An Efficient CAVLD Algorithm for H.264 Decoder

This paper proposes an efficient CAVLD algorithm for MPEG-4 AVC/H.264 baseline profile. In order to improve throughput of CAVLC decoder, we propose two new methods, which are called MLD (multi-level decoding) and NZS (non zero skip for run-before decoding). By performing parallel operation on level decoder, MLD can decode two levels in one cycle at most cases. NZS can produce several run-befores in the same cycle. With these improvements, we obtain the throughput of 1.17*106 macroblock per second at 160 MHz. Compared with the previous designs, the speed up is around 80.5% to 108.5%. The hardware area is 13189 gates and the performance can archive the real time requirement on HD1080i format.