks. Therefore, product manufacturers are looking to upgrade their offering to be able to plug into commodity 1 or 10 Gb Ethernet cabling. But at the same time, new bandwidth-hungry video formats are introduced that allow for a much more immersive user experience. Barco Silex’ new board now offers manufacturers an easy solution for both challenges, a production-ready, cost-efficient OEM board to develop 4K/UHD AV-over-IP products.

The new board is a unique solution for transporting HDMI signals over IP network. The configurability of the board addresses many different setups required in the pro AV market, from the simple point to point transmission up to the multi-channel flexible network or video wall. The OEM board is suitable for real-time AV applications such as video conferencing, residential distribution, digital signage and information boards in hotels, airports, or sports venues. Built around a SoC FPGA, the board features a unique combination of speed, quality, and flexibility. The video/audio path is processed in real-time within the FPGA fabric while the processor is handling all the control and configuration of the board. Both the FPGA firmware and the CPU software can be easily upgraded. The transport and compression are based on Barco Silex’ acclaimed IP cores.

About Barco Silex

Barco Silex is the leading provider of high-end image compression technology for hardware including JPEG, JPEG2000 and VC-2 Low Delay. Next to its professional AV boards, Barco Silex also licenses a wide range of video compression technology for integration in professional AV products, in the form of IP blocks for ASIC or FPGA. This technology has been adopted by leading companies in the broadcast, professional AV and defense market. Next to AV technology, Barco Silex also specializes in security and cryptography. Combined with video transport, this ensures secure video transmission and content protection solutions. Barco Silex is a subsidiary of Barco (NYSE Euronext Brussels: BAR), the global leader in networked visualization products for the entertainment, enterprise and healthcare markets.