AMD64 Technology and Cineform Software Delivers Real-Time High Definition

AMD64 Technology and Cineform Software Delivers Real-Time High Definition

AMD (NYSE: AMD) announced today that dual AMD Opteron™ processor-based workstations from BOXX Technologies were used exclusively with CineForm’s Prospect HD™ for Adobe® Premiere® Pro throughout the post-production process to finish the feature film “Dust To Glory” now playing in theaters. “Dust To Glory”, a film by BronWa Pictures and an IFC Films release, chronicles the notorious and dangerous Tecate SCORE Baja 1000 race in Mexico. “Dust To Glory” broke new ground when choosing AMD64 technology to power Prospect HD, a compressed digital intermediate online format for real-time high-definition (HD) editing, color correction and final film out. Never before has a film intended for broad theatrical release used a compressed digital intermediate format throughout its online workflow.

The matching of these technologies and the success of the implementation on “Dust To Glory” represents a breakthrough in the film making process. By putting more power in the hands of the creator and eliminating the need for expensive, proprietary, post-production equipment, innovative software like Prospect HD on AMD64 technology increases creative freedom in the post-production process. AMD64 technology with Direct Connect Architecture running on the Microsoft® Windows® XP operating system allows significantly greater memory addressing capability to handle and manipulate large, high-definition data sets. The increase in raw processing power allows software like Prospect HD to literally replace specialized video processing hardware typically used to perform these expensive and time consuming tasks.

“Prospect HD software, which was originally developed on a competing dual-processor PC architecture, balances both high memory bandwidth and fast arithmetic processing. But we soon discovered that CPU memory bandwidth limitations would not allow us to reach real-time performance, meaning we didn’t have a viable product. By simply moving our software to a dual AMD Opteron processor-based workstation from BOXX Technologies we immediately gained a 50% performance increase – without further optimization – which was more than enough for us to achieve real time,” said David Taylor, CEO of CineForm, Inc. “I credit AMD’s Direct Connect Architecture and its ability to address larger data sets direct from memory for this breakthrough.”

“We broke every rule in delivering a high-quality HD master for the film print,” said Jacob Rosenberg, online editor and supervisor for “Dust To Glory”. “The CineForm Intermediate running on AMD64 provided flawless reliability and stunning visual quality through multiple recompressions, holding true to the original source quality. The processor speed enabled me to edit with multiple streams of HD in real-time. Making changes in the eleventh hour, the real-time performance with the AMD64 processor made a huge difference in productivity.”

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