Mouser New Product of the Week: AMD / Xilinx Alveo™ MA35D Accelerator

By Embedded Computing Design Staff

August 05, 2024

Various applications today rely on advanced and efficient video processing infrastructure capable of simultaneously managing multiple high-density and ultra-low latency video streams.

Those applications, ranging from live events and cloud gaming to video conferencing and telemedicine, can benefit from an accelerator that performs video encoding, decoding, and transcoding but also supports energy usage and flexibility in both edge devices and large-scale cloud data centers.

The AMD / Xilinx Alveo™ MA35D Media Accelerator is based on ASIC architecture and is capable of delivering AI-enabled video processing. The accelerator is also designed to ensure high-quality video while reducing rack space, power consumption, and network bandwidth.

The AMD / Xilinx Alveo MA35D Accelerator in Action

The MA35D is based on ASIC architecture capable of delivering AI-enabled video processing, as well as a large number of high-definition video streams simultaneously, up to 32 streams of 1080p resolution at 60 frames per second, ideal for the aforementioned applications requiring real-time video processing.

The MA35D Media Accelerator supports a specialized ASIC architecture designed to reduce cost-, area-, and power-per-stream. Additionally, the device utilizes a Half-Height, Half-Length (HHHL) PCIe® form factor which supports a compact design, compatibility, scalability, and cooling and power management.

The accelerator also supports video codec technologies for AV1, H.264, and H.265 at latencies as low as 8ms (4Kp60), as well as an 8K max resolution, more specifically, a 256 maximum transcode channels and 7680 x 4320 maximum resolution.

The accelerator features an AI-enabled, intelligent video pipeline that utilizes compression efficiency to help reduce bandwidth at optimal video quality. The AI-enabled “smart streaming” is also designed to improve video quality at lower bitrates. The AI processor supports 22 TOPS per card and includes AI-enabled Region-of-Interest optimization (e.g., text, face), artifact reduction, and content-aware encoding.

Finally, the MA35D solution is highlighted for its cost when scaling for interactive media applications and high-volume, real-time streaming. The device also supports the use of interactive media and monetization services.

Getting Started with the AMD / Xilinx Alveo MA35D Accelerator

For video processing, the MA35D Media Accelerator supports:

ABR Scaler
Compositor Engine
Video Look-Ahead Engine
Video Quality (VQ) and Quality-of-Experience (QoE) Engine
2D graphics overlay

For a demo of the AMD Alveo MA35D Media Accelerator, check out the company’s video below featuring Director of Video Product Marketing, Girish Malipeddi.