AVS video standard implementation for SoC design

AVS1-P2 is the newest video standard of Audio Video coding Standard (AVS) workgroup of China, which provides close performance to H.264/AVC main profile with lower complexity. In this paper, a platform independent software package is developed for AVS1-P2 decoder to facilitate embedded video codec development. In order to minimize the on-chip memory and save the time consumed in on-chip/off-chip data transfer, an MB-based architecture is developed by modifying the data flow, decoding hierarchy, and the buffer definition and management for low-level decoding kernels. Such system architecture provides over 80% reduction in on-chip memory compared to the frame-based architecture when decoding 720p (1280×720) sequences. By modularizing the decoding kernels and data transfer modules, the proposed MB-based decoder facilitates the AVS video decoder development on the target platform.