Hardware apparatus and method having video/audio encoding and multiplexing functionality

Abstract

The apparatus includes a video signal acquisition device, an audio signal acquisition device, a time information processing device, a video signal encoding device, an audio signal encoding device, a multiplexing device and an output device. The video signal acquisition device receives the video signals and converts them into digital video data. The audio signal acquisition device receives the audio signals and converts them into digital audio data. The time information processing device receives a clock signal for synchronization of the digital video and audio data. The video signal encoding device encodes the digital video data. The audio signal encoding device encodes the audio video data. The multiplexing device converts the encoded video and audio signals into a single piece of bit stream data. The output device outputs the bit stream data. The time information processing device provides the two pieces of time information respectively as a video reference clock and an audio reference clock. The video reference clock and the audio reference clock are multiplexed into the bit stream data as capture time points.