Multi-level encoding and placement techniques for multi-resolution video streams on a disk array

We propose multi-level encoding and placement techniques to efficiently support the retrieval of video streams on a disk array at different resolutions. For the MPEG-1 compression algorithm, this encoding technique first partitions the parent video stream in the temporal dimension. Each frame in the sub-stream is then partitioned in the chroma dimension yielding a low-resolution and a residual component. The server stores blocks of a component on a disk and stores blocks of different components on consecutive disks in a round-robin manner. The lower the resolution level being maintained, the smaller is the number of disks accessed by each client.