Η Microsoft is ready to introduce support for hardware acceleration in Windows 10 for the video encoding format AV1.
ΔHowever, to take advantage of this, you may need to upgrade your processor or graphics card.
AV1 is a free, open source video encoder first released in 2018. Developed as the successor to VP9 encoding by Alliance for Open Media (AOMedia), which has Amazon, Apple, ARM, Cisco, Facebook, Google, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Mozilla, Netflix, Nvidia, Samsung Electronics and Tencent as its main members. It is a very desirable codec not only because it is free, but also because of the huge benefits in terms of performance.
For example, AV1 offers up to 34% higher data compression from VP9 and up to 50% higher than x264. However, its use AV1 in Windows 10 currently does not take advantage of hardware acceleration, which means that it runs on software and therefore requires more power. If you use a portable device such as a laptop, this will adversely affect your battery life.
Although we do not yet have a specific date, the Microsoft confirmed that AV1 hardware acceleration will appear this fall. However, it will require new equipment to run it. You will not be able to take advantage of the acceleration unless you have a processor 11th generation Intel Core with Xe Graphics the one Nvidia GPU, GeForce RTX 3000 series or an AMD GPU, Radeon RX 6000 series. You will also need them Windows 10 build 1909 or later, a web browser with support for AV1 hardware acceleration and AV1 Video Extension.
In other words, laptop owners will not be lucky enough to benefit until their next upgrade, and when 11th generation Intel chips are common in the market. Desktop PC owners will have more freedom to take advantage, as they will, presumably, be able to find a series graphics card RTX 3000 in stock somewhere, or wait for the cards to appear AMD RX 6000.
In the long run, the performance offered by AV1 it will definitely make it the default video encoder used everywhere, so keep this in mind if you are going to upgrade your PC or laptop.
Of course, we can not forget that H.266, which seems to be very promising, but should be able to take advantage of the same hardware that the AV1.
