Any high-quality video has an enormous size in its raw form. Thus, such videos tend to be difficult for both broadcasters and viewers. Broadcasters find it challenging to upload these videos whereas viewers can’t download them easily. Thus, encoding and decoding processes turn out useful to allow the speedy transfer of high-definition videos. So, this post will focus on Streaming Video Encoder and Video Decoder.

Streaming Video Encoder and Video Decoder – the Differences

1. Definition

Video Encoder is nothing but an electronic device with software. This software compresses, i.e. reduces the size of the analogue video and audio. Besides, it also converts analogue or digital video to another digital video format for delivery to a decoder.

Video Decoder, on the other hand,  is an electronic circuit. You will often find it incorporated within a single integrated circuit chip. Now, this device converts base-band analogue video signals into digital video. Moreover, it usually provides programmable control over different video characteristics, including saturation, contrast, hue, etc. Note that, a decoder works precisely opposite to that of a video encoder, i.e. converting the original (uncompressed) digital video into the analogue video.

Nowadays, many live broadcasts are using encoders. So, clients can use decoders or software players to decode. The software decoder is some related player software, and the hardware decoder is useful to decoding high-definition video on the network and then transmitting it to the video display.

 

Which Is Better to Compare Software or Hardware Encoder?

The encoding is generally divided into two groups, which are software encoding and hardware encoding.

Now, the software encoding is more like software that we usually see on the screen. Also, the computer configuration determines the encoding speed.

Likewise, the hardware encoding means to write the above protocol into the hardware encoding and decoding card. Here, the speed is much faster and quicker than the software encoding. So, the same principle works here too; the hardware decoder is more rapid than software.

The Market Situation for Video Decoding and Video Encoding

Decoding market

H.264 decoding products mainly include decoding integrated circuits that support the H.264 standard. It further contains dedicated decoding chips and system chips, and decoding software that supports the H.264 standard, which is used in various electronic products.

Coding market

Due to the excellent coding efficiency of H.264, it was quickly accepted by the coding equipment market with video surveillance equipment as the main body. China is one of the first countries in the world to adopt H.264 to enter the video surveillance market. With the transfer of analogue video equipment to high-definition cameras, H.264 technology will dominate the market for many years to come.

Final Thoughts!

That’s all about video encoder and a video decoder. Both of these technologies work hand-in-hand. In live streaming, the size of the source video needs to be reduced. Also, when the video reaches the destination, i.e. at viewers device, then it should be reset back to the original size, to maintain the quality. Thus, to make that happen, video encoder and decoder are crucial.