Does anyone know if the Omega will play DVD movies?

According to their web site, the MD Omega's lightening graphics chip supports (and I quote) "both 2D and 3D acceleration with jpeg and mpeg hardware decoding", the time consuming part of DVD decoding is the mpeg decode.

The only problem is they don't state if it's mpeg1 or 2 (DVD uses mpeg2 compression). There are also licensing issues. DVD use an encoding system (called the Content Scrambling System (CSS)). Further it uses either Dolby AC3 sound codecs or dts (mostly AC3 to be fair). The problem is they're all PROPRIETARY if you want to license them you need to pay. Just to see the full DVD Spec requires you to sign NDA's and then pay a cool $5000.

MD could opt to go and try the route some Windows/Linux users use, that of using non-licensed decryption software (like DeCSS), the problem with that is they would be open to litigation by any (or all) of the owners of the effected patents. As a commercial outfit I am pretty sure that MD would not want to take that hassle on. If they were to do DVD movie replay they'd have to cough up and pay.

Technically if they DON't have MPEG2 hardware decode the SA-110 probably wouldn't be up to decoding the sound and MPEG2 DVD streams without dropping frames or having a painful frame rate (xScale should do better though).

The only alternative is to get a PC DVD card working on the Omega (something like Creatives excellent DxR3 card). The problem with that is it would take the active co-operation of Creative (and that might be costly). Picture wise such a card gives an image quality better than many actual DVD players and has SPD/IF out so you can drive a 5.1 sound system (Omega as it stands doesn't have such outputs even assuming they licensed Dolby AC-3).

Short answer it is not certain that Omega CAN technically play DVD's (based on the SA-110), they may fare better with xScale. The second issue is licensing and that is in MD's hands. I suppose David Atkins and his merry men may do such a licensing deal if there is a sufficient demand for that feature and enough Omega sales to justify it.

Regards

Annraoi

[Edited by ams at 16:54, 11/8/2001]

[Edited by ams at 16:58, 11/8/2001]

[Edited by ams at 16:59, 11/8/2001]