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Linux Media Labs designs, makes, and markets multi channel unencoded and single channel hardware MPEG4 encoding boards. They offer a "clustered" video recording system with thousands of channels and advertise consulting services.

I have never dealt with them, but I think they this company is a husband and wife who make their own boards (which are only supported with Linux).

Also, check out their customer list! I'd like to know out what kind of work they did for companies like boeing, sun, nasa, google, lanl and mit.

At the ICS West security conference last year, there were dozens of vendors showing Linux based DVR security systems. Some were even just their capture card and an IDE dongle containing the entire Linux OS and their DVR application. Just put it in a system with an existing HD on the secondary IDE bus and you'll soon be running a Linux based DVR. Most were advertising "embedded OS" and higher reliability than PC( Windows ) based DVRs.

I had put together a list a couple of years ago and will post them here. you'll be better served by also google'ing for yourself and filtering out the Virus prone models.

http://www.spysource.net/digitalvideorecorders.htm
http://www.cctvsentry.com/Sentry_leseries_dvrs.htm #pricing
http://www.linuxmedialabs.com/
http://www.ituner.com/spectra.htm
http://www.sonerik.com/linux.asp
http://www.provideo.com.tw/DVR800.htm
http://www.at-fairfax.com/DVR/Info/Sentinel4.htm
http://www.avdeals.com/csispecosecure/digitalsecur ity.htm
http://www.tech-island.com.tw/ep1.htm

ICS West is April 5-7th so I'd be putting in a request for a trip to Las Vegas if I were you. ;-)

LoB

Your IA-32 will run hot if you set it to execute nops, since that's just an alias for xchg eax, eax.

Mmmm. Must have more encoders. Mmmm. Linux MediaLabs

My son and I have been capturing analog video and producing short digital videos and movies for past few months. We have made a goal to do this entirely in Linux and have learned a bit along the way that may be of use to others. My son has recently made some videos for his high school classes that have been voted best in the class. Here's what worked for us:

1. Start with a reasonably recent model PC, such as an Athlon 1700+ or better built on a decent motherboard. Give it at least 512Mb of RAM and make sure you have at least 20Mb or more of free disk space.

2. Use a relatively recent version of Linux with at least a 2.4.18 kernel. Most distributions which use this kernel (e.g., Red Hat 7.3) include drivers which support the capture cards listed below.

3. We've been using two types of PCI capture cards: an Iomega Buz, and a Linux Media Labs LML33. The Buz is out of production, but it can regularly be had on ebay for $20-$40. It is based on the Zoran MJPEG chipset and Phillips video encoder chips. As a side benefit, it also contains an ultra SCSI controller that is supposedly supported in Linux, though I haven't tried it yet. The LML33 was designed spefically with Linux in mind, and is also based on the Zoran MJPEG chipset, but it uses a BrookTree video encoder. It is also a bit more expensive; we paid $125 for a used one on ebay. Both cards are well supported in Linux, and produce high quality DVD-resolution 720x480 video at 30 frames/second.

4. Install a recent version of mjpegtools. The most important piece of mjpegtools is the lavrec utility, which supports recording from the Zoran cards to either AVI or Quicktime formatted MJPEG files. mjpegtools also includes several other useful utilities.

5. Install a recent distribution of Transcode. Transcode is a very useful suite of command line utilities for transcoding and processing videos and supports just about every video codec available on Linux.

6. Install Cinelerra and Blender. Cinelerra is a bit quirky, still tends to crash a lot, and is butt-ugly, but it has some awesome editing and compositing abilities including multiple layer editing and compositing, and keyframe-based effects control. The most recent version also contains a nice adaptive de-interlace filter. Cinelerra also contains a very nice translate filter that can be used to trim edge artifacts that often appear in captured video. Blender is gread for things like generating 3-D titles and short 3-D blurbs and transition animations if you like to do those kinds of things. Gimp is also quite useful for generating titles and editing individual frames if that is required.

With the above combination of hardware and software, you can achive very close to DVD quality results with very little outlay of cash in a completely Linux environment, and the results can be quite satisfying. My son has been making videos for his high school classes and I have been digitizing old home videos and it's been quite fun.

I recommend the LMLM4 video capture board from Linux Media Labs. With this board, I was able to archive my extensive collection of hardcore pre-teen arse raping video tapes onto the computer, so I could share them with my good friends Matthew Kelly, Ken Russell and Roger. We all enjoyed them immensely.

mpeg4 hardware encoder? Like this?

Capturing. Encoding -- too many to name them all.

Linux Media Labs actively supports the development of MJPEG video editing cards in Linux by providing cards, specs and development time, e.g. to the
MJPEG/Linux driver/application project

This company designs and manufactures its own video capture and compression cards, and also remarkets some third-party cards. All supported under Linux (with a name like that, what else?) and they GPL the drivers.

Pretty cool.

Linux Media Labs is another group that is providing video hardware that runs under Linux. I have seen motion JPEG work very successfully in a research environment (Internet2) and I know that the test machines are being deployed. You can find out more about the test machines that I am talking about via
Google.

There is also who have a linux based bt878 tv tuner card and a MJEG encoder card.

Not sure what the quality is like on either of those solutions.

What is their relationship with Linux Media Labs and Linux Media Arts? Linux Media Labs offers for $599.00 Broadcast for LINUX, "a fully supported LINUX video edit[or]", which looks exactly like Broadcast 2000 to me.

Now, this could very well just be a case of a company taking GPLed software and selling support for it. It's somewhat surprising that they don't mention Heroine Virtual at all, but they're not required to do so. (Last week, a story here about Linux office suites linked to a company that was clearly just selling KOffice... they hadn't even bothered to change the names of the applications in the screenshots!) Cygnus had a profitable and very reputable business doing similar, before being consumed by RedHat.

What's the relationship between these companies?

A random project that could use good documentation is the Linux Media Labs video capture project, at http://www.linuxmedialabs.com . They're building a card around the Zoran 36060 chipset (MPEG encoder/decoder). The card's been working for quite a while now, and the driver's been in ok shape for almost as long, but they have *NO* decent documentation on writing programs that use the device (just installation docs and chipset docs).

I wrote reverse-engineered documentation for version 1.0.9 of the driver, which they thanked me for and then promptly ignored (they've belatedly added a link to my now-defunct web page; I was hoping they'd take over maintaining/hosting the document). My own version has since dropped off the face of the web (I graduated, and that web account went *poof*).

If you decide to reverse-engineer the current version of their driver and write docs for it, I guarantee that many people who *use* the card will be grateful. I still get occasional requests for help, even though my own document is now hideously out of date. The LML team itself will be vaguely supportive and maybe answer questions for you now and then when they feel like it. To get a copy of my document, hunt down my email address in the LML33 message boards.

Linux Media Labs

The LML33 would be great, but is also expensive. I don't know what you're aiming for though.

Disclaimer: I have NO connection with LML.

-----

Linuxmedialabs.com place seems to sell boards, but not for cheap.

You could also buy a standard tvtuner board and use these or these drivers.

In case you are like me, and want to invent your own TiVo thing using linux. I found a med-high end video capture card that has GPL drivers.

60fps @ 720x480 NTSC

http://linuxmedialabs.com

It is pretty pricy though >$400.

I wish there were a Linux hardware manufacturing company. Just imagine all the things we could do if someone out there had a couple good engineers, a business-savvy CEO (not a programmer or engineer who founded the company), and a license to use, say, one of IBM's fabs.
There are companies like that (what VA Linux is, btw? Or Cobalt)...
Even a friend of mine has one: ttp://www.linuxmedialabs.com
Paul Bunyk

Linux Media Labs offers MJPEG hardware for Linux and I want to comment on some widespread misconceptions about MJPEG vs. MPEG performance.

Full rate, broadcast quality signal (D1) at 720x480@30frames/sec with 4:2:2 color (2 bytes/pixel) has a data rate of 20 MByte/sec. Now, with 1:10 compression the image quality is very good, especially since there is 60 fields per second with noise caused by lossy compression averaged out. So, D1 quality requires 2 Mbyte/sec bandwidth. That is about 7 Gbyte/hour. DVD disks have 4.7 Mbyte of capacity and hold about 2 hours of video. Therefore with all hoops and patents MPEG-2 has 3 times better performance. I would argue though that D1 encoded with MJPEG at 1:10 compression is much better quality then DVD, and don't forget that it's a 4:2:2 color, not 4:2:0 one as in DVD.

Let up now go to VHS (MPEG1) qualiity and also reduce frame rate to 15 frames/sec. There would be no flicker since our video frame buffer still allows our CRT to be refreshed at 60 fields per second. 320x240@15frames/sec at 4:2:2 (2 bytes/pixel) gives us 2.2Gbyte/sec uncompressed and with 1:15 JPEG compression (certainly better then VHS) gives 150 Kbyte/sec. MPEG1 data rate is about 180Kbyte/sec - i.e. MPEG1 is no better then simular quality MJPEG.

Advantages of MJPEG:

• Patent clean
• Less complex algorithms
• Frame accurate editing/positioning
• Better video quality

Therefore maybe Linux should use MJPEG as a standard for handling video.

Speaking of codecs - nothing prevents Open Source community from creating a first class MJPEG codec. As a matter of fact we're working right now on a MJPEG viewing application, simular to xanim from the user prospective but optimized for MJPEG with the requirement to playback 720x480@30fps on resonable hardware and it's under GNU GPL of course. If anybody has some top performing (assembly language?) JPEG code (DCT/Huffman) or desire to work on such (under GNU GPL) I would like to talk very much.

Vassili Leonov vleo@linuxmedialabs.com

Linux Media Labs offers MJPEG hardware for Linux and I want to comment on some widespread misconceptions about MJPEG vs. MPEG performance.

Full rate, broadcast quality signal (D1) at 720x480@30frames/sec with 4:2:2 color (2 bytes/pixel) has a data rate of 20 MByte/sec. Now, with 1:10 compression the image quality is very good, especially since there is 60 fields per second with noise caused by lossy compression averaged out. So, D1 quality requires 2 Mbyte/sec bandwidth. That is about 7 Gbyte/hour. DVD disks have 4.7 Mbyte of capacity and hold about 2 hours of video. Therefore with all hoops and patents MPEG-2 has 3 times better performance. I would argue though that D1 encoded with MJPEG at 1:10 compression is much better quality then DVD, and don't forget that it's a 4:2:2 color, not 4:2:0 one as in DVD.

Let up now go to VHS (MPEG1) qualiity and also reduce frame rate to 15 frames/sec. There would be no flicker since our video frame buffer still allows our CRT to be refreshed at 60 fields per second. 320x240@15frames/sec at 4:2:2 (2 bytes/pixel) gives us 2.2Gbyte/sec uncompressed and with 1:15 JPEG compression (certainly better then VHS) gives 150 Kbyte/sec. MPEG1 data rate is about 180Kbyte/sec - i.e. MPEG1 is no better then simular quality MJPEG.

Advantages of MJPEG:

• Patent clean
• Less complex algorithms
• Frame accurate editing/positioning
• Better video quality

Therefore maybe Linux should use MJPEG as a standard for handling video.

Speaking of codecs - nothing prevents Open Source community from creating a first class MJPEG codec. As a matter of fact we're working right now on a MJPEG viewing application, simular to xanim from the user prospective but optimized for MJPEG with the requirement to playback 720x480@30fps on resonable hardware and it's under GNU GPL of course. If anybody has some top performing (assembly language?) JPEG code (DCT/Huffman) or desire to work on such (under GNU GPL) I would like to talk very much.

Vassili Leonov vleo@linuxmedialabs.com

Sure. It's all in Video4Linux or V4L2. The heroic Alan Cox has been hacking on drivers for the open-source LML33 and similar Iomega Buz MJPEG compression cards. This'd allow you to record compressed video to HDD.

MPEG2 has some licensing problems, and the owners are leery about open-source versions of their security measures, but work is progressing.

I don't know about that double-headed HDD one fellow hinted at, but good caching, a quiet HDD and a well-designed custom filesystem may make that unneccessary.

Quantum has a new technology caled QuickView that might be that double-head dealie. Should be fun to write drivers for.

Check-out the specs!

Parameters: CCIR and square resolution - 720x480 NTSC 60 fps, 720x576 PAL 50 fps Motion JPEG compression and decompression in hardware - ZR36060 chip Compression rates 3.5 - 30 Maximum JPEG image size 768x32768 Video stream DMA transfer into video board memory or RAM - allows for video in a window Composite and S-Video analog input/output
Possible Applications: Internet-Video Production WEB-cam Home and semi-professional video editing Video conferencing Remote security monitoring

I hope you guys succed!

---

Check-out the specs!

Parameters: CCIR and square resolution - 720x480 NTSC 60 fps, 720x576 PAL 50 fps Motion JPEG compression and decompression in hardware - ZR36060 chip Compression rates 3.5 - 30 Maximum JPEG image size 768x32768 Video stream DMA transfer into video board memory or RAM - allows for video in a window Composite and S-Video analog input/output
Possible Applications: Internet-Video Production WEB-cam Home and semi-professional video editing Video conferencing Remote security monitoring

I hope you guys succed!

---

>Does anyone know of ANY video hardware supported
>under Linux that supports any sort of medium to
>high bitrate video codecs? Any hardware that can
>do MPEG2? Or software?

I'm quite interested in the Tivo boxes, but more from the hardware point of view.

We're developing a centralised media recording-centre for recording multiple channels of TV and radio onto a large server. So far we've been thinking MJPEG with the Linux Media Labs card, which runs only on Linux. But still we would have to build our own TV-tuner set.

Hopefully some of the technology that the Tivo guys are using can become accessible for the rest of us as well. If I have some luck, this could happen, and it would be so perfect.

...free replacement for RealNetworks suite. Yes, it's better to have an Open and Free solution for Internet audio/video broadcasting, but it's not here yet. I personally started a company Linux Media Labs for manufacturing a hardware foundation for that - video capture/playback card with JPEG compression. I have the interfaces open and drivers under GPL. But I'm very glad that RealNetworks released the encoder, and I've bought it already. Since that allows to build the whole live video webcasting solution based on pure Linux, NOW!!!. Believe me, if comparable soltion would be implemented as free software users and providers would just jump on it - the complete suite from RealNetworks costs more then $5000, you don't need a lot of explanations why Free solution would be accepted, both from the freedom and $$$ viewpoint.

You can visit our site at http://linuxmedialabs.com and even order a board that does video capture/playback with (de)compression.

I hate propriatory as much as any other Linux fan and it seems that MJPEG is a very good standard. It's patent clean, it can have very good quality. And the fact that compression ratio is not very high, i.e. you need about 10Gb for a movie would soon become a non-issue with storage capacity and network bandwidth becoming more and more affordable.

Also we have plans to bundle our board with MainActor software, so resonable video solution for Linux is not that far away, maybe in the May timeframe.

Board interfaces are fully open and drivers are under GPL. But more people need to get the board to get GNU process started. We are fully commited to providing video solutions for Linux and have plans for MPEG-1 and 2 board. Of course more support for video (real time) needs to get into Linux kernel and in fact into XFree.

When there is over 10 millions around, and they demand something that would be delivered, by us, or somebody else. That is the true nature of capitalism, not a particular license - be it GPL or not. In fact I'd rather call that Free Market.

Vassili Leonov vleo@linuxmedialabs.com

We have fully open, with GPLed drivers, LML33 video capture card with hardware JPEG codec.

You're welcome to look at and if you want to support the notion of open hardware and want to
have fun messing with registers and bits - order the darn board.