Enhanced Versatile Disc
Encyclopedia
The Enhanced Versatile Disc (EVD) is an optical medium-based digital audio/video format, developed to provide a means for playing HDTV content using existing optical media. It was announced on November 18, 2003, by the People's Republic of China
's Xinhua News Agency
as a response to the popular DVD-Video
format and its licensing costs (which some considered excessive). It uses an optical storage medium in CD
size (120 mm) that is physically a DVD
disc with the same UDF
file system. China
started development on EVD in 1999, because DVD Video (CSS, Macrovision
, etc.) and MPEG-2
(Video and Systems) licensing costs were relatively high—reportedly in the range of $13–$20 USD per hardware video player
.
On the EVD, the video codecs VP5 and VP6
from On2 Technologies
were supposed to be used. These are more efficient than MPEG-2 Video and could enable the disc to store HDTV
resolutions, which the standard DVD format does not support. With EVD, royalties to On2 for the VP6 codec part of the EVD design were anticipated to be about $2 USD per video player (a much lower fee than that associated with MPEG-2 Video). However, a contract dispute rapidly developed between On2 and Beijing E-World (the consortium of companies developing the EVD format). On2 announced in April 2004 that it was not being properly paid and would file multiple breach of contract claims against E-World for arbitration. Approximately one year later, the arbitrator dismissed all of On2's claims and ruled that nothing was owed to On2, primarily because no significant number of player devices had ever been produced by the E-World companies. While the EVD format design including VP6 had been proposed to the Chinese government to become a standard, the effort appears to have stalled at that point and no further progress is evident.
The audio codec was to come from Coding Technologies and was called the EAC (Enhanced Audio Codec
) 2.0. It is the successor of a prior design known as EAC and works on the basis of spectral band replication
. EAC 2.0 supports mono, stereo
and 5.1 surround sound
.
The development was supported by the Chinese government
and was developed by Beijing
E-world Technology (a multi-company partnership including SVA, Shinco, Xiaxin, Yuxing, Skyworth
, Nintaus, Malata, Changhong
, and BBK), which reported the overcoming of development, chip
-design and production problems. The team applied for 25 patents, of which at least seven have currently been granted.
Prototype EVD discs and software players were presented in April 2004. As the disc is physically a DVD it could be read with any computer DVD drive. Successful copies were made with DVD-R discs. The number of films ever offered in the format was very limited.
Following the contract dispute in spring 2004, very little news was available about EVD until December 6, 2006, when 20 Chinese electronic firms unveiled 54 prototype EVD players, announcing their intention to fully switch to this format by 2008 in an effort to decrease dependency on foreign electronic products and establish a niche in the market. Although earlier attempts have been made, none have had such widespread support as this.
It is speculated that currently no EVD is encoding in an HDTV resolution or an Image Constraint Token
is preventing all discs to be displayed at full resolution. Support for the disc format had been dropped by the Xinhua Bookstore in Wuhan
, which was a major supporter of the format, due to a lack of sales. The official Chinese EVD site (www.evd.cn) has also gone offline.
People's Republic of China
China , officially the People's Republic of China , is the most populous country in the world, with over 1.3 billion citizens. Located in East Asia, the country covers approximately 9.6 million square kilometres...
's Xinhua News Agency
Xinhua News Agency
The Xinhua News Agency is the official press agency of the government of the People's Republic of China and the biggest center for collecting information and press conferences in the PRC. It is the largest news agency in the PRC, ahead of the China News Service...
as a response to the popular DVD-Video
DVD-Video
DVD-Video is a consumer video format used to store digital video on DVD discs, and is currently the dominant consumer video format in Asia, North America, Europe, and Australia. Discs using the DVD-Video specification require a DVD drive and a MPEG-2 decoder...
format and its licensing costs (which some considered excessive). It uses an optical storage medium in CD
Compact Disc
The Compact Disc is an optical disc used to store digital data. It was originally developed to store and playback sound recordings exclusively, but later expanded to encompass data storage , write-once audio and data storage , rewritable media , Video Compact Discs , Super Video Compact Discs ,...
size (120 mm) that is physically a DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
disc with the same UDF
Universal Disk Format
Universal Disk Format is an implementation of the specification known as ISO/IEC 13346 and ECMA-167 and is an open vendor-neutral file system for computer data storage for a broad range of media. In practice, it has been most widely used for DVDs and newer optical disc formats, supplanting ISO 9660...
file system. China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
started development on EVD in 1999, because DVD Video (CSS, Macrovision
Macrovision
Rovi Corporation is a globally operating, US-based company that provides guidance technology, entertainment data, copy protection, industry standard networking and media management technology for digital entertainment devices and services...
, etc.) and MPEG-2
MPEG-2
MPEG-2 is a standard for "the generic coding of moving pictures and associated audio information". It describes a combination of lossy video compression and lossy audio data compression methods which permit storage and transmission of movies using currently available storage media and transmission...
(Video and Systems) licensing costs were relatively high—reportedly in the range of $13–$20 USD per hardware video player
Video player
Video player can refer to the following:*Hardware video players:** VCR** Laserdisc player** DVD player*Software video players:** Video player...
.
On the EVD, the video codecs VP5 and VP6
VP6
On2 TrueMotion VP6 is a proprietary lossy video compression format and video codec. It is an incarnation of the TrueMotion video codec, a series of video codecs developed by On2 Technologies. This codec is commonly used by Adobe Flash, Flash Video, and JavaFX media files.- Overview :The VP6 codec...
from On2 Technologies
On2 Technologies
On2 Technologies , formerly known as The Duck Corporation, was a small publicly-traded company , headquartered in Clifton Park, New York, that designs video codec technology. They created a series of video codecs called TrueMotion...
were supposed to be used. These are more efficient than MPEG-2 Video and could enable the disc to store HDTV
High-definition television
High-definition television is video that has resolution substantially higher than that of traditional television systems . HDTV has one or two million pixels per frame, roughly five times that of SD...
resolutions, which the standard DVD format does not support. With EVD, royalties to On2 for the VP6 codec part of the EVD design were anticipated to be about $2 USD per video player (a much lower fee than that associated with MPEG-2 Video). However, a contract dispute rapidly developed between On2 and Beijing E-World (the consortium of companies developing the EVD format). On2 announced in April 2004 that it was not being properly paid and would file multiple breach of contract claims against E-World for arbitration. Approximately one year later, the arbitrator dismissed all of On2's claims and ruled that nothing was owed to On2, primarily because no significant number of player devices had ever been produced by the E-World companies. While the EVD format design including VP6 had been proposed to the Chinese government to become a standard, the effort appears to have stalled at that point and no further progress is evident.
The audio codec was to come from Coding Technologies and was called the EAC (Enhanced Audio Codec
Enhanced Audio Codec
Enhanced Audio Codec is an audio codec developed and owned by Beijing E-World, that uses a unique perceptual model, spectral band replication, to compress the audio signal by utilizing the redundancy as well as the relevancy. The EAC codec supports mono, stereo and 5.1 surround sound modes for...
) 2.0. It is the successor of a prior design known as EAC and works on the basis of spectral band replication
Spectral band replication
Spectral band replication is a technology to enhance audio or speech codecs, especially at low bit rates and is based on harmonic redundancy in the frequency domain....
. EAC 2.0 supports mono, stereo
Stereophonic sound
The term Stereophonic, commonly called stereo, sound refers to any method of sound reproduction in which an attempt is made to create an illusion of directionality and audible perspective...
and 5.1 surround sound
Surround sound
Surround sound encompasses a range of techniques such as for enriching the sound reproduction quality of an audio source with audio channels reproduced via additional, discrete speakers. Surround sound is characterized by a listener location or sweet spot where the audio effects work best, and...
.
The development was supported by the Chinese government
Government of the People's Republic of China
All power within the government of the People's Republic of China is divided among three bodies: the People's Republic of China, State Council, and the People's Liberation Army . This article is concerned with the formal structure of the state, its departments and their responsibilities...
and was developed by Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
E-world Technology (a multi-company partnership including SVA, Shinco, Xiaxin, Yuxing, Skyworth
Skyworth
Skyworth , viz. Hong Kong Skyworth Digital Holdings Co Ltd is a Chinese holding company whose subsidiaries manufacture and sell consumer electronics and upstream components Skyworth (创维), viz. Hong Kong Skyworth Digital Holdings Co Ltd is a Chinese holding company whose subsidiaries manufacture...
, Nintaus, Malata, Changhong
Changhong
Sichuan Changhong Electric Co. is a consumer electronics company based in Mianyang, China and founded on 1958. It is the second largest manufacturer of televisions in China. In 2004, 90% of the television sets exported from China to the United States were made by Changhong.In 2010, they made a...
, and BBK), which reported the overcoming of development, chip
Integrated circuit
An integrated circuit or monolithic integrated circuit is an electronic circuit manufactured by the patterned diffusion of trace elements into the surface of a thin substrate of semiconductor material...
-design and production problems. The team applied for 25 patents, of which at least seven have currently been granted.
Prototype EVD discs and software players were presented in April 2004. As the disc is physically a DVD it could be read with any computer DVD drive. Successful copies were made with DVD-R discs. The number of films ever offered in the format was very limited.
Following the contract dispute in spring 2004, very little news was available about EVD until December 6, 2006, when 20 Chinese electronic firms unveiled 54 prototype EVD players, announcing their intention to fully switch to this format by 2008 in an effort to decrease dependency on foreign electronic products and establish a niche in the market. Although earlier attempts have been made, none have had such widespread support as this.
It is speculated that currently no EVD is encoding in an HDTV resolution or an Image Constraint Token
Image Constraint Token
The Image Constraint Token is a protocol flag that can cause downsampling of high-definition video content on Blu-ray and HD DVD to slightly-better-than-DVD quality video...
is preventing all discs to be displayed at full resolution. Support for the disc format had been dropped by the Xinhua Bookstore in Wuhan
Wuhan
Wuhan is the capital of Hubei province, People's Republic of China, and is the most populous city in Central China. It lies at the east of the Jianghan Plain, and the intersection of the middle reaches of the Yangtze and Han rivers...
, which was a major supporter of the format, due to a lack of sales. The official Chinese EVD site (www.evd.cn) has also gone offline.
See also
- China Blue High-definition Disc (a follow-on to EVD based on HD-DVD technology)
- Audio Video StandardAudio Video StandardAudio Video Standard is a compression standard for digital audio and video, and is competing with H.264/AAC to potentially replace MPEG-2. Chinese companies own 90% of AVS patents. The audio and video files have an .avs extension as a container format.-Overview:Development of AVS was initiated by...
(a newly created audio/video format designed for use in the EVD standard) - TheoraTheoraTheora is a free lossy video compression format. It is developed by the Xiph.Org Foundation and distributed without licensing fees alongside their other free and open media projects, including the Vorbis audio format and the Ogg container....
(based upon On2 Technologies' VP3 codec) - Competing technologies: Blu-ray DiscBlu-ray DiscBlu-ray Disc is an optical disc storage medium designed to supersede the DVD format. The plastic disc is 120 mm in diameter and 1.2 mm thick, the same size as DVDs and CDs. Blu-ray Discs contain 25 GB per layer, with dual layer discs being the norm for feature-length video discs...
, HD DVDHD DVDHD DVD is a discontinued high-density optical disc format for storing data and high-definition video.Supported principally by Toshiba, HD DVD was envisioned to be the successor to the standard DVD format...
(defunct), FVDForward Versatile DiscFVD, or Forward Versatile Disc, is an offshoot ofDVD developed in Taiwan jointly by the Advanced Optical Storage Research Alliance and the Industrial Technology Research Institute as a less expensive alternative for high-definition content...
, HVDHigh-Definition Versatile DiscHigh-Definition Versatile Disc is an Asian standard of advanced high-definition technology originally developed in China by AMLogic Inc., for high-definition video. The format resolutions support 720p, 1080i, or 1080p on version 1 discs...