4K and 8K Technology Discussion Thread

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#743246 11-Jan-2013 12:43

In 5 years, will 8K be the 'Full HD' of today?

We may see that 4K ends up being the 720P of HD?

paulspain

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#743268 11-Jan-2013 13:34

Quite a lot here at CES to see as far as 4K goes - including a demo of Samsung/Netflix demo of Netflix streaming 4K video to a Samsung TV. Will be a long time before there is any way of getting that in NZ however as it will only be available through specific ISPs who have a local cache.

Also saw the 8K prototype TV from Sharp. Incredible detail but up real close a top end smartphone still has a much higher definition (in terms of pixels per inch).

No doubt that as the production prices come down we'll probably see 4K becoming common place over the next 2-3 years. I'd think it's quite likely the next Xbox and PlayStation platforms will offer 4K (though depending on how soon we see them, maybe not in their initial release).

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#743604 11-Jan-2013 21:43

There are still several technical pieces that really need to be put into place on top of the content itself:
1. DVB broadcast standards don't support HEVC.
2, HDMI 1.4 doesn't support framerates of more than 24p with 4k (ie. I think 3D 4k is not possible with standard links).
3, Blu-ray standard doesn't support HEVC or resolution/frame rate greater than 1080p24.

My personal thoughts and predictions...

I estimate (2) and (3) are probably 6 to 12 months away, though reasonable gear prices are probably still 2 or even 3 years away. Who knows when (1) would happen... but I don't see it happening for broadcast TV in NZ for 5 years, if ever. DVB-T2 and DVB-S2 (or their successors) would almost certainly need to have taken hold, which would require many (the majority?) of [existing] STBs to be upgraded. Extra broadcast bandwidth is required as well of course. Depending on how the digital dividend auctions turn out, cellular upgrades to LTE[-A] may prevent terrestrial broadcast TV from acquiring the required bandwidth. On the satellite front, it is possible that extending the broadcast frequency range from 12.25..12.75 GHz to 11.7..12.75 GHz will help. My understanding is that the Optus D series satellites have this capability already. "Optus 10" may help as well, depending on where Optus puts/points it.

I'm happy to wait patiently. :)

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#747103 18-Jan-2013 20:05

There seems to be a lot of cunfusion with the use of 4k for consumer TV's and players. 4k is a pro standard and has a resolution of 4096x2160, while UHD (or QuadHD) has a resolution of 3840x2160. Sony, LG etc are confusing people when they refer to UHD as 4k, because it is not. Cinema 4k will still need to be down-sampled for any consumer devices/formats.

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#1002219 10-Mar-2014 17:27

Rather than start a new thread I thought I'd bring this one to life.

Had a car service just a block away from the local Noel Leeming so went in there to look at the 'latest and greatest' while I waited.

The rep who approached me spent most of his time pushing the 4K tellys (LG being the cheaper option, Sony in the middle and Samsung at the higher end).

I know it's sales speak, but he told me they were selling a number of 4K tellys.

Unless you're a gamer - why would you buy 4k when there is still no content?

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#1002221 10-Mar-2014 17:34

myfullflavour: Rather than start a new thread I thought I'd bring this one to life.

Had a car service just a block away from the local Noel Leeming so went in there to look at the 'latest and greatest' while I waited.

The rep who approached me spent most of his time pushing the 4K tellys (LG being the cheaper option, Sony in the middle and Samsung at the higher end).

I know it's sales speak, but he told me they were selling a number of 4K tellys.

Unless you're a gamer - why would you buy 4k when there is still no content?

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#1002228 10-Mar-2014 17:54

i don't know how they are going to get 4K featured content to the public. it probably wón't fit in a bluray disc ... would it? either they compress it, or a new dvd spec needs to be invented?

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#1002230 10-Mar-2014 17:59

Is there a law of diminishing returns going on here? Full HD on a good screen is great. And if that's transferable via satellite or cable, and bandwidth is a consideration, both in capability and cost, can 4k survive in the now, or is that really for later once fibre and content providers giving 4k on a regular basis? If full HD was just ok, that's another issue, but I feel it's more than ok and it's relatively common .

Yes, I know Sky is 1080i.

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#1002232 10-Mar-2014 18:05

myfullflavour: Rather than start a new thread I thought I'd bring this one to life.

Had a car service just a block away from the local Noel Leeming so went in there to look at the 'latest and greatest' while I waited.

The rep who approached me spent most of his time pushing the 4K tellys (LG being the cheaper option, Sony in the middle and Samsung at the higher end).

I know it's sales speak, but he told me they were selling a number of 4K tellys.

Unless you're a gamer - why would you buy 4k when there is still no content?

Apparently content is already becoming available:
http://www.tomsguide.com/us/4k-video-source-faq,news-18021.html

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Stefan Andres Charsley

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#1002240 10-Mar-2014 18:13

SO ... to those of us not on a 100/50 plan, you buffer for 2 hrs and come back and watch?

charsleysa

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#1002242 10-Mar-2014 18:15

joker97: SO ... to those of us not on a 100/50 plan, you buffer for 2 hrs and come back and watch?

Another reason why rolling out fiber now is better since we'll be ready for when 4k and 8k content gets rolled out on a large scale.

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tdgeek

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#1002252 10-Mar-2014 18:21

Did a quick and dirty Google. BR file size of a movie is around, and up to 30GB, 4k around 160GB. Max for both is about 50 and 500GB

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#1002260 10-Mar-2014 18:33

According to a Sony representative, a 2-hour 4K movie download will eat up about 40 GB of storage

So to stream a 4k movie, customers will need about 50Mbps just to keep up with real-time. Yikes!

EDIT: Netflix have said their 4k streams will be no more than 15Mbps.

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#1002266 10-Mar-2014 18:49

tdgeek: Did a quick and dirty Google. BR file size of a movie is around, and up to 30GB, 4k around 160GB. Max for both is about 50 and 500GB

The technology is coming however the problem being that if these 25TB disks ever see the light how much will the new players cost to buy initially. My guess $1000+ add that to your $10,000 TV and then $50+ for every movie you want to buy and suddenly watching your old mid-definition blu-rays isn't really sounding that bad now is it.

tdgeek

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#1002267 10-Mar-2014 18:52

Hobchild:
tdgeek: Did a quick and dirty Google. BR file size of a movie is around, and up to 30GB, 4k around 160GB. Max for both is about 50 and 500GB

The technology is coming however the problem being that if these 25TB disks ever see the light how much will the new players cost to buy initially. My guess $1000+ add that to your $10,000 TV and then $50+ for every movie you want to buy and suddenly watching your old mid-definition blu-rays isn't really sounding that bad now is it.

Yep. SD to HD is a great upgrade, is 4k ready for prime time, given that HD and BR is rubbish? I don't think so

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