AptoVision unveils new engine for advanced AV signal processing

Reaching a new milestone in chip-level integration for AV signal processing, Montreal-based AptoVision, a pioneer of game-changing AV chipset technology, has introduced Plethora, a fully in-line engine for high fidelity processing of uncompressed audio and video signals. Plethora provides broadcast-quality scaling, color space conversion, frame rate conversion and several audio functions. It also features AptoVision’s exclusive light compression technology for visually indistinguishable image transmission.

The Montreal-based company, winner of the 2015 Deloitte Technology Fast 50 Companies to Watch award, will introduce the Plethora engine at ISE, Europe’s largest trade expo for residential and commercial AV technology on February 9-12 in Amsterdam (https://www.iseurope.org).

“Our Plethora engine packs functionality which currently requires at least three discreet chipsets and results in various quality and performance compromises while adding significant cost and complexity,” says Stephane Tremblay, CTO & co-founder of AptoVision. “Plethora is truly one-of-a-kind in the AV industry. It is designed from the ground up to apply all signal processing operations in-line with the signal distribution system.”

Available on its BlueRiver NT+ and new BlueRiver 400 chipsets, the Plethora engine is named for the numerous functions it integrates into a single, in-line, zero-frame latency signal processing subsystem. These functions include broadcast-quality scaling, visually “indistinguishable” light compression, color space conversion, frame rate conversion, audio embedding/de-embedding, audio down-mixing and audio re-sampling. “The Plethora engine is fully embedded into and tightly coupled with the BlueRiver chipsets’ signal extension and switching capabilities, delivering the world’s first and only single-chip solutions for end-to-end signal distribution and processing,” Tremblay said.

Details of Plethora features include:

Broadcast-quality scaling: Optimized for video, graphics and text quality, the Plethora engine supports both upscaling and downscaling of motion video, graphics, and text for resolutions up to true 4K/60/4:4:4. Applications include video-wall, multi-view and true seamless switching between sources of different resolutions.

Visually indistinguishable light compression: Mathematically lossless for most content, this unique 1.4:1 ratio compression codec delivers images which are virtually indistinguishable from the uncompressed image. While almost all resolutions can be supported in uncompressed mode, this feature is highly useful when small bandwidth savings are needed to deliver a unique resolution within a limited bandwidth envelope.

Audio embedding/de-embedding/down-mixing: Analog or digital audio from any transmitter can be embedded into the HDMI output of any receiver on the same AV network. Conversely, digital audio from any transmitter can be de-embedded and sent to any receiver in its native format or down-mixed from LPCM to 2-channel audio.