Matrox CompressHD is designed for professional content creators delivering H.264 files for Blu-ray, the web, and mobile devices, who need a fast, flexible, high quality encoding workhorse. Matrox CompressHD is the first implementation of Matrox MAX technology in an amazingly affordable H.264 accelerator card. It works in systems with or without a video I/O device and extends the life of your current system investment, giving you the power you need to deliver today's premium H.264 formats faster than ever. This low profile, half-length PCIe x1 card fits into Mac Pros, Intel-based Apple Xserve systems, and PCs. Get yourself a Matrox CompressHD card and deliver your projects in a fraction of the time!

Professional accelerator card for faster than realtime H.264 HD file creation

Matrox MAX is a unique technology that implements faster than realtime H.264 encoding for resolutions ranging from iPod to HD. It uses a dedicated hardware processor to accelerate the creation of H.264 files for Blu-ray, the web, and mobile devices. By using specialized hardware acceleration, jobs are finished with amazing speed and system resources are liberated for other tasks. Quality and flexibility are ensured through direct integration with professional applications such as Apple Compressor on the Mac and Adobe Media Encoder on the PC. As an added benefit, the Matrox MAX technology allows direct export to higher-quality H.264 Blu-ray compliant files from Compressor.

Key features of Matrox CompressHD for the Mac

• Faster than realtime creation of H.264 files, for resolutions ranging from iPod to HD, using Matrox MAX technology
• Low profile, half-length PCIe x1 card that fits into all Mac Pros and Intel-based Apple Xserve systems
• Works in systems with or without an I/O device
• Three-year hardware warranty and complimentary telephone support

Key features of Matrox MAX technology

• Faster than realtime creation of H.264 files, for resolutions ranging from iPod to HD, at bitrates up to 50 Mbps
• A specialized, dedicated hardware processor liberates system resources for other tasks
• Accelerated encoding for Blu-ray, PS3, Apple TV, YouTube, Flash, web formats, and mobile devices including iPhone, and iPod from various video sources including 2K files
• Direct integration with Apple Compressor to simplify workflow
• Creation of Blu-ray H.264 files that can be authored in Adobe Encore CS4 or Roxio Toast 10 and burned without re-encoding
• Support for Apple Qmaster to take advantage of multiple systems with a Matrox MAX processing engine for distributed encoding across a network

The Matrox CompressHD Awards

The Black Diamond Awards recognize the best products making their debut at the NAB Show, specifically those that will appeal to DV Magazine's readership of independent video professionals.

The Best of Show Vidy Awards recognize outstanding achievement in the advancement of the art and science of video technology. The Videography Vidy Awards is the longest-running NAB awards program.

EventDV, The Authority for Event Videographers, has announced the winners of its fourth annual "Best of NAB" awards. Chosen each year by contributing editor and leading L.A.-area videographer and filmmaker Marc Franklin, the awards recognize products in four categories: cameras, production gear, and postproduction solutions.

Special offer — Apple Compressor 4 Owners
SAVE $100 on Matrox CompressHD
The Matrox CompressHD card featuring MAX technology works in a Mac Pro alongside your MXO2 device or on it's own to turbocharge your H.264 deliveries with Compressor. Until September 30, 2011, when you buy Compressor 4, you can save $100 on the Compress HD card.

To redeem this offer:
•  Order Matrox CompressHD from Videoguys.com at the special price of $395.
•  Include a copy of your customer's Mac App Store receipt for Compressor 4 with your purchase order.

Terms and conditions:
•  Offer valid until September 30, 2011
•  This offer cannot be combined with any other discount, coupon, or promotion from Matrox.

Using Matrox MXO2 devices with FCP X and Compressor 4
In the first release of Final Cut Pro X, the interaction with I/O devices such as the Matrox MXO2 products is different than with previous versions of Final Cut Pro when it comes to capturing, monitoring, and outputting video. Exporting to H.264 files from the new Compressor 4 using Matrox MAX-enabled MXO2 devices remains up to 5 times faster than software alone.
 
 
Capture
With FCP 7 you can capture from tape or live sources from within the app. With FCP X you use the Matrox Vetura Capture stand-alone application to quickly and easily capture to many of the QuickTime codecs that are installed on your system such as Apple ProRes 422 HQ, XDCAM HD, and many others.  

Monitoring
With FCP 7, the Matrox MXO2 devices provide full quality audio and video monitoring via digital and analog outputs so you don't need to rely on just a preview-quality output when making edit decisions. The Matrox MXO2 products also include the unique Matrox HDMI Calibration Utility that lets an HDMI monitor perform like a broadcast HD/SD monitor.

FCP X does not support professional video monitoring. For full-screen, preview-quality output you can use the second DisplayPort output from your computer in Full Screen Mode. The audio outputs of the MXO2 devices can be used for audio monitoring.

Print-to-tape
With FCP 7 you can print-to-tape from the timeline within the app. With FCP X you must first export your timeline to a 1080, 720, PAL, NTSC .mov file then use the Matrox Vetura Playback app to record to tape through your MXO2 device.  

Lightning fast H.264 encoding
Matrox MXO2 devices with MAX give you the same accelerated H.264 encoding with Apple Compressor 4 as they did with Compressor 3.5. You can still deliver H.264 video up to 5 times faster without sacrificing quality! Matrox MAX taps into Compressor to let you quickly and easily create H.264 files for the web, mobile devices, Apple TV, and Blu-ray discs from a variety of video sources including SD, HD, and RED proxy files up to 2K.  

More to come
Matrox is committed to adding new features to the Matrox MXO2 products to further enhance FCP X workflows for professional users. As the FCP X software platform evolves, so too will the workflows we can offer.

This year's Top 10 list began with Matrox, and it ends with them as well. The Matrox Compress HD and MXO2 family of products with MAX technology allow you to encode your footage into H.264 faster then real-time. A one-hour video might take several hours to encode using Compressor or Adobe Media Encoder or a 3rd party encoder like Sorenson Squeeze, even on a Dual Xeon Mac Pro or HP workstation. With the Matrox MAX technology this same clip would take around 50 minutes. That's right, from HD to Blu-ray H.264 in under an hour! Now that's a huge savings in time, with no sacrifice in quality. In the video business time = money. So you should immediately be able to see the value of the MAX technology.

Click here to read the full article

Our "Toasted" Blu-ray Bundles for Mac also happen to be perfectly timed with a hot new product from Matrox that solves yet another Mac problem - ENCODING! We know that encoding your HD video to H.264 gives you the very best possible quality video on Blu-ray and Flash. Unfortunately H.264 encoding takes lots of time.

How fast is it? Right now a fully loaded 8-core Mac Pro tower will take several hours to encode one hour of ProRes HD video to H.264 - with the Matrox CompressHD card it will take less then an hour! That's right faster then real-time encoding - even on a slower Mac.

• Faster than realtime creation of H.264 files, for resolutions ranging from iPod to HD, at bitrates up to 50 Mbps using Matrox MAX technology
• Works great with your existing HD hardware including AJA, Blackmagic and more
• Matrox MAX technology taps into Apple Compressor on the Mac and Adobe Media Encoder on the PC to let you quickly and easily create H.264 files for Blu-ray, PS3, Apple TV, YouTube, Flash, web formats, and mobile devices including iPhone, and iPod.

Matrox MAX technology saves you time. You'll spend less time rendering and more time being creative and productive. The following table shows typical encoding times for a 20-minute H.264 deliverable.