Why HEVC is coming faster than you think

While no one denies that HEVC is a significant leap forward, there is some discussion about whether the technology will be accepted by the market. What is the timeline for widespread adoption, two years, three years, five years? In reality, the opportunity for widespread HEVC may be more immediate than thought.

High Efficiency Video Coding, or HEVC, has been the star of numerous consumer electronics shows around the world this year. And of course – who wouldn't appreciate an impressive new compression technology that can maintain visual quality, while reducing video file size by almost half? The advantages of HEVC are enormously beneficial to the video distribution industry. Content owners can store more videos and movies for the same price, broadcasters can stream video more efficiently across networks, and consumers can enjoy a better entertainment experience because video is easier to stream directly to all their devices.

While no one denies that HEVC is a significant leap forward, there is some discussion about whether the technology will be accepted by the market. What is the timeline for widespread adoption, two years, three years, five years? In reality, the opportunity for widespread HEVC may be more immediate than thought.

At first

First, a little history. Since the early days of video distribution, there have been several big leaps in compression technology. The first was from MPEG-2 to MPEG-4 ASP. MPEG-4 ASP followed Advanced Video Coding (AVC). And finally there is the jump made from AVC to HEVC. These have all been great advances, but it has taken years for the industry to adopt these new standards. An example of this is the broadcasting industry. Many broadcasters are still stuck on MPEG-2 and haven't even made the switch from MPEG-4 to AVC, despite the obvious compression benefits.

De modo que ¿por qué HEVC ha de ser diferente? Por una cosa, el vídeo es más importante que nunca. Más que cualquier otra tecnología, el vídeo digital está impulsando el futuro de las comunicaciones y de Internet. De hecho, un reciente estudio realizado por Rovi Corporation halló que aproximadamente el 66% de los usuarios de tabletas y el 71% de los usuarios de teléfonos móviles en EE.UU. visualizaron vídeos en esos dispositivos de 2 a 3 veces por semana o más. Al mismo tiempo, los usuarios de dispositivos móviles señalaron que están preocupados por los costes relacionados con la transmisión de vídeo. Aproximadamente la mitad de los encuestados afirmó que limitan la cantidad de streaming de vídeo en sus teléfonos móviles debido a su preocupación por los costes que puedan derivarse de ello. Si a esto le unimos, la lentitud en los tiempos de carga y las pausas demasiado frecuentes en la acción debido a la amortiguación, es fácil de entender por qué los consumidores recibirían con agrado el HEVC.

The advantage of HEVC

HEVC can reduce those concerns. Those who enjoy watching videos on smartphones but are worried about paying a big bill at the end of the month will benefit the most, as HECV reduces the costs incurred by downloading digital video over mobile networks. Today, video is the enemy of most data plans. A few days on Netflix can eat away at any bandwidth limit. But with HEVC reducing compression rates, consumers could watch more videos at a lower overall cost.

What's more, as devices begin to support HEVC playback at the chip level, the processing power needed to play these videos will be reduced, saving battery life and generally improving the overall mobile video experience.

For device manufacturers, HEVC is one of the few ways to truly improve their hardware and gain a competitive advantage by offering consumers better, faster and cheaper digital video. It is also a strong incentive to quickly introduce new devices that support HEVC. Some say it will be years before the hardware is ready to handle HEVC. The truth, however, is that chip companies are planning to launch HEVC decoders very soon. By the end of this year, PCs and smartphones will be on the market capable of playing high-definition HEVC streams in real time.

The rise of 4K

Another big driver of HEVC adoption is 4K (3840x2160) video. 4K offers impressive sharpness and represents a big step forward compared to the current 1080p (1920x1080 pixels), since it multiplies the number of pixels by 4. The problem, of course, is that 4K files are huge. But with a compression standard like HEVC, 4K video is perfectly possible. In fact, 4K could become the flagship application for HEVC, as HD was for AVC.

Ahora es posible reproducir vídeos 4K en hardware que utiliza el potencial del plug-in, y es sólo una cuestión de tiempo antes de 4K sea práctico para ordenadores portátiles, dispositivos móviles, e incluso cámaras digitales. ¿A qué consumidor no le gustaría una cámara de video 4K, sobre todo si se puede obtener una resolución asombrosa y una compresión más alta que hace que sea más fácil que nunca compartir y disfrutar de las fotos con la técnica más avanzada y de videos caseros? Además las imágenes fijas se encuentran en el rango de resolución de 4K, y una vez que los consumidores experimentan la impresionante alta resolución en sus pantallas, les ayudará a impulsar la demanda de pantallas de 4K.

Ahora que el almacenamiento en la nube ha entrado en la dinámica, las ventajas económicas de HEVC se hacen aún más evidentes. Muchas empresas de servicios cloud están cobrando una cuota por todo lo que va más allá de la capacidad de almacenamiento básico, obligando a los consumidores a escoger y elegir lo que ellos ponen en la nube. Pero con HEVC, los consumidores pueden almacenar más videos domésticos y fotos, así como cientos de horas de entretenimiento y películas, a la vez que ahorran dinero en el proceso.

Dar el salto

HEVC could also act as a catalyst for infrastructure providers, such as the audiovisual industry. Many broadcasters, especially those still stuck in the MPEG-2 era, will likely say, “Okay, now is the time to make the switch” when they see the leap HEVC offers.

Of course, there are also economic forces at play. If these large providers do not act soon, they will be even less competitive since they are not compressing video as efficiently as their rivals. And, with 4K on the horizon, TV networks and cable providers will feel the pressure to start offering more products and services that can compete with companies like Netflix and Hulu.

Lastly, unlike in the past, the entire ecosystem is firmly in place to drive rapid adoption of HEVC. Compression technology today is closely linked to things like digital rights management and adaptive streaming. Additionally, hardware and software vendors are firmly integrated into the ecosystem, allowing them to take advantage of new standards like HEVC faster than ever.

With the explosion of online video and web-connected devices, consumers will be on the receiving end of a bonanza of high-quality, narrow-bandwidth entertainment. And best of all: it's going to happen much sooner than it seems.