4 ms·

Did you read the article? Apple is going to support the new standard. It doesn't matter that the old phones support HEVC. Now if only Apple would join Vulkan,

by mtgx 9y ago

Did you read the article? Apple is going to support the new standard. It doesn't matter that the old phones support HEVC. Now if only Apple would join Vulkan, too, so we can all agree on a cross-platform graphics API, too. Because of Apple Khronos now has to make a subset of Vulkan that will be cross-platform. This means that if developers end-up adopting that one over Metal on iOS, the situation will be worse off for everyone, including Apple. Apple has gotten better with supporting standards from the Steve Jobs days, but I think it still has some way to go.

ksec 9y ago
Apple has joined AOM is different to Apple announcing support.
- gribbly 9y ago
  They joined AOM as a top level (governing) member, why on earth would they do that unless they are going to support the codec on their software/hardware ?
  - ksec 9y ago
    AV1 will likely be voted as IEEE 's NetVC. Much like opus. Apple joining simply means they won't sue AOM's company for video codec patent.
    - gribbly 9y ago
      But why would they join if they're not going to support (as in use) the codec ? They joined AOM at the highest level, which means they get a seat on the board of directors, I can't see any reason why they would do this unless they have decided to use it on their products.
      - ksec 9y ago
        I am only guessing, from what I know of Apple. So dont take my word as concrete information. Apple uses Opus too, I think IETF announced it as a RFC standard. ( If my memory serve me correct ) But Apple only support the usage of Opus in limited ways. So why would Apple not use it? If we forget about the patents and royalty fees for the moment. AV1 isn't necessarily better then HEVC from Apple's prospective. HEVC is actually a standard, and has been for many years. There are many difference implementation of HEVC encoder and decoder, all adhering to this standard and conformance. Even Apple has their own implementation, there are Open Sources like x265, and many other commercial solution as well. AV1 isn't a standard, ( yet ) and there is one and only one implementation. Now before any geeks starting arguing about software benefits of implementation as standard over written standard, you need to think of this not as a pieces of software ( While it certainly is ), but a tools for professionals. Those who do TVs, and movies, etc all wanted something different and they want choices. Google, or On2 to be precise; continuing its tradition of over hyping its codec. AV1 at its start was no where near 30% better then HEVC. And since they claim AV1 is now another 30% better then their initial version, you would have expect it to be 1.3 x 1.3 better then HEVC. But truth to be told AV1 when tested by panel of expert provide tangible better results then HEVC, at the cost of much slower encoding time. While that was done a while ago and AV1 has since improved a lot more, we shall wait and see when it finalized. Everyone has been saying they will be forced to support AV1 because of Netflix and Youtube. Well that is only half correct because Netflix are already encoding in HEVC. And Netflix, has yet to provide their newer results of HEVC vs AV1. My guess is that they are waiting for AV1 to finalize. VMAF is a lot better then all other PSNR or SSIM, but it is still not perfect. There are zero Full hardware AV1 decoder ( There may be partial Hardware decode that could be enabled with update, but you be the judge how many hardware manufacture is going to enable that then to sell you something new ) , but there are billions of devices capable of decoding HEVC already. So apart from being royalty free, AV1 doesn't have a lot of advantage to it. The question is, for most business, will using AV1 saves me more money in the long term then using HEVC. Apple joining on board, with No Press Release from AOM, and only Cnet manage to pick up, suggest this may be an Intentional leak. Or one way of Apple saying, HEVC Groups, you either do as I say and lower your fees, allow free software decode implementation ( One of the group already allows that ), or you know what? You can hold on to your patents for as long as you want and you wont earn a single dent in the billion of iOS devices in the future.
  - fragmede 9y ago
    Outside of the office walls in Cupertino, who knows? What does it cost to join as a governing member? Money? Apple has an unbelievably big pile of it. Spending it relieves their tax burden, so why not buy the most expensive level of membership? Cynically, maybe they want to influence it so that it sucks, so while Apple does support it, Apple's going to have their own proprietary code, so Apple videos on Apple gear looks great. Everyone else gets the AOM code which, for some reason, everyone else's looks (and sounds) ever so slightly worse. They could influence the codec so it works better on Apple hardware, so they get an advantage while designing the GPU that will go inside the iPhone XI or XII. They could use this to see what the codec will support, and then decide not to support it out of spite, just like the iPhone X does't have USB-C, even though their laptop team has discovered that technology. Point is, why knows? Yes, it is reasonable to think that Apple joining AOM means they'll put AOM codecs on their devices, but unless you work at Apple at the executive level, it's pure conjecture (and even then, executives are allowed to change their minds).

by mtgx 9y ago

ksec 9y ago

Apple has joined AOM is different to Apple announcing support.

gribbly 9y ago
They joined AOM as a top level (governing) member, why on earth would they do that unless they are going to support the codec on their software/hardware ?
- ksec 9y ago
  AV1 will likely be voted as IEEE 's NetVC. Much like opus. Apple joining simply means they won't sue AOM's company for video codec patent.
  - gribbly 9y ago
    But why would they join if they're not going to support (as in use) the codec ? They joined AOM at the highest level, which means they get a seat on the board of directors, I can't see any reason why they would do this unless they have decided to use it on their products.
    - ksec 9y ago
      I am only guessing, from what I know of Apple. So dont take my word as concrete information. Apple uses Opus too, I think IETF announced it as a RFC standard. ( If my memory serve me correct ) But Apple only support the usage of Opus in limited ways. So why would Apple not use it? If we forget about the patents and royalty fees for the moment. AV1 isn't necessarily better then HEVC from Apple's prospective. HEVC is actually a standard, and has been for many years. There are many difference implementation of HEVC encoder and decoder, all adhering to this standard and conformance. Even Apple has their own implementation, there are Open Sources like x265, and many other commercial solution as well. AV1 isn't a standard, ( yet ) and there is one and only one implementation. Now before any geeks starting arguing about software benefits of implementation as standard over written standard, you need to think of this not as a pieces of software ( While it certainly is ), but a tools for professionals. Those who do TVs, and movies, etc all wanted something different and they want choices. Google, or On2 to be precise; continuing its tradition of over hyping its codec. AV1 at its start was no where near 30% better then HEVC. And since they claim AV1 is now another 30% better then their initial version, you would have expect it to be 1.3 x 1.3 better then HEVC. But truth to be told AV1 when tested by panel of expert provide tangible better results then HEVC, at the cost of much slower encoding time. While that was done a while ago and AV1 has since improved a lot more, we shall wait and see when it finalized. Everyone has been saying they will be forced to support AV1 because of Netflix and Youtube. Well that is only half correct because Netflix are already encoding in HEVC. And Netflix, has yet to provide their newer results of HEVC vs AV1. My guess is that they are waiting for AV1 to finalize. VMAF is a lot better then all other PSNR or SSIM, but it is still not perfect. There are zero Full hardware AV1 decoder ( There may be partial Hardware decode that could be enabled with update, but you be the judge how many hardware manufacture is going to enable that then to sell you something new ) , but there are billions of devices capable of decoding HEVC already. So apart from being royalty free, AV1 doesn't have a lot of advantage to it. The question is, for most business, will using AV1 saves me more money in the long term then using HEVC. Apple joining on board, with No Press Release from AOM, and only Cnet manage to pick up, suggest this may be an Intentional leak. Or one way of Apple saying, HEVC Groups, you either do as I say and lower your fees, allow free software decode implementation ( One of the group already allows that ), or you know what? You can hold on to your patents for as long as you want and you wont earn a single dent in the billion of iOS devices in the future.
- fragmede 9y ago
  Outside of the office walls in Cupertino, who knows? What does it cost to join as a governing member? Money? Apple has an unbelievably big pile of it. Spending it relieves their tax burden, so why not buy the most expensive level of membership? Cynically, maybe they want to influence it so that it sucks, so while Apple does support it, Apple's going to have their own proprietary code, so Apple videos on Apple gear looks great. Everyone else gets the AOM code which, for some reason, everyone else's looks (and sounds) ever so slightly worse. They could influence the codec so it works better on Apple hardware, so they get an advantage while designing the GPU that will go inside the iPhone XI or XII. They could use this to see what the codec will support, and then decide not to support it out of spite, just like the iPhone X does't have USB-C, even though their laptop team has discovered that technology. Point is, why knows? Yes, it is reasonable to think that Apple joining AOM means they'll put AOM codecs on their devices, but unless you work at Apple at the executive level, it's pure conjecture (and even then, executives are allowed to change their minds).