Intel's Haswell Architecture Analyzed: Building a New PC and a New Intel
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 5, 2012 2:45 AM ESTHaswell Media Engine: QuickSync the Third
Although we still have one more generation to go before QuickSync can apparently deliver close to x86 image quality, Haswell doesn't shy away from improving its media engine.
First and foremost is hardware support for the SVC (Scalable Video Coding) codec. The idea behind SVC is to take one high resolution bitstream from which lower quality versions can be derived. There are huge implications for SVC in applications that have varied bandwidth levels and/or decode capabilities.
Haswell also adds a hardware motion JPEG decoder, and MPEG2 hardware encoder.
Ivy Bridge will be getting 4K video playback support later this year, Haswell should obviously ship with it.
Finally there's a greater focus on image quality this generation, although as I mentioned before I'm not sure we'll see official support in a lot of the open source video codecs until Broadwell comes by. With added EUs we'll obviously see QuickSync performance improve, but I don't have data as to how much faster it'll be compared to Ivy Bridge.
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CaptainDoug - Friday, October 5, 2012 - link
Quite the read. Very informational. Anandtech has some of the best tech writers. True online journalism. Sometimes i miss that while reading tech blogs... You guys are a cut above.. at least one.colonelclaw - Friday, October 5, 2012 - link
Couldn't agree more, this article really brightened up what was otherwise a pretty miserable afternoon here in London.When am I going to be able to walk into a shop and buy something with Haswell inside it? Next March maybe?
Kepe - Friday, October 5, 2012 - link
As stated in the article, Haswell is coming in the summer of 2013.linuxlowdown - Saturday, October 6, 2012 - link
Tag team Intel fanboy puke.Azethoth - Sunday, October 7, 2012 - link
How do I downvote stupid crap like this "Tag team Intel fanboy puke." comment so that collectively we can see high quality comments without having to wade through the interturds as well? It really takes away from the best article I have read in a long time. Not because it is about Intel, but because it is about the state of the art.medi01 - Tuesday, October 9, 2012 - link
Well, I'd also ask how do I downvote stupid butt kissing like OP, while we are at rating....Kisper - Saturday, October 20, 2012 - link
Many people enjoy well written and informative articles. Are you telling me that if you wrote, you would not enjoy positive feedback from your readers?CaptainDoug - Tuesday, October 23, 2012 - link
Exactly.actionjksn - Sunday, October 7, 2012 - link
Why are you even on this article dumb fuck? I'm sure there is something that is of interest to you on the internet somewhere.medi01 - Tuesday, October 9, 2012 - link
Not sure about him, but I've looked into this article to figure power targets for haswell (especially interesting to compare to ARM crowd), NOT to read orgasmic comments about eternal wizdom of Intel's engineering...