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Enter The 2160p HDTV
Dr. Eggman writes "The Consumer Electronics Show is kicking it in high gear as Westinghouse shows off its 2160p or "Quad" HDTV. While enthusiasts pine for new 1080p monitors Westinghouse has stated that the Quad HDTVs, like the 52" on display, "does not really target the consumer market, but high-end industrial applications.""
There was a lot made of the early specs of the PS3, one of them being it was capable of driving not one - but two 1080p displays in tandem. The potential of this being used in real-life led to it being dropped (so the story goes). If the PS3 was truely capable of driving two 1080p's wouldn't it be possible to drive a single 2160?
I recall that many early 30 inch progessive display cards used two cards in tandem to spit the screen into two vertical halves. If the PS3 video system has the omph, could it be similarly done?
Don't know how BIG the display would have to be to be ideal either. I recall that 1080p is barely perceptible with anything under 37-40 inches. I can only imagine the optimal size you'd need to see the advantages of Quad HDTV.
It's not price that's going to prevent this from coming to the consumer market. Plasma 4 years ago was around $30,000 for the larger units, but the prices dropped pretty fast. The real issue for consumer adoption is bandwidth. Cable and satellite providers have enough trouble delivering decent-quality 1080i. And over the air broadcasts? Forget about it. The ATSC standard is 19Mbits with MPEG-2 compression. There's no way you're fitting 2160p in 19Mbits with MPEG-2 and have a picture that looks better than a 1990's era AVI. So unless a brand new broadcast standard is developed and adopted, that's not happening. Cable and satellite have the advantage of being able to go to MPEG-4. But even with that, DirecTV cripples their HD by dropping the 1920x1080 picture down to 1440x1080 so they can fit more content.
Your information is a little dated, and bit misleading. The Sony HDV 1080i is a consumer product, not a professional one. The Sony HDCAM is 10 years old. The newer HDCAM SR does full 1920x1080. And as I understand it, DVCPRO100 was intended more as an entry-level professional HD tape for news crews and the like, who aren't as concerned about full resolution picture as much as convenience and portability. Almost all modern professional equipment does 1920x1080. Most of what you see on stations like DiscoveryHD and INHD, not to mention film transfers like those on HDNet, are all done in full 1080i these days.
I know this is anathema to the Slashdot crowd, but I wonder if one could use this to watch four sporting events at once like sports bars do with big projection screens. There's enough HD feeds on most systems to make this look pretty nice. ESPN, ESPNHD, the various broadcast networks, FSNHD, NFL Network HD, INHD special events, etc. Just switch the audio feed around as needed.
Also would be cool when they do ESPN Full Circle where you get the same game but with different camera priorities on ESPNHD, ESPN2HD, ESPNEWS, and ESPNU. That's a sports geek's dream! Talk about sensory overload.