
Currently, most video decoding in Windows CE (such as DVD playback) is based on Microsoft's decoding engines and requires hardware decoding. MainConcept's Windows CE Codecs provide DirectShow filters which allow convenient DirectShow software-only decoding on CE without any additional hardware.
These filters emulate hardware decoders and handle all of the data that Windows CE normally requires hardware to decode. They operate with Microsoft's decoder engines like drivers and process the streams and corresponding video and audio data.