Question
I'm trying to figure out if I can use the ADV7180, or a similar Analog product,
to transfer an analog composite video signal to a PC. The part of transfering
the signal is not a part of my inquiry. But if you have some good suggestions
they are always welcome. Just for information, I'm looking into using a FDTI -
FT245R - chip for this purpose.
The datasheet for ADV7180 spesifies a 8 bit output in the YCbCr format. This
format is somewhat unknown to me. I have read up on it but I fail to understand
if a computer is able to read this signal and thus display the video. I'm
thinking it will not work, but I'm not sure.
If a computer will not be able to read this signal as it is, do Analog have any
other chips that will convert the signal into a readable format which I can
transfer to the PC via USB?
Answer
We advise using the ADV7182 for new designs. The ADV7182 is the replacement
part for the ADV7180.
Both of these parts output digital video according to the ITU656 specification.
This involves 8 parallel data lanes and one 27 MHz clock lane. Timing
information is encoded in over the data link.
Optionally the timing information can be output over Vertical Synchronization
(Vsync) , Horizontal Synchronization (Hsync) and Data Enable (DE) pins instead.
The video data transmitted over the ITU656 link is encoded in a YUV422 format.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/YUV
I can think of two solutions :
1) Connect the CVBS camera output to ADV7180/ADV7182. The ADV7180/ADV7182
output could be fed into an HDMI Tx such as the ADV7511. The HDMI output of the
ADV7511 could then be fed into the HDMI port on the computer. We have done
experiments in the lab of feeding the ADV7182 into the ADV7511 so we already
have the scripts available.
2) Feed the output of the ADV7180/ADV7182 into an FPGA. The FGPA could then
output video over a PCI express link.