The kit comprises the eXpressDSP Configuration Kit, and SoC analyzer based on the eXpress data visualization technology and MontaVista’s Linux operating system. The combination is said to reduce the DaVinci development cycle from months to weeks for designers of IP set top boxes, video phones and video security systems.

The company said it has shipped over one thousand of its DVEVM evaluation platforms, launched late last year. According to Jean-Marc Charpentier, DSP Business Development Manager for the DSP Product Group in Europe, “400 companies are developing products and systems based on the platform. We are seeing a lot of ARM users doing something around video.”

Green Hills Software and QNX Software Systems have already created an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and real-time operating system for the video platform.

Charpentier also said TI is readying a slimmed down version of the video processor, as well as several application specific development platforms and new multimedia operating systems and codecs. “Some of these enhancements to the DaVinci platform will be ready this year, other next, and represent a move to extend the versatility of the entire platform.”

The single core version, based on TI’s DM644xx signal processor, is likely to sell at about $10 and is targeted at lower cost video applications. It is expected to be ready by the end of the year and, according to Charpentier, could be used as the video processor in feature rich mobile handsets.

Charpentier said the latest development kit pushes the envelope for the kind of video applications the platform can be used for. The configuration kit will allow system integrators to integrate discrete software modules and combine these into a single output, thus avoiding months of tedious manual integration.

The kit integrates TI’s video, imaging, speech and audio codecs, custom codes complying with the eXpressDSP Digital Media algorithm standard, the company’s codec engine framework, DSP/BIOS real-time kernel and Link inter-processor communication technology.

The SoC analyzer allows developers to identify bottlenecks that were previously not possible to identify. The minimally invasive tool helps in analyzing and identifying problems by capturing and displaying system interaction, load distribution, bottlenecks in data throughput and other types of behavior.