Patent ID: 8199829

Claim:
A system comprising: a video decoder system configured to receive an encoded video signal and to output a decoded video signal, the video decoder system including: a first decoding path configured to access a first lookup table storing first data corresponding to a complete set of codewords of a variable length coding scheme; a second decoding path configured to access the first lookup table and a second lookup table storing second data corresponding to an incomplete set of codewords, wherein the second decoding path is configured to access the second lookup table prior to accessing the first lookup table such that the second decoding path is configured to decode at a slower average rate than the first decoding path; and a dynamic switch configured to provide a first portion of the encoded video signal to the first decoding path or to the second decoding path, the dynamic switch further configured to provide a subsequent portion of the encoded video signal to the first decoding path or to the second decoding path in response to a value of a decoding metric associated with decode processing of the first portion of the encoded video signal, wherein the decoding metric indicates a relationship between an amount of data remaining to be decoded and an amount of time or a number of clock cycles available to decode the data remaining to be decoded.