Efficient implementation of the DCT-based video compression on custom computers

Custom computers are a new computing paradigm where reconfigurable logic in the form of SRAM-based field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) are used as a co-processor resource in addition to a conventional CPU. This allows application developers to adapt not only the software but also the hardware of the computer on an application-by-application basis. The design of arithmetic circuits for FPGA-based custom computers is investigated, and it is demonstrated that look-up table based arithmetic circuits can provide significant performance benefits compared to conventional arithmetic. Experimental evaluation of computational speed for 2-D discrete cosine transforms of 8/spl times/8 pixels blocks within a 512/spl times/512 pixel image show that a custom computer can provide speedups of 50-100 times compared to state-of-the art computer workstations.