From AnandTech's coverage (http://anandtech.com/show/8814/intel-releases-broadwell-u-new-skus-up-to-48-eus-and-iris-6100/2 http://anandtech.com/show/8814/intel-

From AnandTech's coverage (http://anandtech.com/show/8814/intel-releases-broadwell-u-new-skus-up-to-48-eus-and-iris-6100/2 http://anandtech.com/show/8814/intel-releases-broadwell-u-ne...): Support for HEVC is also present in terms of a combined (hybrid) hardware and software solution, just as it was on Core-M. Intel stated that as parts of the H.264 algorithm are near if not identical to those of the H.265, with a small tweak to the hardware it can be used for both. This is still not an all-encompassing hardware acceleration, but it does aim at some parts of the codec. I would speculate that if a full section of the silicon could be made for complete hardware acceleration, it might eat into certain power budgets.