Broadcast Developer Products

H.264 Codec Cards

Matrox M264 Series

The M264 family of H.264 Codec Cards
Instant density and quality boost for H.264 encoding and decoding

Matrox® M264 family of PCI Express® cards features hardware-based multi-channel 8- and 10-bit H.264 encoding, decoding and transcoding capabilities. They provide an instantaneous H.264-quality and density boost offering the pristine quality needed for broadcast contribution, production and distribution. With the capability for up to four channels of 4K XAVC encoding/decoding in a single-slot card, the M264 family enables OEMs to provide multi-channel 4K production servers in a PC platform. Supporting the H.264-based Sony® XAVC and Panasonic AVC-ULTRA mezzanine codecs, it makes live 4K production as easy as today’s XDCAM HD workflows in PC platforms.

The M264 family can encode/decode up to four streams of 4Kp60 at 4:2:2 10-bit, 40 streams of HD Long GOP at 4:2:2 10-bit or 64 streams of HD at 4:2:0 8-bit. The faster than real-time encoding/decoding ability of the M264 allows multiple blazing fast transcodes for distribution on different media platforms. With onboard multi-channel, motion-adaptive deinterlacing, and up/down/cross scaling, the M264 family can repurpose content into any resolution before encoding or after decoding, particularly beneficial for over-the-top (OTT) workflows.

Specifically designed for high-density encoding/decoding (Baseline Profile to High 10 Intra Profile up to Level 5.2), M264 cards provide the highest possible quality, with ultra-low power consumption, and in the smallest footprint. The M264 S4, S3, and S2 cards are cloud-friendly and their resources can be shared across virtual machines.

Matrox M264 cards are the ideal H.264 accelerators for channel-in-a-box systems, video servers, broadcast graphics systems, multi-viewers, and switchers or to create high-density encoders, transcoders, render farms, and other broadcast media equipment. The Matrox M264 hardware is supported by the Matrox DSX software development kit (SDK). Please refer to the Matrox DSX Developer Products datasheet for information on file I/O, software codecs and CPU effects. The Matrox M264 family also provides plug-ins for H.264 transcode acceleration into the FFMPEG framework.

Performance chart (number of streams)

4:2:2 10-bit1,2

 


Resolutions

GOP Structure

Format

M264

M264 S2

M264 S3

M264 S4

3840x2160p60

Intra frame

XAVC Class 300 & Class 480 / AVC-Intra 4K

1

2

3

4

1920x1080p60

Intra frame

XAVC Class 200 / AVC-Intra 200

3

6

9

12

1920x1080i30

Intra frame

XAVC Class 100 / AVC-Intra 100

10

20

30

40

3840x2160p60

Long GOP

Generic / XAVC 4K Long

1

2

3

4

1920x1080p60

Long GOP

Generic / XAVC Long50 / AVC-LongG50

5

10

15

20

1920x1080i30

Long GOP

Generic / XAVC Long25 / AVC-LongG25

10

20

30

40

1280x720p60

Long GOP

Generic / XAVC Long25 / AVC-LongG25

10

20

30

40

 

4:2:0 8-bit Long GOP1,2

 

Resolutions

M264

M264 S2

M264 S3

M264 S4

3840x2160p60

2

4

6

8

1920x1080p60

8

16

24

32

1920x1080i30

16

32

48

64

1280x720p60

16

32

48

64

Proxy (720X480p30)

100

200

300

400

 

1- M264 performance scales with resolutions and frame rates (within defined capabilities) and also supports working with mixed resolutions.
2- M264 S2, S3, and S4 provide two, three and four independent M264 instances, where each can be individually controlled to achieve 2x, 3x and 4x the performance respectively.

 

Key Features

  • PCI Express Cards
    • M264 - Gen 2, ½ length card
    • M264 S2 - Gen 3, ¾ length card
    • M264 S3 - Gen 3, ¾ length card
    • M264 S4 - Gen 3, full-length card
  • Multi-channel, high-quality H.264 video encoding, decoding, and transcoding
  • Up to 4K resolutions supported
  • 4:2:2 10-bit and 4:2:0 8-bit
  • Dynamic codec control
  • Hardware-based deinterlacing and scaling
  • Real-time and faster than real-time operation

CONTACT US

  • Sony XAVC-certified encoding including XAVC 4K Long 4:2:2 and 4K Intra Class 300/480
  • Panasonic AVC-ULTRA compliant
  • Native MXF file wrapping
  • Native MXF file reading. This includes:
    • Trim in and Trim out settings for building playlists
    • File consolidation
    • Time Delay Instant Replay (TDIR) support
  • MXF file truncation and appending during live recording
  • Plugin for FFMPEG framework
  • One comprehensive SDK for all our developer cards
  • 2-year warranty

Support