Video Processing Engine

nVidia introduced the Video Processing Engine or VPE with the GeForce 4 MX. It is a feature of nVidia's GeForce graphics processor line that offers dedicated hardware to offload parts of the MPEG2 decoding and encoding. The GeForce Go FX 5700 rolled out the VPE 3.0. The VPE later developed into nVidia's PureVideo.
Operating system support.
The VPE SIP core needs to be supported by the device driver. The device driver provides one or multiple interfaces, like e.g. VDPAU, VAAPI or DXVA. One of this interfaces is then used by end-user software, like e.g. VLC media player or GStreamer, to access the VPE hardware and make use of it.
Nvidia's proprietary device driver is available for multiple operating systems and support for VPE has been added to it. Additionally, a free device driver named nouveau is available. This driver also supports the VPE hardware.