back to article HEVC patent prices are out. Look who's NOT at the codec party: Microsoft and Google

The MPEG Licensing Authority (MPEG LA) has released pricing for High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) that is almost certainly low enough to claim the market overnight. HEVC is the successor to the tech used to encode video stored on Blu-ray Discs and streamed in high-definition digital TV transmissions the world over. The …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Just one more step required...

    If all these companies are involved in this, why not just add one more step which is to free the use of the codec. That way, everyone wins. That 20c will only just pay admin and lawyer fees, so the companies are almost certainly not gaining financially from the arrangement. Go on, corps, let the codec go.

    1. oddie

      Re: Just one more step required...

      For hardware companies with relevant video patents this might make sense if it bascially zeroes out anyway, but they (hardware+patent comp) woudln't want their non-patent competitors to get the use of the codec for free, after they had developed the necessary technology behind it - also, research institutees like the ones mentioned in the article won't sell devices using the licensed codec and as such would probably not like to see their research work and patent valued at 0 (no idea if fraunhofer is involved in this round, but most people know of them from the mp3 days, so good as an example)

    2. CheesyTheClown

      Re: Just one more step required...

      I used to work for one of the patent holders on H.263 and H.264 and they actually used the possibility of patent payments as a means of lying their asses off for shareholders and hyping the stock.

      Oddly, I don't see why this is a big deal for Google. It's a valuable decoder and avoiding paying the $25 million will probably cost them $50 million.

    3. This post has been deleted by its author

  2. tony2heads
    Go

    Just how much better is HEVC

    I wonder when a codec is 'good enough'?

    Is it much more compact? Or much better dynamic range? or what?

    1. oddie

      Re: Just how much better is HEVC

      MPEG2 is 'good enough' for any purpose you might want, as long as you don't mind the size of your video. In fact, raw prores is all you would need if you had an infinite amount of storage.

      The main developments are getting the video smaller (in terms of bytes), within the confines of a) visual quality and b) processing power available for decoding.

      You can't successfully use a video codec that is more process intensive to decode than the kit that you use to play it on. if H264 had existed around the time of the video CD it couldn't have been used (outside of research labs/supercomputers) because no one would have the processing power to decode it in realtime (as long as it was a normal resolution anyway..)

      * There are also better/more advanced techniques for coding/compressing video data, its not all data processing capability related.

    2. Nigel Whitfield.

      Re: Just how much better is HEVC

      It can provide much better compression; for a comparison in the UK, we use a DVB-T2 mux for HD broadcasts, with a capacity somewhere around 40Mbits/sec, based on using external aerials. This currently allows for five channels (BBC 1, BBC 2, ITV, C4, BBC 3) in HD using the H.264 codec.

      In Germany, they are proposing using T2 with HEVC, configured for reception using indoor aerials. That lowers the carrying capacity of the mux somewhat, but the plan nevertheless is for 6-7 HD streams in a mux running at round 24Mbits/sec.

      So, it is a pretty impressive achievement - and could certainly solve some of the bandwidth squeeze facing Freeview, if there were enough receivers that supported it.

      1. DrXym

        Re: Just how much better is HEVC

        "So, it is a pretty impressive achievement - and could certainly solve some of the bandwidth squeeze facing Freeview, if there were enough receivers that supported it."

        Freeview, Freesat and Sky should all end-of-life MPEG-2 broadcasts. Give people 3 years grace and then start moving to AVC. It's ridiculous for there to be a BBC 1 HD (in AVC) and a BBC 1 (in MPEG-2) essentially hogging 2-3x more bandwidth than it needs to.

        They probably couldn't just migrate to HEVC but they could use AVC for SD & HD and HEVC for UHD.

        1. Gordon 10
          FAIL

          Re: Just how much better is HEVC

          "Give people 3 years grace and then start moving to AVC."

          When the average life of TV equipment should reasonably be measured in decades (as it always was before the LCD flat panel explosion) - how do you work that one out?

          Nice contribution to our throwaway society sir!

          I bet you bought a 3D tv didn't you?

          1. DrXym

            Re: Just how much better is HEVC

            !When the average life of TV equipment should reasonably be measured in decades (as it always was before the LCD flat panel explosion) - how do you work that one out?!

            And most digital TVs from the last 5 years have supported AVC for a very long time. Some DVB-T services use AVC already. All DVB-T2 boxes already do.

            In other words, switching to AVC means no impact at all for most TVs.

            "Nice contribution to our throwaway society sir!"

            Buy a new decoder box. Keep the TV. Stop moaning.

        2. Nigel Whitfield.

          Re: Just how much better is HEVC

          "Freeview, Freesat and Sky should all end-of-life MPEG-2 broadcasts."

          It's obviously less of an urgent issue for the satellite services, and perhaps they'll be able to hold off long enough to see both HEVC and DVB-S2X introduced as a 'great leap forward' much as Freeview originally went from T/MPEG2 to T2/H264 in one go.

          Certainly, as I've said before, there will be a second changeover, and that's one reason for the temporary muxes we have at the moment, to encourage takeup of HD-capable equipment, which will be much more efficient for SD.

          The one aspect that just doesn't appear to have been sorted out is when to tell the public, so that they will stop buying kit that doesn't support T2/H264. To switch to broadcast HEVC in the UK would mean obsoleting a lot of kit bought pretty recently for HD, and so is unlikely in my view. HEVC in the short to medium term will be something for OTT delivery here.

          On satellite, it may be something the likes of Sky will consider, but they'll want there to be more standards (and maybe even wait for UHD Phase 2 specs to be firmed up) before they think about swapping out people's set top boxes. Freesat is in an awkward position here; they might mandate new boxes include it, some way down the line, but because people pay for their own kit, they probably won't actually want too many channels to switch to HEVC, as that will lessen the attractiveness of their service to people who bought into it because of the 'no subscription' aspect and don't want to have to upgrade.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: Just how much better is HEVC

            Can't speak to the UK, but in the US Directv plans to drop MPEG2 in a few years. Earlier this year they stopped doing new installs of MPEG2 hardware - but had been doing a majority of MPEG4 (required for HD) installs for the past several years anyway. When they drop MPEG2 they will no longer have SD duplicates of HD channels, though the HD receivers can of course output composite for those who will have SD TVs.

            They'll almost certainly be using HEVC for 4K, though it remains to be seen whether there will be much 4K content at all, aside from movies. Certainly not enough to have very many channels that will be broadcast in both HD and 4K in the way today they have a SD/HD duplicates of the large majority today.

    3. DrXym

      Re: Just how much better is HEVC

      "I wonder when a codec is 'good enough'?"

      It claims to halve the bitrate requirements of AVC for similar subjective results. But throw in the audio and other bits of the stream and the effective bitrate may only be 3/4 the size.

      Given how "unlimited broadband" means "limited broadband" anything which cuts it by 25% is still a good thing.

  3. Charlie Clark Silver badge

    Dear Faultline

    Please at least have someone proofread your stuff.

    You seem completely to ignore that Google has mandated hardware support for VP9 for future Android releases. That means VP9 will definitely be in devices and Google will have content for them.

    1. Nigel Whitfield.

      Re: Dear Faultline

      Google will have some content encoded with VP9, but will lots of other people? Broadcasters and the like are going for HEVC, just as with HD they went for H.264. And, notwithstanding the huge amounts of stuff on YouTube and that Google will want to sell people via Play Movies, there's likely to be a massive adoption of HEVC.

      I suppose it's entirely possible that a few people will decide that when they're encoding for online/mobile, they'll use VP9 rather than just run things through the HEVC encoders that they will probably already have, but I don't think it's terribly likely.

      So, VP9 ignored in a story that was about HEVC? Yep; just like it'll probably be ignored in most of the devices that have HEVC too.

      1. Charles 9

        Re: Dear Faultline

        That's the thing. HEVC isn't exactly an established standard yet unless you're saying a slew of HEVC encoding suites are already available to them. Now, granted, MPEG-LA isn't charging a mint for the use of the codec, but Google's offering VP9 gratis and offering a guaranteed line of devices it'll support. Those are two pretty good incentives right there.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          VP9 has no chance

          What the Faultline article seems to have omitted is that unlike with h.264 there will be NO FEES for streaming content over the internet, or on Blu Ray discs.

          What reason would any streaming site have for using VP9, which would only work on Android phones (and even then it would take several years before the majority of them are on a recent enough software version to support it) and those with Chrome browsers, versus the equally free to use HEVC which will work on everything? People using Firefox and IE don't want to have to install a plugin to view a video, that's so 10 years ago.

          Even if Google chose to be stubborn and not support HEVC in Android, the device makers would all add it because they'll know the users want it. Before long all the ARM SoCs on the market will include at least HEVC decode in hardware, so they'll be paying for it anyway.

          1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

            Re: VP9 has no chance

            What reason would any streaming site have for using VP9, which would only work on Android phones (and even then it would take several years before the majority of them are on a recent enough software version to support it)

            Neither VP9 nor HEVC have any chance as a software only solution: they currently bring even high-end x86 chips to their knees.

            This will be a time-to-market race for hardware and content. If either solution has significant technical (faster encode or uses less power) or financial advantages (total cost to encode and distribute) then that could be decisive.

            1. Anonymous Coward
              Anonymous Coward

              Re: VP9 has no chance

              I was talking about decode on the client end, not encode on the server end. Unless they're streaming live content, they don't care too much about encoding performance.

              If decode of HEVC can't be done in real time, then VP9 really really has no chance, because it is highly unlikely that SoC vendors will spend die area accelerating it when they're already going to be adding a HEVC decoder.

  4. Nigel Whitfield.
    Pint

    @Charles 9 (so excited by looking at the clock, I didn't reply properly...)

    Well, all the broadcasters and their roadmaps at IBC involve HEVC. There is equipment available for them that can handle it, and the amount of that will increase quite substantially over the coming years. TV makers are already rolling out HEVC kit (yes, of variable quality in some cases), but it's coming.

    So, I don't think there's much doubt that the broadcast world will be going HEVC, and that means that lots of TVs will be having it built in, and set top boxes.

    Even if VP9 is free, and in Android devices, that's still a lot of devices it's not necessarily in - and unless Google not only mandates VP9 but also forbids HEVC, I can't see that it's going to make much difference. The change in terms compared to H.264 also make HEVC a little more attractive.

    For the next couple of years, at any rate, this is largely an academic issue; there isn't a huge amount of 4K content, and virtually every device out there supports H.264. By the time there is more 4K content - which is after all the main driver for this, certainly in the OTT market, as no one's going to rush to replace set top boxes for non-subscription services - there will, of course, be a smattering of devices with Android and VP9 built in. But there will also be a lot more stuff with HEVC built in, both on the production and the consumption sides.

    Honestly, I don't see that Google are going to enjoy any noticeably greater success with VP9 than they did with its predecessor.

    (Icon because it's Friday, it's five to five and it's Craaaackerjack! Or, at any rate, time to go to the pub, which is where I'll be if you have a burning desire to continue talking about this right now)

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Neither HEVC nor VP9 are finalised yet. This is a big difference to h264 and VP8: h264 was finalised and in lots of silicon before Google bought OnVideo.

      The Android market is now what of the biggest for video so only fools are going to ignore it.. Google gives anything running on VP9, including its own services a headstart. We'll have to see which chipmakers cough up for HEVC but I suspect Mediatek might not.

    2. Charles 9

      "Well, all the broadcasters and their roadmaps at IBC involve HEVC. There is equipment available for them that can handle it, and the amount of that will increase quite substantially over the coming years. TV makers are already rolling out HEVC kit (yes, of variable quality in some cases), but it's coming."

      OK, so HEVC does have a head start with content and hardware providers. That's significant since it means Google may be late to the party again unless they can steal a march on MPEG-LA (which is still possible, forcing the content providers to scramble), but it would mean Google convincing chip makers to implement VP9 in silicon in volume on both the encoding and decoding end. And hardware is not exactly Google's strong suit. Unlike companies like Apple, Google isn't well-known for dictating exacting hardware terms.

      @Charlie Clark: Trouble is, while Android does dominate the mobile market, most of that market is towards the lower end of videos which are still the domain of AVC. Furthermore, a sizeable chunk of that market is still held by Apple, who would sooner see Hell freeze than support The Enemy with their codec because it's Bad For Business, and Apple still has significant pull with content providers. HEVC is going to be, at least at first, primarily used for high-resolution content where mobile data would struggle. This would leave high-speed home networks, which means the playback device will likely be the TV or an STB hooked to it. And the TV end of the market happens to be where HEVC is focusing right now, particularly with content providers and chipset makers.

    3. thames

      VP9 is the codec for WebM, which Google and others intend to use for video conferencing and other similar applications, not just video streaming. It's in Chrome (and Chromium) and Firefox. I think that Opera is adding it as well (if they have not already done so). According to Wikipedia, some TVs are currently shipping with VP9 support.

      VP9 has the advantage that there's no reason not to include support for it (unless you have a vested interest in collecting HEVC royalties from everyone + dog).

      What some parties find appealing about the royalty model is that they can slice and dice the market and dictate the direction of technology. As soon as you impose any sort of royalty, you put a barrier up to new entries in the market. It's not just the cost of the royalty, but you have to have established distribution and payment channels for charging customers up front. That's a big problem for small companies that want to bring innovative new technology to market and plan on making their money by secondary means (e.g. sell related services) once they've established a position in the market. Established players and "platform" owners already have those sales and payment relationships set up, so they look at patents as a way of hobbling small newcomers.

      What we could see is HEVC used for "legacy" (e.g. broadcast TV) applications, while VP9 will be adopted for things that we as commenters here haven't even thought of yet.

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