UHD Spec Stomps on Current Blu-ray Spec, But Will Consumers Notice?

An anonymous reader writes Details have emerged on the new UHD Blu-ray spec and players set to start shipping this summer. UHD promises resolutions 4X greater than Blu-ray 1080p as well as much higher data rates, enhanced color space and more audio options. But, will consumers care, and will they be willing to upgrade their HDTV's, AV Receivers, and Blu-ray players to adopt a new format whose benefits may only be realized on ultra large displays or close viewing distances? The article makes the interesting point that UHD isn't synonymous with 4K, even if both handily beat the resolution of most household displays.

Comments

I won't notice

[itzly]

I don't even have a Blu-ray player. :)

Re:I won't notice

[Pinkfud]

Neither will I. My eyes have gone bad with advancing age, and I can no longer see any difference between current definitions. :(

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly this. A well encoded DVD is plenty good enough for anything other than very large screens and for people with insanely large screens they won't be buying 4k because it will cost more than their homes.

That isn't to say that some DVDs are (intentionally?) badly encoded, for example the later harry potter movies, and would benefit from bluray but anything higher than bluray just isn't going to be noticable unless you either sit 12 inches from your screen or you have a screen the size of a small building.
(seriously check out the quality of the half blood prince dvd vs bluray; the dvd is so poorly encoded it's laughable. And it's not due to space because avatar is far longer than of far higher quality)

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

You should probably ask your mom, since that's who he got them from.

Re:I won't notice

[silas_moeckel]

So I'm supposed to by some low density read only plastic disk with a movie on it with heavy DRM. To put into a player that is beholden to the media companies who happen to have a horrid history for security.

I'll stay with downloaded content, aside from an unlikely unrecoverable raid 6 failure they content is mine and I can do what I like with it forever. No I do not want to rent your content, I do not want to have to view it on approved displays (I'm still using a pre HDMI 1080 CRT 10+ years old). I do not want to be beholden to your licencing servers allowing me to view something. I will format shift and re-encode my content as desired (thank you plex). I do not want to have to use your player app and/or use your god awful myopic library app. I will not be forced to watch your previews or use your "cool" custom menu system. I will use whatever subs I choose including the original language translation vs your horrid dub script.

If somebody will let me pay retail pricing for that, with the content I want to watch I'm happy to pay for it. Frankly even the stuff I buy for the sake of owning the dvd box set etc I never actually watch from the included media.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Brave Guy]

A human adult with average vision can't distinguish anything much above current HD resolutions from normal TV viewing distances at typical physical TV screen dimensions either. This is one of the big problems all the businesses creating flashy new 4K TVs haven't quite worked out how to deal with yet.

Meanwhile, plenty of people still have DVD players rather than Blu-Ray, because even moving to HD doesn't make much difference for a lot of material in practice, and the old "get them to buy Star Wars for the seventeenth time two step" has run out of music.

Then you have to consider the rise of on-line sources and the generally poor experience of the physical disc systems. Most of that poor experience isn't actually because of swapping discs. It's because of all the other silly things that all legally manufactured players are required using tortured legal tricks to implement, preventing otherwise obvious improvements in competing devices such as skipping to the !~%# movie straight away.

So personally, I'm expecting 4K and other very high resolution formats to flop outside of niche markets, like say luxury home cinema systems with a projector and a screen several metres across. Even where they do get adopted, I'm expecting the market to demand less messy distribution, which would make any sort of disc-based successor to Blu-Ray even less likely to succeed.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

She got them from you, so...

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like you are just attempting to justify your cheapness.

Re: I won't notice

[maccodemonkey]

I've never seen a DVD that looks good on an HD TV above 40 inches. Same goes for H.264 SD content, which has a better encoding potential.

It always just looks like a blurry mess. Not totally unwatchable, but also not as enjoyable either.

Re:I won't notice

[thetoadwarrior]

You need some super specs then.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

A human adult with average vision can't distinguish anything much above current HD resolutions from normal TV viewing distances at typical physical TV screen dimensions either.

Yes, you can. Anti-aliasing and various techniques to reduce or compensate for Moire patterns only exist because the display resolution is still outmatched by the human eye. In terms of being able to "resolve" individual pixels your statement is more accurate... but there are still other aspects of the image which benefit from greater pixel density.

So personally, I'm expecting 4K and other very high resolution formats to flop outside of niche markets

I agree that adoption will be a lot slower than current HD formats, but eventually it will get here. But what we are going to see is a gradual shift from defining our displays in terms of absolute resolution in favor of pixel density. And as you mentioned, if you want to maintain a good pixel density for a large screen you will need a larger absolute resolution along with it.

Re:I won't notice

[ArmoredDragon]

So personally, I'm expecting 4K and other very high resolution formats to flop outside of niche markets, like say luxury home cinema systems with a projector and a screen several metres across.

I don't think so. I think it'll keep going until 72" TVs are cheap enough for the masses to own or something like that HoloLens Microsoft was talking about matures. IMO one or the other will happen by 2030, at which point it will stop at 8k (however studio masters will be at 16k so that they can downres for a sharper 8k image, similar to how present 4k is downresed from 8k for the same reason.)

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Same here. I still use DVDs.

Re:I won't notice

[Echo_Hotel]

On the other hand, the color space of current TV grade LCDs is absolutely atrocious and any improvement is going to be noticeable.

Re:I won't notice

[DuckDodgers]

I disagree. I've watched a Blu Ray played on a 50" HDTV at 1920x1080 resolution, and next to it a 50" 4K (3880xwhatever) television was playing some UHD content. The difference in definition was very easy to see from even ten feet away.

Now, I'm perfectly happy to use $12 Blu Ray disks (6-12 months after a film comes to video) and a $300 37" HDTV for entertainment. 4K is gorgeous, but didn't buy an HDTV until my previous television was ten years old and I could get an HDTV for $300 or less. Once a 37" 4K TV costs $300, I'll upgrade.

Re:I won't notice

[dark_requiem]

Permit me to disagree. I have not so hot vision (contacts, -4.50), and, unlike many people I know, I can clearly distinguish between, say, 720p and 1080p. I just moments ago installed my new 55" 4k Vizio (P series ftw!), and the difference is remarkable. It's fairly noticeable on upscaled 1080p content, but plug in a computer and push some real 4k (read: games), and the difference is remarkable. At a viewing distance of about 10 feet, the difference in clarity is readily apparent. And I'm not alone in this regard. The friends who helped me install this beast are fellow videophiles, and we were all blown away by the difference. I'm about to hop on to netflix to start up my subscription again (haven't had an active netfilx account in years) just so I can stream their 4k content (already have amazon prime), and I'm eagerly awaiting 4k blu ray (not that I'll spend much time swapping discs, as with current blu ray, they'll go in the drive just once, to be ripped, and then get carefully filed away).

Also, I heard many of your arguments years ago when HD was first rearing its head in the market. "There's no content, no one will buy it", "no one will buy it due to lack of content, so no one will make content", "current resolutions are completely sufficient, and no one will see a difference anyway". All wrong. Give it a year or two. Even if 4k blu ray doesn't take off particularly well, expect to see more and more streaming/downloadable 4k content. And, a quick perusal of 4k video on torrent sites show that 4k is already being pushed by the same people who have pushed every other major advance in home video for the last few decades: the porn industry. I couldn't find any 4k movies to download, but if you want to watch people screw in 4k, the future is now.

I'll go ahead and get off your lawn now.

Re:I won't notice

[StarFace]

Try VLC. It is the only thing I will use to watch DVDs these days. For one thing you can start playing the film immediately for most discs, just stick it in and load with menus skipped. For those discs that put other crap in the 1-1 position, loading to the menu means just that. No preview bullshit, no restricted navigation, no tedious animated menu effects, just straight to the navigation point, click play and the film starts without every other authoritative government's angry and unskippable piracy warnings.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

This is one of the big problems all the businesses creating flashy new 4K TVs haven't quite worked out how to deal with yet.

I think they have worked out how to deal with it - marketing. Specifically, marketing targeting the ego of the viewer.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Then its almost time to upgrade: http://www.amazon.com/Seiki-Class-2160p-120Hz-UHDTV/dp/B00Q2VFC4U

Re:I won't notice

[rtb61]

Everyone has to keep in mind that the big screen high definition display is still far, far cheaper than a picture window with a good view and it can do far more with out disrupting the insulative affect of walls by putting holes in them. So one for every room, price being the driving issue.

Of course when it comes to content distributor, (buying the same content again and again under new marketing) and manufacturer (you must upgrade) PR=B$ and the latest double vision, the actors with botox and plastic surgery look terrible and their facial expressions are farcical (another new secret, exactly how much does Hollywood spend on animation to cover up bad acting and trying to keep up with photoshop levels of attractiveness) and every scenery defect shows up on 3D High Definition content, that content fails on better displays. The cinema warmly fuzzy look was not without reason.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

"Normal" TV viewing distance can be inferred by simple deduction: it is basically from the couch to the TV, which might be anywhere from 6 feet to maybe 10 feet. It's a pretty rough measure, but it's still a measure. 4 feet is significantly less than "normal", and 14 feet is more.

At the viewing distances and screen size I use, I can certainty see a considerable difference.

What is your screen size and distance? You don't say. And you see the difference between what? Standard definition and HD? Or HD and 4k?

I doubt very much you see the difference between HD and 4k, because while 4k TVs are being sold, there is almost no 4k media being sold. So any difference you might see is a result of artificial upsampling. You're fooling yourself.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

But what we are going to see is a gradual shift from defining our displays in terms of absolute resolution in favor of pixel density.

It happened a long time ago.

Technically, "resolution" already refers to pixel density. People have come to incorrectly use the word resolution to mean size in pixels, but that's not what it actually means.

Re:I won't notice

[The Snowman]

Exactly this. A well encoded DVD is plenty good enough for anything other than very large screens and for people with insanely large screens they won't be buying 4k because it will cost more than their homes.

Nope. I have a 46" 1080p HDTV and sit around 10 feet from it. I have compared DVD and Blu-ray versions of some of the same movies that I bought on both mediums. The difference is night and day. If I watch on my 1080p computer monitor, 23" and I sit about 2 feet away, it is even more noticeable.

DVDs annoy the piss out of me because they are so blurry. Blu-rays might not be the high-resolution king anymore, but they are certainly not blurry.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

They don't need to sell it for me to download it.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Every man is an island and your mom is the sea.

Re:I won't notice

[ArcadeMan]

That's exactly what it means: resolution is the number of pixels, always has been. There is no direct relationship between the size of a display and its resolution. If a company wanted to make a 60" display with a resolution of 192x108 pixels, they could.

Re:I won't notice

[ArcadeMan]

Furthermore, pixel density is a relation between resolution and physical size, so if you think resolution means pixel density, you learned things the wrong way.

A programmer doesn't care about the size of the display when he makes sprites and bitmap images. A bitmap image takes exactly the same number of bytes wether the display is 2" or 200" as long as the resolution is the same, which is measured in pixels.

Re:I won't notice

[DuckDodgers]

Oh wow. Thanks. I hadn't been following the price of 4K televisions closely, I assumed it was still at least twice the cost of an equivalent size 1080p television.

Damn. We just got a second 37" HDTV in December for $245 (floor model). I thought that was a screaming deal, but $340 for 4K trumps it.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Sort of right.

A lot of people can tell in a side by side comparison. The thing is most people do not care about better. They care about cheaper.

DVD is usually 5-10 dollars cheaper per disk. Unless you are willing to wait for the bargain bin. The players usually have a slight premium.

Most people rent their media from redbox or netflix. That market does not care. They just want to watch the movie and return it. So the cheaper the better.

For the not too small market that does care like you point out. They will upgrade if there is media. If not no one will care.

I have about 2500 dvds/bluray many times I still buy DVD because there is no reason to spend 5-10 bucks more for most movies. Your mid summer explosion fest yeah its worth it. Your drama or comedy where it is a bunch of talking heads? not so much... The only way I will buy bluray over dvd for the later is if the price is exactly the same or better.

Also many of the early blurays were very poor upscale transfers. There was pretty much 0 difference between bluray and dvd. For the more recent movies it is pretty noticeable.

Re:I won't notice

[Znork]

Anyone labelled 'videophile' is expected to be blown away by new video equipment. Or gold-plated optical connectors. So.

Do an actual blind-study where you downsample the same original material and then run through 20 random samples, half with the lower-res material and half with the higher, guess what you're seeing and have the computer tally the results. At a viewing distance of 10 feet, with a 50 inch screen, I don't do much better than chance on 720 vs 1080 and I've got 20/20 as long as I'm wearing glasses. Nor should I, as that barely even touches 1080 perceivable territory.

Here's a helpful chart to assist with appropriate placement distance for that display: http://s3.carltonbale.com/reso...

About 3-4 feet and you'll get your money's worth.

Now, on the other hand, if they could improve contrast ratios to the point I can get sunburn from watching Dune, then I'll start getting excited about improved display quality.

Re:I won't notice

[TWX]

I always found that there was a rough ratio of screen size to viewing distance, and it varied between conventional television viewing and "home theater" viewing. Those two have blurred in recent years with the advent of inexpensive large TVs, we we can err more toward the home theater size.

I have a 100" projector at 4:3. At 16:9 it's about 92" diagonal. We sit about eighteen feet from the screen. When I had smaller screens over the years we sat proportionately closer. I also have a 30" HD tube television, I sit about ten feet from it. When I had smaller televisions over the years I sat closer generally for movies, but for conventional television shows it could be further away. So, for a ratio, distance to viewing ratio seems to fall between 2:1 and 3.5:1 or me. I expect that most people are similar, based on my friends' setups.

I have computers running at 1920x1080 on both setups. The resolution is so high for the distance that I have to zoom-in the web browser to use it. Fonts are almost unreadable without walking up to the display. I don't think there would be a lot of practical advantage to increasing resolution on either setup, and remember, that's with a 92" screen in the mix. There is just no better viewable image for me. I'm also young enough that my eyes are still pretty good, for what that's worth.

We don't really buy new DVDs anymore unless it's for TV shows that just aren't available in better quality anyway, but I don't see a lot of benefit over Blu-Ray. Hell, I still have a ton of Laserdiscs and they're watchable on these setups.

Re:I won't notice

[turbidostato]

"I disagree. I've watched a Blu Ray played on a 50" HDTV at 1920x1080 resolution, and next to it a 50" 4K (3880xwhatever) television was playing some UHD content. The difference in definition was very easy to see from even ten feet away."

On a mall, I bet.

Maybe you are an expert and I'm wrong, but you probably were fooled to think the UHD was better by gaming the controls of both screens.

Re:I won't notice

[aliquis]

Neither do I.

Call me when I get a license to the movie as such with downloads where the downloads are of various quality and keep having future improvements.

I don't give me "we'd added this little bonus content so now it's a new movie"-bullshit.

If I've bought it I have. Offer it to me.

Fuck discs.

Re:I won't notice

[thegarbz]

"Normal" TV viewing distance can be inferred by simple deduction: it is basically from the couch to the TV,

Couch? Oh what a novel idea. I've sat on the couch once I think we were watching the news or something.

Yes my couch is what you would consider a "normal" distance from the TV. Movies on the other hand are watched from beanbags and pillows on the floor with bowls of chips (crisps for the Americans out there).

There is no idea or no concept of "normal" for a distance for a TV. There is a concept of "optimal" for any given resolution, but just because something doesn't fit your use case does not mean it is applied globally. And while you're right there is almost no 4k media in current circulation this is much like the early cases of 3D or the early cases of HD. If you have full support for the standard and you do like what you see then you will seek out media. Sure you may not get the latest blockbuster but simply lumping it into "Starwars hasn't come out on 4k yet so you're not actually watching 4k" is just stupid when you think about it.

Re:I won't notice

[DuckDodgers]

The 1080p was much cheaper. So if the seller (in this case, Costco) intentionally degraded the visual quality of their cheaper product in favor of the more expensive one, then they would be willing to forego a higher volume sales of the more affordable 1080p HDTVs to get the profits on a smaller number of 4KTVs. That seems unlikely to me, though definitely possible.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Speaking of degrading, given that it's difficult to get a good picture with 720p and 1080i on cable television, I can't imagine 4k being available. Over-compressed television feeds. Not sure if satellite is any better because I hear they do weird compression stuff also.

I think Netflix does 4k on some things. I imagine that's a lot of extra bandwidth. Maybe this isn't a big deal.

Don't smaller pixels affect the brightness?

For the home-theater audience, I imagine 4K and 8K would great.

Here is what I'd like to see with discs...
1. No fast-forward/skip blocking through the warnings and such.
2. If the ads keep it cheaper, fine. But as long as we can skip through them. But it would be nice to skip directly to the movie. Maybe a version of the disc/movie that lacks the ads, even if it costs an extra $10 or so?

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

The relationship between the size of the display and its resolution is the "dot pitch" as in the distance between the pixels. It's roughly the number of total pixels divided by the area of the screen. It's not something that people talked much about after the early '90s because the number of pixels on screen became enough for many applications, but it's still there.

A 60" display with 192x108 pixels is perfectly fine if you're willing to sit far enough away and don't mind the limited amount of detail on the screen. In practice, most people won't as that's about half the number of pixels on analog TVs.

In terms of resolution, once the dot pitch is smaller than the ability of the eye to easily discern the individual pixels, there's not much point in making the pixels smaller or getting more of them as you won't be able to see the difference. Either you have to have a larger display or you have to sit closer to tell it from a lower resolution screen.

A person's eyesight will affect where exactly that distance is, but 4k has so many pixels that most people are just not going to have a room and a TV large enough to make good use of it.

Re:I won't notice

[dark_requiem]

To quote the article you linked,

What the chart shows is that, for a 50-inch screen, the benefits of 720p vs. 480p start to become apparent at viewing distances closer than 14.6 feet and become fully apparent at 9.8 feet

So, if we are to accept the conclusions of this article, we shouldn't really be able to tell the difference between 480p and 720p until we get to roughly 10-12 feet. That's ridiculous, I could tell a 720p from a 480p image from twice that distance. If you can't, double-check that 20/20 of yours, may be time for a new prescription.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

"This is one of the big problems all the businesses creating flashy new 4K TVs haven't quite worked out how to deal with yet."

No, this is a problem that society refuses to deal with, what to do when everything we already have is good enough and progress is no longer warranted? Do we keep the same "continuous progress" economic model propped up with artificial requirements or do we finally get to the leisure society?

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

There is no idea or no concept of "normal" for a distance for a TV. There is a concept of "optimal" for any given resolution, but just because something doesn't fit your use case does not mean it is applied globally. And while you're right there is almost no 4k media in current circulation this is much like the early cases of 3D or the early cases of HD.

No matter what, you're going to have something at least approximately a bell curve. And "normal" is going to surround the peak portion of that curve.

Don't blame me. I didn't make it up.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

That's exactly what it means: resolution is the number of pixels, always has been. There is no direct relationship between the size of a display and its resolution. If a company wanted to make a 60" display with a resolution of 192x108 pixels, they could.

No, that isn't waht it means. What you are describing is the SIZE, in pixels, of the display.

In order to get the actual resolution, you divide the number of pixels in a given linear distance by that distance; the result is Pixels Per Inch or PPI. Notice the "per" in there: that means it is a ratio, not a simple scalar number like your SIZE is.

In practice, not all displays have square pixels. In that case some math trickery is used to come up with the "effective" PPI, which is your resolution, as opposed to the size.

Don't misuse the word then try to tell me it "always has been". That's just plain false. "Never was" would be closer to the truth.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

The relationship between the size of the display and its resolution is the "dot pitch" as in the distance between the pixels.

Almost but not quite. Dot pitch is a measure used on CRT screens. And it is, on a color screen, the distance between dots of the same color, just as you say.

On modern pixel-based displays, however, the resolution is measured in Pixels Per Inch (or Pixels Per Cm), which is not a distance but a ratio. Still the same basic idea.

Re:I won't notice

[Tough Love]

Well, if Sony and their idiot partners had not made such an absolute hash of the Blu ray experience by excessive DRM, offensive warnings that can't be skipped and crass shovelware loading of endless previews that are opt out (and sometimes, randomly either can't be fast forwarded or can't be skipped) and super slow clumsy content menus due to the braindamaged Java tie then consumers might actually care about the next Blu Ray standard. But Sony did make a hash of it and delivered an experience that makes you want to throw a shoe at the TV every time. The kick in the face that just keeps kicking. Sorry, no more crappy optical disks rubbing my face in whatever a content provider wants to rub my face in. Solid state, hard disk or streaming for me, Blu Ray can fuck off and die, and so can Sony.

Re:I won't notice

[Tough Love]

The different between 1080 and 4K is stupidly obvious on any 60" TV, and readily apparent to connoisseurs on much smaller displays in the same way that the difference between a consumer speaker and a studio monitor is obvious to any sound technician even if it may be completely missed in favor of bass boost etc by the average consumer. If you care about image quality, you care about 4K. If you think your boom box sounds pretty damn good playing Lady Gaga then you will probably be happy with 1080p for quite some time, or standard DVD for that matter.

Re:I won't notice

[antdude]

Ditto. I still don't own a BR drive and player. I just got a HDTV (moved and CRT TV was too heavy) and monitor (old 5:4 LCD monitor was dying).

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

Furthermore, pixel density is a relation between resolution and physical size, so if you think resolution means pixel density, you learned things the wrong way.

NO.

Pixel density is measured in pixels per inch. THAT is the relation between pixels and physical size, just like physical density is a relationship between mass and size. It is an "intrinsic" property, meaning it doesn't matter how big your bar of gold is, it still has the same density.

Resolution, which today is measured in Pixels Per Inch (or Centimeter), is also an intrinsic property, in that sense. The resolution of your screen has nothing at all to do with its size. A screen that is 1 inch square can easily have the same resolution, in PPI, as a screen that is 120" diagonally. It makes no difference. However, if they did have the same resolution, the SIZE in pixels of the 120" unit would be vastly greater.

You are arguing exactly the case that I was explaining is wrong. Resolution is size-independent.

1080p is a DISPLAY SIZE measured in pixels. (Plus the 'p' part, which is a different matter entirely). My telephone is 720p. But because my phone is small, its resolution, in PPI, is far higher than most televisions.

This was the whole point I was getting at originally. What most people (and even manufacturers) CALL "resolution" isn't. It's a misuse of the word. Resolution is a ratio, it has a scientific definition, it is measurable, and it has nothing to do with total number of pixels on a screen.

Re:I won't notice

[ArcadeMan]

People have called the pixel dimensions "resolution" since the late 1980's.

It's also what's on Wikipedia.

It is usually quoted as width × height, with the units in pixels: for example, "1024 × 768" means the width is 1024 pixels and the height is 768 pixels.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

It's also what's on Wikipedia.

You didn't read far enough, wise guy.

Note that for broadcast television standards the use of the word resolution here is a misnomer, though common. The term "display resolution" is usually used to mean pixel dimensions, the number of pixels in each dimension (e.g. 1920 x 1080), which does not tell anything about the pixel density of the display on which the image is actually formed: broadcast television resolution properly refers to the pixel density, the number of pixels per unit distance or area, not total number of pixels. In digital measurement, the display resolution would be given in pixels per inch.

Just as I wrote earlier.

Re:I won't notice

[thegarbz]

You are of course right, but you're wrong in the way you're applying data. Even people beyond the viewing distance where the difference between 4k and 1080p is identifiable will upgrade for a multitude of reasons:

- Status
- Technological Masturbation
- Marketing (this is the big one that will catch most people)
- Attrition (this will catch the rest).

All the same arguments were used for 1080p right here on Slashdot. They were used for BluRay just as they were being used for 3D, just as they are being used now for 4k. Guess one in every case the new technology wins out in the end.

Put a reminder in your calendar to reply to this post in 10 years. If I was wrong I'll send you a beer.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

I was an early adopter of DVD and HD-DVD, a later adopter of Blu-Ray... and that's it, I'm out of the disc business. Stream it or GTFO.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Same goes for dynamic range. I've seen some of the upcoming HDR television technology, and the results compared to current HDTV is incredible. You don't really need gimmicky old 3d all that much when you have sufficient dynamic range, because your brain can use lighting cues to generate depth information even when parallax isn't available.

Re:I won't notice

[dwywit]

Please tell me, what content - that you have viewed in both 2K and 4K, whether movies, TV or games - have you completely been unable to enjoy in 2K?

I can enjoy, be entertained, and appreciate a well-made movie in standard definition, let alone 2K.

Hint - there's so much more to a movie/TV show/computer game than the level of detail you can see on the screen. Things like acting, direction, plot/story/script, audio/music, and so on. It's possible to make a gripping, suspenseful film with a VHS camera. Detail can be a distraction in some cases, and it speaks of the skill of the director and art department to not let the detail distract from the story. Imagine "Alien" without the dark, hard-to-see corridors, hmmm?

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

broadcast television standards
We're talking about blue ray, not broadcasting.

Re:I won't notice

[Paradise Pete]

That's exactly what it means: resolution is the number of pixels, always has been.

No it doesn't. It's the measurable degree of detail.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't even have a Blu-ray player. :)

Nor do I. Nor do I have an HDTV. In fact, my old 19"CRT analog TV was the last TV I had, and I gave up on that, and cable, before they cut off analog for HDTV anyways. I don't watch TV at all really, the few things I watch I watch on my computer... got too tired of the 24/7 propaganda...er, "news"... and pointless "unreality" TV shows and sitcoms, etc. Even 100 channels of crap was too much.

Re:I won't notice

[Yoda's Mum]

You don't have to choose one or another; good acting, direction, plot, and music can be had at high definition as well as low.

As for Alien, it's a post child for the value of quality production; it looks as real and atmospheric at low resolution as it does at high. Even in 1979 cinema cameras and projectors were able to operate at an effective resolution far and above TV or VHS of the day. We really can have it all.

Re:I won't notice

[Waccoon]

To me, the move from DVD to Blu-ray is a big deal, since I no longer have to suffer with those horrible compression artifacts. I can't readily see the difference in resolution on my modestly-sized TV, but with DVDs, compression artifacts are extremely noticeable, especially when things are moving quickly on screen. I still buy a lot of DVDs since they are cheaper and I can watch them anywhere, but for the really good movies I get Blu-ray.

4K doesn't appeal to me because the biggest problem with image quality, compression, has been solved.

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

If i'm going to be using my computer to view it anyway...

Why did i buy the disk at all? Why not pirate it and skip ALL that mess. Still do the same thing. And save money too.

Re:I won't notice

[DuckDodgers]

I think one legitimate objection to getting 4K is that a lot of 4K content isn't available yet.

I rip my DVDs so that I can skip the damn previews and warnings and just start the film when I want. (But if anybody cares, every single rip is for a DVD I purchased. Nothing is downloaded.) I want to do the same thing for my Blu Rays for the same reasons, but I haven't gotten around to figuring it out yet - a lot of websites mention the MakeMKV software, I'll try that.

Re: I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Bowls of chips (crisps for the Americans out there)

I think you'll find crisps is most used in the UK.. Never heard Americans refer to anything but fries and "chips"

Re:I won't notice

[Tough Love]

Actually, I can be adequately entertained with a ukulele, I don't strictly need a TV at all. But if I watch video, good quality video equipment pleases me, just as good quality sound equipment does. This is orthogonal to any content quality issues.

Re:I won't notice

[AmiMoJo]

I can tell 1080p from 4k on a 130cm screen from 3m away, with 4k media. I can tell when 1080p media is upscaled on the same screen too. I can also tell 8k apart from 4k under the same conditions, which is actually easier since 8k doubles the frame rate too.

It's not just resolution. 4k has better colour. It's more noticeable on outdoor scenes with a lot of natural tones and dynamic range. Skin looks a lot more realistic too... It's actually kind of a problem because actors that look fine in 1080p look like they are wearing make up in 4k (which of course they are).

Re:I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

"Try VLC"

If you care about this little thing called quality then don't...
VLC has a pretty bad decoder and quality suffers immensely.
VLC has no room in a discussion about super high quality formats imho.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

In other words, what you're doing here is called ignorance. People have come to incorrectly use the word trolling to mean redefining meanings of words to suit once agenda to idiotic degree, but that's not what it actually means.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

Let me see if I understood your argument correctly.

You are seriously suggesting that common use of the word for decades is in fact not a widely accepted definition of the word, but is an incorrect definition of the word because this wasn't a correct definition several decades ago?

Are you at all aware how languages work in general? Words gain meanings and languages gain new words from wide general acceptance. That is the main criteria that dictionaries use to add meanings to words.

It's very hard to take someone who effectively says that the entire concept of dictionary is wrong and then proceeds to argue about meanings of words seriously.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

Placebo effect is strong.

In blind test, situation is typically very different.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

3D failed, as did quite a few other similar technologies. First attempt at wearables for example failed miserably in the 90s. Curved displays are dying on the vine.

Technological advancement is not a guaranteed thing. To gain acceptance technology must provide a significant enough perception of value to the user. Real value is important only as a factor in the "perceived value".

Re: I won't notice

[Luckyo]

Get a decent DVD player. All modern ones perform solid upscaling.

Re: I won't notice

[StarFace]

Because downloading is kind of lame & takes hours if you have normal Internet access speeds. I prefer to rent DVDs because the quality is significantly superior and I like the commentary and behind the scenes stuff. Just rip the DVD and return it, it is fun to browse at the rental place if it is a good one. Lots of esoteric old titles nobody bothers to seed.

Re: I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, 4K is a bunch of garbage. Who could possibly ever notice a difference. I mean my 27inch TV from 1990 and my VHS player can hold its own any day to Bluray and I'm sure 4K too.

Re:I won't notice

[KingMotley]

Don't misuse the word then try to tell me it "always has been". That's just plain false. "Never was" would be closer to the truth.

Resolution has always referred to the number of pixels available on the screen.

Dictionary.com:

1. the maximum number of pixels that can be displayed on a monitor, expressed as (number of horizontal pixels) x (number of vertical pixels), i.e., 1024x768. The ratio of horizontal to vertical resolution is usually 4:3, the same as that of conventional television sets.

In windows, when you go the screen resolution dialog, you tell it how many pixels by how many pixels your display is. It's been that way since Windows 2.0 back in 1987.

Re:I won't notice

[KingMotley]

That's exactly what it means: resolution is the number of pixels, always has been.

No it doesn't. It's the measurable degree of detail.

Yes it does. It's the number of pixels available on the screen, usually described in WxH.

Re:I won't notice

[KingMotley]

Let's try an example. Enter "resolution" into google. What does it say?

the degree of sharpness of a computer-generated image as measured by the number of dots per linear inch in a hard-copy printout or the number of pixels across and down on a display screen. Their resolution never failed them, their fervour seemed never slackened.

Google says you are wrong.

Let's see what Microsoft says. Right click your desktop, and choose "Screen Resolution". What does it say? Microsoft says:

Resolution: 2560x1440 (Recommended)

Boy those silly software guys must have got it all wrong. Let's check the hardware guys... How about dell?
http://accessories.us.dell.com...

Under tech spec, that monitor says:

Native Resolution 1920 x 1200

Guess the hardware guys are wrong too. So who uses it the one true "Jane Q. Public" way?

Re:I won't notice

[KingMotley]

Your blind test isn't actually testing to see if people can tell the difference between 1080p and 4k. It's testing to see if people can correctly identify which is which. That's not the same thing.

A better blind-study is to have two TVs placed side by side of the same make and model. Turn off all upsampling and then show a 1080p image on one and a 4K image on the other alternating randomly the which is which and have the participant identify which image looks better. You will have a much different result, and have proven that people can tell the difference quite easily.

Re:I won't notice

[wijnands]

Neither do I. Don't miss it either. DVD showed me there's little to gain from buying official content. And the last few years there's extremely little content that I've enjoyed enough to even consider buying.

Re:I won't notice

[Kjella]

Put a reminder in your calendar to reply to this post in 10 years. If I was wrong I'll send you a beer.

Just a technical nitpick, old articles eventually get archived - I'm assuming to prevent spambots making replies and modding them up to get into Google results since there's no real moderators around anymore - so he won't be able to.

Re:I won't notice

[thegarbz]

Interesting assertion. The number of 3D players is on the rise, the number of 3D TVs is on the rise and the number of content in 3D is on the rise. What a colossal failure.

You don't need to provide a value proposition to the user at all. You just need to bundle, market or provide no alternative. For example do you know anyone who actually subscribes to cable TV solely to get shopping channels? Of course not. Yet the number of people who effectively pay money to have shopping channels on their TV are in the millions.

Re:I won't notice

[thegarbz]

Oh.

Well honestly I didn't think it was going to happen anyway :-)

Re:I won't notice

[lsatenstein]

A human adult with average vision can't distinguish anything much above current HD resolutions from normal TV viewing distances at typical physical TV screen dimensions either. This is one of the big problems all the businesses creating flashy new 4K TVs haven't quite worked out how to deal with yet.

Meanwhile, plenty of people still have DVD players rather than Blu-Ray, because even moving to HD doesn't make much difference for a lot of material in practice, and the old "get them to buy Star Wars for the seventeenth time two step" has run out of music.

Then you have to consider the rise of on-line sources and the generally poor experience of the physical disc systems. Most of that poor experience isn't actually because of swapping discs. It's because of all the other silly things that all legally manufactured players are required using tortured legal tricks to implement, preventing otherwise obvious improvements in competing devices such as skipping to the !~%# movie straight away.

So personally, I'm expecting 4K and other very high resolution formats to flop outside of niche markets, like say luxury home cinema systems with a projector and a screen several metres across. Even where they do get adopted, I'm expecting the market to demand less messy distribution, which would make any sort of disc-based successor to Blu-Ray even less likely to succeed.

I suppose that if you use that high definition to drive a side of a building display, composed of multiple panels, that the high definition will make a difference when you are standing at close range.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

That doesn't make be wrong. It doesn't contradict anything I said. I only implied that most people under most circumstances wouldn't be able to see much if any difference.

I didn't say they wouldn't sell.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

You are seriously suggesting that common use of the word for decades is in fact not a widely accepted definition of the word, but is an incorrect definition of the word because this wasn't a correct definition several decades ago?

No, I'm saying it's incorrect because it's not the correct definition RIGHT NOW.

Common usage of words changes all the time. But that doesn't make the technical definition of the word any different.

For example: people now use the word "schizophrenia" to mean something that is completely different from the actual, technical meaning of the word. But it's technical meaning still hasn't changed at all. People are using it incorrectly, and it will continue to be incorrect as long as they use it that way.

Common usage aside, the technical definition of resolution hasn't changed, and it's not going to. So you can use it however you want, but yes, you'll still be wrong.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

We're talking about blue ray, not broadcasting.

Will you at least attempt to read and understand the goddamned article? Look at the last sentence I quoted. It says In digital measurement, the display resolution would be given in pixels per inch.

Do you STILL need to have that explained to you again?

Re:I won't notice

[StarFace]

As to the quality, I've never noticed it being significantly worse than Apple's DVD player, the main difference being interlacing, you have to remember to turn deinterlacing on if you leave it off for other things--and yes, without proper deinterlacing it can look pretty awful.

But then, I don't watch films on a home theatre rig or anything fancy. Perhaps I am a bit of a troglodyte in that regard. My computer monitor and headphones is sufficient for me to enjoy the experience, so maybe I'm not seeing what would otherwise be obvious if I tried to use VLC on a large television screen or projector.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

Being "on the rise" does not mean "breakthrough" or "being widely successful". It means that marginal unsuccessful technology is getting slowly increasing adoption from "nonexistent" to "slightly less nonexistent" levels of adoption.

All while all the major marketing and R&D has already been taken out of said 3D because technology flopped. And the aforementioned "adoption" is overwhelmingly just a cheap feature that is being added and never used. Unlike for example 1080p resolution.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

But it is a common usage. Ask 9/10 people what it means and they will provide the meaning you claim to be incorrect, as we have seen here. You're fighting the windmills.

Re:I won't notice

[Ottibus]

Resolution has always referred to the number of pixels available on the screen.

Resolution has multiple meanings, this one is a late arrival to the list. In the early days of Computer Graphics the term was used in the scientific sense that applies, for example, to telescopes.

I don't object to this new meaning, but it is simply not true to say that this is the only meaning of that word in the context of electronic displays.

Re:I won't notice

[terjeber]

The difference in definition was very easy to see from even ten feet away

Probably not. Not from 10ft away. What you probably saw was the increased color space in UHD, which is certainly discernible at 10ft, and has the effect of appearing a little like increased resolution. In addition the UHD content was probably over-sharpened, which looks like higher resolution but which is only a nasty, nasty, nasty trick. If you want to see the nasty trick, watch the Netflix "House of Cards" series. The editor of those should be locked up for creating disgusting over-sharpened junk.

Oh, and no, Netflix does not broadcast 4K anywhere in the world (perhaps inside the Netflix offices). The bitrate is abysmal and the content is so over-sharpened it is ridiculous. Any 1080p Blu-Ray out-resolves any "4K" broadcast from Netflix. Sadly, Average Joe is never going to know and he is going to think he can actually see 4K content from Netflix on his 50" UHD TV. Anything below 70" is a scam. Netflix 4K is a scam.

Re: I won't notice

[terjeber]

They can't add what is not there. Upscaling is never going to match a 1080p source. I have a fantastic upscaler and it gives terrible results on my 65" screen.

Re: I won't notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Because downloading is kind of lame & takes hours if you have normal Internet access speeds

Nope, it takse hours if you have an extremely slow internet connection. With a normal speed, it is typically something like 15-30 minutes for a decent full HD file.

I prefer to rent DVDs because the quality is significantly superior

Sorry, but no. Video DVDs are, by definition, SD. The quality is horrible compared to even a mediocre Blu-Ray rip.

Just rip the DVD and return it, it is fun to browse at the rental place if it is a good one. Lots of esoteric old titles nobody bothers to seed.

The problem is that very few DVD rental places still exist. I live in a big city and as far as I am aware, there are none left here. I do agree, however that there are some films you can really only see if you obtain a disc (be it Blu-Ray or DVD).

Re:I won't notice

[DuckDodgers]

What I saw was a video that included footage taken from a helicopter. On the 1080p television, you could make out some of the detail on the cars. On the 4K, you could make out a lot more of the detail.

If that was the result of increased color space instead of 4K, then I'm sold on UHD for increased color space. Because no matter what the cause, the visual difference was noticeable and I could see details in one that were obscured in the other.

Elsewhere in the discussion, someone suggested that the retailer intentionally degraded the video quality on the 1080p television to promote the 4K television. In case you were going to mention that, I'll respond again - it seems unintuitive to push consumers away from your lower cost, much higher sales volume products just to get a much smaller number of higher margin sales. I can't rule it out, but it seems unlikely.

Re: I won't notice

[KingMotley]

I can't recall a time in which it refered to anything else. Here's another example from 1985: the original Atari at service manual. http://www.atarimania.com/docu...

So it has been in use for at least 30 years. Not exactly "new". If you can find another reference before that in which it talks about resolution being described in pixel density (which would be hard I imagine as screens didn't have pixels back then). You might be able to find a reference to a tv (which isn't the same field) describing resolution in terms of lines, but again, lines isn't density either.

Re: I won't notice

[Luckyo]

Good upscaler will not result in "blurry mess". In fact, to untrained eye, a good upscaler will typically look almost as good or just as good as source material.

Notably a lot of "native HD" content out there is in fact upscaled in production.

Now if you have a trained eye, you will see the very specific artefacts that result from upscaling. But when you are watching a good movie, you're not going to be actively looking for those - you will be too busy enjoying the movie.

So my advice stands. Get a modern DVD player with a good upscaler. From what you describe about your problem, yours clearly is not "fantastic" by a long shot.

Re:I won't notice

[david_thornley]

In the room our TV is in, the distances from seats to set are less than 4 meters. I don't think a 60" TV is a good fit.

Re:I won't notice

[Jane Q. Public]

No, I'm not. You missed the whole point of my last post.

It doesn't matter how popular usage changes. The technical definition will remain the same.

And the technical definition is the "correct" definition, since it is the one used to MEASURE the attribute.

Re:I won't notice

[Luckyo]

And there we have it - an open admission that you do not understand how languages work.

I rest my case.

Re: I won't notice

[terjeber]

to untrained eye, a good upscaler will typically look almost as good or just as good as source material

No, it will not. That's not even theoretically possible. An upscaler simply can not add information that isn't there. I have worked with both real-time upscaling and non-real-time, which is significantly better since it can spend a lot of time analyzing and trying to add detail. I have never seen any upscaler able to come close to the original material. Not from SD to HD nor from HD to 4K.

Notably a lot of "native HD" content out there is in fact upscaled in production.

That depends. If the material is of recent production it is not, it is downscaled either from 4K or 8K. If the images were available in decent quality on film, it is probably scanned at 4K and downscaled to HD. To see the difference, get the Blue Planet series, watch the Seas of Life part. Most of the Blu-Ray is filmed on film, scanned at high quality and down-sampled to 1080p. Most of the under-water scenes are shot in SD. To me, the transitions from HD to up-scaled SD material is jarring. Very jarring. Others do not notice.

Get a modern DVD player with a good upscaler

I own several of the very, very best ones. They can not touch "native" HD material. Not even close. I also shoot quite a bit in 4K and down-sample that to 1080P. 4K down-sampled to 1080P blows material that is shot in 1080P out of the water. The quality difference is staggering. At 1080P.

Re: I won't notice

[Luckyo]

This is not "theoretically possible" but a reality. I've actually conducted tests about ten years ago on early MPEG-4 compression (specifically divx and xvid compression artefacts in relation to usability) as a part of lab excercise. We brought in around 50 volunteers for screenings iirc. Basically random students we grabbed from hallways and promised them a free lunch if they gave us a few hours of their time. They were told that we were testing something else, I think it was something about "acting quality in relation to your general interest" or some similar bullshit.

We had them watch three short movies. All three were either original MPEG-2 DVD, DIVX at high quality and original resolution (notable artefacts, DIVX was in early stage back then and generally pretty good and churning out macroblocking and other artefacts even on high bandwish) and DIVX at low quality and half resolution (massive compression artefacts around edges, heavy "washout" loss of detail).

Around 2/3 couldn't tell the difference between massively artefacted XVID re-encoded to half the original resolution and original MPEG-2 DVD on a large TV. Almost no one could tell the difference between original and high quality XVID. And that's young people from technical university with much better eyesight and interest in technology than average public.

Our conclusion was pretty much in line with similar blind tests. Overwhelming majority of people will not spot a difference unless they're specifically looking for it. That is why broadcasters get away with massive overcompression of streams and a lot of content HD broadcasters show is upscaled. Most people never notice. You need a trained eye and to know to look for problems to spot those things.

Re: I won't notice

[terjeber]

Most people are blind (and morons too, but that's another discussion). I'm not. Neither is anyone with a mild interest in photography or art. The fact that morons will buy snake oil, believe in astrology or Jesus and feel better when taking homeopathic medicines doesn't mean that peddling BS and charging for it is OK, nor does it mean that people that do not buy into BS like 42" UHD screens are snobs.

In reality there is a significant difference between up-scaled content and native HD. It's there, it is not only measurable, but it is easily visible. If the blind morons don't see it, they need to be educated. Same as with Jesus and astrology.

Re: I won't notice

[Luckyo]

As I have noted in the original post, I was specifically addressing large public. That is why I included the following phrase:

"In fact, to untrained eye, a good upscaler will typically look almost as good or just as good as source material."

Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

Blu-ray only succeeded because of the advent of LCD TVs.

Without a comparable advance in technology on the TV side (4K does not count) this will never get off the ground.

Re:Nope

[wonkey_monkey]

(4K does not count)

And why not?

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

(4K does not count)

And why not?

Because unless you live in a palace with a real fucking movie screen 10 meters across and 6 meters high, 4K will be about as noticeable as an acarian bug. In other words it is completely useless for a normal consumer living in a normal house. You know the 99,99% of the world's population ?

Re:Nope

[drinkypoo]

Well, what's the difference between typical NTSC and 1080p? Holy crap, it's massive. What's the difference between 1080p and 4k? The numbers are big, but the perceptual difference is nowhere near.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a load of nonsense. I have a 4k set and have watched 4k shows and movies already, it looks absolutely amazing. I've watched the same shows with a 1080p set of the same size and it looks like crap after watching 4k. Yes, 4k is noticeable. It's extremely sharp and unless you have absolutely horrible eyes, you will notice the difference between 1080p and 4k. So yes, it's worth upgrading and they wouldn't be investing so much money to make 4k possible if it was just "useless" like you say.

Re:Nope

[Nerrd]

Congratulations - you have made the exact same argument that was made against HD in the first place. Guess what: people will upgrade, because people who aren't you, can notice a difference in the living-room.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know why everyone says it's a crazy marketing gimmick. I've purchased and watched UHD format shows and movies. It is noticeable. You want to know how noticeable? You can see the little hairs on peoples arms, that's how noticeable it is. Yes, even people with bad eyes can tell the difference. Yes, consumers may not care at first like you say, but when they see the amazing details of 4k, they will care.

They would not be investing so much money into 4k if it was just a marketing gimmick like you say. Just because you don't own a 4k set or monitor, doesn't mean you should be spreading all this "fud" basically about it.

Re:Nope

[Z00L00K]

The problem with better resolution is that now even more snafus and easter eggs can be found in movies and TV shows.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

I notice the difference between regular standard definition and 1080p, but I still don't see why I should care about it.

I have an imagination and know what shit looks like already. Give me a good story with good dialogue and I'll fill in the details. Hell, I'm still bitter about the move from analogue to digital, because the digital cliff means that I either get near-perfect reception or NOTHING, and while I can work with a bit of snow and fuzzy sound, I can't work with NOTHING.

TV is for escaping reality as a bit of fun. If reality is so unbearable that we need to faithfully reproduce an alternative, the problem isn't with lack of resolution on the alternative.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

4K is such a crazy marketing gimmick. Most of the population can already barely tell the difference between a quality DVD upscale and a Bluray at any reasonable size or distance. The manufacturers *want* to keep making everything obsolete so people "have" to keep buying new stuff,â¦..

Wasn't it that > 1M RAM was just a crazy marketing gimmick. 640K was good enough for any home computer. Most people won't be able to tell the difference.

Oh, wait.

Well, 32-bit was just a crazy marketing gimmick. 16-bit processors work just fine.

Oh, wait.

Well, at least we know that 64-bit processors are just a crazy marketing gimmick. The manufacturers want to keep making everything obsolete so that people have to keep buying new stuff.

Oh, wait.

Surround sound is just a marketing gimmick. You only have two ears, so two speakers should be just fine. Adding center channels, satellite speakers, etc., doesn't really make it that much better, and most of the population can't tell the difference anyway.

Oh, wait.

3-D is just a crazy marketing gimmickâ¦. finally! That one works.

Progress requires change (but change isn't necessarily progress!), and often, the benefits of the change aren't immediately obvious. But calling something a marketing gimmick when there's been actual progress is needlessly harsh and arguably untrue.

I'd say that HD (1080p == Hi Def) is a marketing gimmick, because the effect was that many displays *lost* resolution. (Do I want 1920x1280 display, or do I want a Hi-Def display? Many people chose Hi-Def.)

4K is therefore not a gimmick. It may not be necessary, it may not be reasonable, it may not be affordable, but it is an improvement, and it'll drag along technology behind it. With 4K displays, you get 4K-compatible formats and capacities (MOAR DATA), improved throughput on video systems (MOAR FRAMES), increased network capacity (MOAR BANDWIDTH), more processing power on speed-limited CPUs (MOAR CORES), etc. etc.

Now, the expectation that consumers will upgrade their hardware investments is a bit insulting, until you think about it -- the communities that pour money into the upgrade churn eventually overtake and dominate the market.

Look at the history of the microcomputer market. The IBM had a crappy design built around a crappy intel chip that was annoying to work with, annoying to program for, ran crap software that didn't do much. The motorola cpus were better in so many ways that they spawned a host of competing systems, most of them better than the IBM at everything except being a boat anchor.

But the IBM users happily embraced the upgrade churn. That's an influx of money and incentive to make incremental improvements. And where there's a money stream funding incremental improvements, there will continue to be incremental improvements, and thus, eventually, dominance.

Technology follows money. It behooves those with money to spend it wisely, but spend it they should.

Re:Nope

[dreamchaser]

Exactly. I can notice the difference between 1080p and 4k, but said difference is so small that I'm not about to buy a new 60" TV and the coming HD-Bluray yet. Hell, people are just now really starting to even buy standard BluRay. I really doubt this will take off anytime soon. When it does and it makes sense then I'll upgrade. Right now 1080p on my 60" is a fantastic experience that I don't see being worth money to 'upgrade'.

Re:Nope

[jedidiah]

4K probably needs a media format to get off the ground. The extra bandwidth required for a 4K broadcast is probably a problem for most cable systems. The extra bandwidth required for streaming will VERY likely be a problem.

Streaming already has to make severe compromises as is.

Although most people probably don't have viewing setups that would benefit from 4K. Many don't have setups that benefit from BD even.

Re:Nope

[wiredlogic]

Reminds me of how VGA could readily handle higher resolutions than modern displays, component video even better, but everything had to be digital so they could sneak in their DRM.

Re:Nope

[muirhead]

... 4K will be about as noticeable as an acarian bug.

I'm guessing you've never had a dust mite allergy.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

So by most you mean 51% of the 7 billion or so out there?

Re:Nope

[davester666]

They are investing in this because the last upgrade cycle is over [HD flatscreens and blu-ray players]. Now sales are down because people are mainly just buying replacement units when they break, not new units into homes that don't already have one.

They want to try to move back to the early-adopter stage of sales for 4k.

Re:Nope

[jedidiah]

Anyone with a space where they can mount a projector will be in a decent enough position to see an improvement with 4K.

Everyone else, not so much.

Re:Nope

[jedidiah]

The industry already has a problem convincing people that they need HD. A lot of people don't have the enthusiast sorts of setups where it would really matter. Or rather, most people don't.

A lot of people are skipping 3D too.

The industry got fat off of a forced technology switch. They were on the gravy train for awhile and don't want to go back. It never occured to them that they were experiencing an unsustainable bubble.

Now they want to throw all sorts of nonsense at us in a desperate attempt to keep the gravy train rolling.

Re:Nope

[AK Marc]

You want to know how noticeable? You can see the little hairs on peoples arms, that's how noticeable it is.

I can't see the hairs on real people 10 feet away (for normal arm hair), if I can see the hairs on someone's arm on TV, why are they zoomed in on someone's arm?

They would not be investing so much money into 4k if it was just a marketing gimmick like you say.

By that standard, 3D isn't a gimmick. But nearly everyone still agrees it is. And, so long as people with 1080p at home, look at my 720p and ask if it's 4k, I'll believe that there's something else to it. Good settings on the TV, high quality input material, scaled properly seems to make more of a difference than pixels. At least with people with 20/20 or worse vision (nearly everyone, though it seems all the exceptions on the planet post on slashdot, mostly as A/Cs).

Re:Nope

[dotancohen]

I can't see the hairs on real people 10 feet away (for normal arm hair), if I can see the hairs on someone's arm on TV, why are they zoomed in on someone's arm?

I suspect that the format might fit a certain popular film niche, in which seeing the actor's body hairs is in fact considered a desirable feature.

Re: Nope

[maccodemonkey]

Industry is having trouble convincing people they need HD? A large majority of the market switched to HD. They're not having trouble convincing the market to adopt HD. They already did.

That's why they ended up doing 3D because their market dried up when everyone had an HDTV.

Re:Nope

[markdavis]

>"So by most you mean 51% of the 7 billion or so out there?"

Reasonable setup- 60" TV viewed at 8 feet:

No, by "most" I would estimate 75% of people off the street would not be able to tell you they were watching an upscaled DVD on that setup instead of 720P or 1080P (without showing them that) and be perfectly happy. Maybe 50% of those 75% would probably still not even notice a difference if you flipped between the upscaled DVD and a 1080P source in that same setup.

And I would estimate 99% of people off the street would not be able to tell any difference between 1080P and 4K in that same setup- even when flipping between the two. The number would be higher for really large TV's, or really close viewing, but it will still be an insignificant number.

Now, the results for the typical Slashdot demographic? The numbers would be much further along the "I can tell" scale, but I bet not as much as you might think.

Resolution is a rapidly diminishing return once you reach "very good". It is the same insanity of putting a 2K display on a 5 or 6" phone. It is WAY beyond the human eye resolution discrimination for any typical person held at any reasonable distance (like 12 to 14 inches). So rather than being a useful feature, it becomes more of a marketing gimmick- a spec just to sell devices to consumers that don't know any better. The net effect is it just pushes up the price and places more demand on the battery.

Re: Nope

[CronoCloud]

A large majority of the market switched to HD. They're not having trouble convincing the market to adopt HD. They already did.

I know of people who have their HD set hooked up to cable and satellite boxes with RF cables...and then they stretch the SD image because they think they're not getting what they paid for.

Re:Nope

[TheGratefulNet]

this is one evil downside to 'higher res'. more wasted (imho) storage and network! I like using just enough to get the job done. blue ray has too much; its over 30gig for a movie. the torrented versions tend to be 3gig (lets say) and that's a 10:1 compression and with very acceptable quality (not perfect but for 10 to 1, I'll take it!). no drm, no ads, no problems.

I can store movies on my nas if they are 3gig or so. but when they are 30gig, that's insane. storage is cheap, sure; but I won't just throw away 10x 'just because'. and now, they want to put even more data in the movie files, which will mean even more wasted network resources, storage and cpu. will we SEE that much improvement to justify it? I doubt it. if you compress it down to 'torrent style' again, maybe. but it won't be sold that way and it will appear that its not 'nas-able' and is still stuck on opto spinning discs with properietary players, probably insisting they connect to the net. (blech!)

audio is also like this; there are now 24/192k audio flac files which is overkill and wasteful for space.

storage is cheap. but why be so blatant about being so wasteful? the master needs to be in pure lossless high res. the stuff that we watch, as consumers, does NOT need to be 30gig and larger. that's part of the problem and it is why I reject BD and will reject the new format, as well.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

I notice the difference between regular standard definition and 1080p, but I still don't see why I should care about it.

The biggest (and most obvious) advantage from the move from SD to HD (720 or 1080) was fixing the problems SD had with the unnatural aspect ratio. SD makes people look fat because they are squished, thus the origin of the old TV saying "the camera adds pounds". Wide-screen productions converted to the old SD screens had to use "pan and scan" methods which cut out a fair bit of what was happening.
But even 1080p does not have enough resolution to display full Widescreen format movies- you still get a small amount of Letterboxing when viewing a full format film. And you still need to use Anti-aliasing techniques and methods to reduce Moire Patterns, because while in most situations you may have trouble making out individual pixels, you can still see the visual artifacts from them.

I agree that for most consumers, moving to 720 or 1080 was a much more obvious quality leap than moving up to 4K will be. So the adoption rates will be quite a bit slower, and will most likely stay exclusive to high-end systems for quite some time. And many people like yourself will probably not bother, just like many people still listen to AM radio because they just don't care that they're missing out on much of the original art. Which is fine, but it's not a good reason to trash-talk the people who do care.

Re: Nope

[tepples]

Is that because cable providers charge more per year for high-definition service?

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't see the hairs on real people 10 feet away (for normal arm hair),

Then you need to get your eyes checked. not trolling.

if I can see the hairs on someone's arm on TV, why are they zoomed in on someone's arm?

Well I don't know, what show are you watching? I've seen plenty of shots in movies and on TV where they are zoomed in on someone. If you need me to explain the plot reasons for a close-up shot, you'll need to tell me what show it is.

And, so long as people with 1080p at home, look at my 720p and ask if it's 4k

With the exception of a few Sports channels, cable and satellite (and yes, even streamed content) usually compresses their content at least 4:1 or more. Many people watch what is in reality lower quality than 720i and *think* they are seeing 1080p HD. Aside from Blu-Ray and a few select video games, nobody runs 1080p at all... the best you get is 1080i and in most cases it's really 720 which has been upconverted.
So when the average person with "1080p at home" (as you put it) gets a good look at an uncompressed 720p native video, it's natural for them to notice the obvious quality improvement. And since they assume what they're used to is 1080p, they then assume you must have 4K.

Good settings on the TV, high quality input material, scaled properly seems to make more of a difference than pixels.

In terms of the improvements from 1080p to 4K, for the most part I agree. But there are still things that make 4K look better, for example you don't need to anti-alias the image or buy an expensive TV with the right type of edge-processing hardware to eliminate the jagged edges on straight lines, or reduce Moire Pattern effects.

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

Let me guess - you took the time to adjust the brightness, contrast, color, etc. settings to suit your room? In my experience most people don't, and the defaults that are tuned to look good in the over-bright fluorescent lighting of the display rack look horrible anywhere else.

That makes sense from a marketing perspective, after all the store staff isn't going to fiddle with anything, but it would be really nice if there were a quick and easy option to switch to "living room defaults". Maybe even an overlay in the corner for the first few minutes after being turned on that says "Currently using showroom defaults. Do you want to switch to settings much better suited to the average living room?" That would probably dramatically improve the image quality for 90% of users.

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

How many people have 30+" TVs? How many people have computers? How many would occasionally benefit from connecting a large-screen monitor that doesn't suck to their computer?

Or alternately, how many people don't want to always watch TV from at least two screen-diagonals away? Why do people sit in the front rows of a theater where they cave to crane their necks back to see the whole screen? I *like* having the image fill most of my field of view, and that means sitting considerably closer than one diagonal away from the screen, at which range the individual pixels at 1080p are clearly visible.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

The industry already has a problem convincing people that they need HD. A lot of people don't have the enthusiast sorts of setups where it would really matter. Or rather, most people don't.

A lot of people are skipping 3D too.

The industry got fat off of a forced technology switch. They were on the gravy train for awhile and don't want to go back. It never occured to them that they were experiencing an unsustainable bubble.

Now they want to throw all sorts of nonsense at us in a desperate attempt to keep the gravy train rolling.

Most of the content available to most people is not actually 1080p... it's 720i, which has been upconverted to 720p or 1080i. Even sports channels are only 720p native resolution. The only place you'll see 1080 (i or p) native content is on Blu-Ray (and only if it was actually recorded or remastered at 1080) and in some video games... or if you download a digital format ripped from a true 1080 source of course.
The streaming providers are starting to claim HD content, but it varies as to whether or not the source was actually full 1080p or if it's a 720 upconvert.

Other than Blu-Ray and a few rips straight from digital theatre projectors, the content simply isn't out there even at 1080p. And most cable/sat/streaming providers compress the hell out of their content on top of everything else.
Try it some time, if you have the chance- setup up a BluRay movie side-by-side on identical televisions against cable, satellite, or streaming of the same movie supposedly in "full HD". You'll see a massive quality difference.
The real advantage in HD over SD was the fix for the shitty old aspect ratio. Delivery and distribution systems are struggling to supply even 1080i content, let alone 1080p, and 4K will be even longer in coming.

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

So what's the problem? It's not like 1080p TVs took the world by storm - it's been almost two decades and plenty of people still have CRTs. Most people replace their TV when the old one starts to fail, at which point I will certainly be willing to pay a modest premium for 4K. In the mean time let the enthusiasts have their fun.

Personally I suspect one of the major drivers behind 4K screens will be computer monitors - there's much to be said for standardized resolutions, and even on a 30" screen the difference with 1080p is dramatic. Hell, I'd kill for a 4K screen on my 15" laptop, I'm tired of reading blocky, pixelated text.

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

That's not a bug, it's a feature.

Seriously - who notices such things except the people who enjoy spotting them?

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

On the other hand, almost my entire video collection is DVDs, but I would still much rather watch them on a 1080p screen. My computer has enough horsepower to upscale and deinterlace them beautifully. And then there's the few works of video art where the additional detail is worth the added storage space.

Meanwhile for the un-tech masses a DVD, Blue-ray, or UHD video all take roughly the same amount of storage space - one ~5" plastic disc, plus case (usually)

Re:Nope

[DuckDodgers]

You can see a difference in a store very easily, even from more than ten feet away. So you will see a difference in your house, even with a relatively small television.

I don't plan to be an early adopter, but when a 4K 37" television is under $400 I will probably get one.

Re:Nope

[StillAnonymous]

"They" invested a bunch of money in SACD, which was totally unnecessary, so that's a meaningless metric.

I've seen 4k displays at electronics stores. Meh. I can tell the difference, but I wouldn't upgrade unless there was a noticeable problem with what I already had, which there isn't. I only upgraded from DVD when I got a large screen LCD that made some of them look pretty poor. On the other hand, many of my DVDs still look good on a 50" screen, and the upscalers have gotten better.

Re:Nope

[PRMan]

In original uncompressed actual HD, I could do that too. Now it has all been compressed to where I can't anymore.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh the placebo effect is strong with this one.

It's physically impossible for the human eye to discern the difference between 720p and 1080p on an average-sized television, much less the difference between 1080p and 4k.

But that won't stop the upgradophiles from loudly screaming from every rooftop that their brand new televisions that they just wasted money on are the best things on the planet. No thank you. But hey, without people like you, my 720p television would have probably cost a ton more. So thanks for that, I guess.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

Congratulations - you have made the exact same argument that was made against HD in the first place. Guess what: people will upgrade, because people who aren't you, can notice a difference in the living-room.

No they can't. It's physically impossible; the human eye can't even discern the difference between 720p and 1080p on an average-sized television.

They just like convincing themselves that they do because they don't want to face the reality that they just got swindled for a shitload of money on a TV that they didn't need.

Re: Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

I disagree, unless you're talking sub-30" monitors.

I got a new 65" TV for the lounge room a few months back, comparing the same 1080p content on a 1080p TV and a UHD TV is indeed obvious to the naked eye, and that's with crappy interpolated upscaling.

Comparing 1080p content to UHD content on a UHD TV at 65" is surprisingly mind blowing assuming the content was indeed mastered at 2K or above. The finer details of fabrics, dust, foliage, water, high frequency shadows, it all pops out in a noticeable way.

Anyone who claims otherwise obviously hasn't seen real UHD content on a display whose pixel density to viewing distance ratio actually benefits from the resolution bump - or is declining past their 40s and has deteriorating vision (in which case understandably, you don't see much difference I presume)

Re:Nope

[drinkypoo]

Reminds me of how VGA could readily handle higher resolutions than modern displays, component video even better, but everything had to be digital so they could sneak in their DRM.

The problem with that idea is that the quality of the VGA cable dramatically effects what kind of degradation there is going to be of the signal by the time it reaches the other end, and that there will always be degradation. Skinny VGA cables that worked perfectly fine back when I was using 800x600x60Hz displays had to be thrown away when I got up over 1280x1024@75Hz because they just didn't have the bandwidth necessary to carry the signal. This is not a big deal over short run lengths, less than 6' say, but running a 50' HDMI cable is no big deal — even the part where you pay for it.

The same stuff is of course also true of component cables. Their quality varies wildly. Some equipment will only output up to 1080i on component, but 1080p via HDMI, possibly for this reason or maybe just to sell TVs and receivers with HDMI connectors. I, for one, only recently got one with component video switching.

Re:Nope

[sjames]

Noticeable and noticeably more entertaining are two different things. I generally don't find arm hair very entertaining.

They invested a pile into 3D and where is that now?

Re:Nope

[drinkypoo]

Let me guess - you took the time to adjust the brightness, contrast, color, etc. settings to suit your room?

Hell, I got out the Eye-One and calibrated my TV. Problem is, sometimes the sun is in the room, and that's a feature because I like light and the house is passive solar... and sometimes the sun is down. So I calibrated it for nighttime when I can actually see the most detail, but even so the solution is not ideal.

First world... FIRST WORLD PROBLEMS. Cue the music.

Re:Nope

[tverbeek]

Blu-ray is already a physical-media format that we don't need. The CD isn't obsolete simply because a higher-capacity disc came along to replace it; it's obsolete because there's a better way to music files: the internet. The DVD is on the way out for the same reason. In fact, if not for the streaming rights being a licensing clusterfuck, Netflix would have completely shut down its DVD-mailing business by now. We don't need another higher-resolution media format. We just need a convenient way to watch movies at whatever resolution our display devices can manage, and that's the internet + a licensing clearinghouse.

Re:Nope

[Kjella]

I have a 28" UHD monitor - the U28D590D if you want to be specific - and yes, you can tell the difference. That said, it was underwhelming to my eyes, I don't have the eyes to take full advantage of 4K. I think I could pick the 4K image in an A/B test, but not the 8K image. We're getting closer though, but I'm not sure it's meaningfully relevant. That is, would it matter if you got infinite resolution, infinite fps, infinite FPS? Or would it just be another failed atttempt.

Re: Nope

[Rakarra]

Is that because cable providers charge more per year for high-definition service?

This. Although HD antennas for over-the-air free digital broadcasts are pretty cheap.

Re:Nope

[Rakarra]

Blu-ray is already a physical-media format that we don't need. The CD isn't obsolete simply because a higher-capacity disc came along to replace it; it's obsolete because there's a better way to music files: the internet. The DVD is on the way out for the same reason

Man, you really paint a dystopian vision of the future. :-(

Re:Nope

[BitZtream]

difference between a quality DVD upscale and a Bluray

You lost all credibility when you said upscale. You just showed that you don't understand that you've been caught in a marketing gimmick.

And ... pretty much everyone can tell difference if you put them side by side, its just that most people will never see them side by side because they have far better things to do than sit around jerking off about the video quality ... like actually watching the video.

Re:Nope

[thegarbz]

You've contradicted yourself.

4K is such a crazy marketing gimmick. Most of the population can already barely tell the difference between a quality DVD upscale and a Bluray at any reasonable size or distance.

So the answer is actually yes, not nope. Consumers will lap up crazy marketing gimmicks regardless of technical merit.
Consumers may also not be willing to upgrade, but how long do modern electronics last and will non-UDH variants be around when your screen finally dies?

The answer is definitely yes, but for many people it won't be for technical reasons.

Re: Nope

[thegarbz]

And these people don't own bluray players right?

I know plenty of those people as well. But most of them have the setup out of pure ignorance. When I show them where to button is to adjust the screen width they have all corrected it without fail.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

Most people don't seem to be able to tell when a video is being played back at the wrong aspect ratio. 720p is good enough for the majority of people. I've seen some nice 720p displays and have had to ask if it was 720 or 1080. 4k? nah, not for the display sizes I foresee using.

Re:Nope

[markdavis]

So you are assuming people always have, everywhere they need:

1) Access to the Internet
2) Reliable access to the Internet
3) High enough speed access to the Internet
4) Reasonably priced non/metered Internet
5) No problem with some entity knowing exactly what, where, when, and how they are watching everything.

Streaming is not a suitable replacement for physical media in all cases.

Re:Nope

[markdavis]

>"You lost all credibility when you said upscale. You just showed that you don't understand that you've been caught in a marketing gimmick.

Apparently you don't understand the technology at all, because upscaling is a real and useful feature, not a gimmick. And I said "upscale" because nearly ALL consumer equipment does it and you have to factor that in when comparing to something that is much higher resolution. It narrows the gap further.

>"And ... pretty much everyone can tell difference if you put them side by side"

Wrong. Perhaps if they are 1 foot from the screen, but that is not a "reasonable size or distance".

Re:Nope

[markdavis]

Interesting points!

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

Yeah, at 28" the difference probably isn't *that* dramatic unless you have really good eyes, or frequently rest your nose on the screen. There's also the question of the relative quality of the two monitors, not to mention how well you calibrated them. I've also heard that Samsung's TV quality has become far less consistent, even within a single model number - no idea if they're any better with monitors. As for 8k - I think that's likely to remain primarily the domain of home theater enthusiasts and VR helmets - and might not be enough for really good VR. Then again, with a 40" or 60" monitor it would probably be well worth it. 1080p on a 40" monitor leaves me almost able to see the subpixels

Re:Nope

[Ereth]

You apparently need smarter friends.

I just put a 55" UHD TV in my home office, to replace an aging 50" DLP. That's not your normal viewing space as the typical viewing distance is only about 4 feet away (my living room has a projector and a 120" screen). Hooked it up, got some 4k content and my nephew literally exclaimed "WOW" and when his wife came to get him, I believe her exact words were "Holy crap!". Within seconds both of them could see it was better.

I want a 4k projector for the 120" screen, but those are still in the $20k range, so no time soon for that. In the meantime, "Breaking Bad" never looked better than in UHD.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

A 25 inch tube set was $400
A 32 inch HDTV was on sale for under $200

Paying extra to upgrade is the issue.

Re:Nope

[swb]

Maybe if the rights weren't such a cluster fuck, we would have offline Netflix where the movie could be stored locally for offline viewing.

Unfortunately the rights holders and the wireless internet providers seem to be in some kind of Mexican standoff over who is the greediest asshole.

If LTE data was 10x cheaper (ie, my 10G plan was 100G), it would solve most of the stream only issues. There would still be some corner cases like long aircraft trips or weird rural areas.

Re: Nope

[drinkypoo]

Anyone who claims otherwise obviously hasn't seen real UHD content on a display whose pixel density to viewing distance ratio actually benefits from the resolution bump

Probably true, but since most content won't be available in UHD for a long long time, most people won't be seeing it any time soon anyway. If they're lucky, the demo video in the store will be in UHD, and not just interpolated.

or is declining past their 40s and has deteriorating vision (in which case understandably, you don't see much difference I presume)

I'm far-sighted, you insentitive clod! And, I think, gradually becoming moreso. I think I'm losing a little bit of fine resolution close-up. I can still count pixels in a stipple on my 25.5" 1920x1200 IPS, though.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

How many people have 30+" TVs? How many people have computers? How many would occasionally benefit from connecting a large-screen monitor that doesn't suck to their computer?

I would say 100's of millions of people world wide. Go to any modern store that sells HDTV's or better yet why not go on-line and look at prices. It is possible to get 50" or better HDTV's at 1080p and 4K for under US$800. If you want smaller (say 40") you can get 1080p and 4K for under US$400. I must qualify that the price difference between 1080p HDTV's and 4K HDTV's is not that great and in the region of 5% to 30% depending on brand.

Or alternately, how many people don't want to always watch TV from at least two screen-diagonals away? Why do people sit in the front rows of a theater where they cave to crane their necks back to see the whole screen? I *like* having the image fill most of my field of view, and that means sitting considerably closer than one diagonal away from the screen, at which range the individual pixels at 1080p are clearly visible.

Of course in your case a 4K HDTV would be the best option although I do think you would be better to get your eyes checked since you appear to be sitting too close to the TV.

To the people who would say that the prices I have given are too expensive then my answer would be to say "Why do you have a computer to post on this forum?"

Re:Nope

[Chandon Seldon]

It's physically impossible for the human eye to discern the difference between 720p and 1080p on an average-sized television, much less the difference between 1080p and 4k.

And in the 1970's, it would have been physically impossible for the human eye to distinguish between NTSC and 720p on an "average size television" at a "normal viewing distance", because people had 14" TVs that they watched at 20 ft.

Personally, I'm a fan of the 70" TV at 6 ft, or the 30" display at 18in. And for that, I can see the difference between 1080p and 4k clearly even without my glasses.

Re:Nope

[Immerman]

The distance from the TV is not about being able to see the image - it's about filling your field of view to make the experience more immersive. If you sit the recommended two screen diagonals away from your TV, the diagonal will always have an angular size of 28 degrees, regardless of physical size. If I want to do some more immersive gaming, or really get "into" a movie, and have the diagonal span 90* of my field of view then that requires that I sit half a diagonal away. And that isn't necessarily a problem - it's recommended that you sit one arms-length away from a computer monitor to minimize eye strain, so get a TV with a two arms-length diagonal and you're golden.

Re: Nope

[CronoCloud]

No, because they don't actially offer "SD only service", it's all HD now. The problem is a lot of people don't understand the varying abilities/quality of the various ways to connect things to TV's. To them they've got an HD set, what more do they need? Not realizing that they may need to trade in the old cable/satellite box.

Re: Nope

[CronoCloud]

No, they aren't, because you really need an outdoor antenna on a mast for that. Then you're back to just receiving the local ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox, and PBS affiliates.

Re: Nope

[CronoCloud]

And these people don't own bluray players right?

Not usually, sometimes it's an upscaling DVD player, but that too is usually connected with a composite cable at best.

Re:Nope

[Luckyo]

And when you're sick you often can get better just by going to a clinic, looking at the person in white coat and leaving.

Placebo effect does amazing things to people.

Re:Nope

[AK Marc]

You need smarter relatives.

UHD content is played constantly in every store selling them. If they were so shocked, had they never been to a store before?

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

Resolution is a rapidly diminishing return once you reach "very good". It is the same insanity of putting a 2K display on a 5 or 6" phone. It is WAY beyond the human eye resolution discrimination for any typical person held at any reasonable distance (like 12 to 14 inches). So rather than being a useful feature, it becomes more of a marketing gimmick- a spec just to sell devices to consumers that don't know any better. The net effect is it just pushes up the price and places more demand on the battery.

I have an LG G3, 2560x1440 on a 5.5" diagonal. For any extended use I remove my progressive bifocals and hold it 8" from my face. That makes it about the same size as my 15.6" laptop screen at typical viewing distance. It would probably be fine at 1920x1080, but the extra resolution certainly isn't "insanity". I sure wish my laptop had a 2560x1440 screen.

Re:Nope

[terjeber]

I've purchased and watched UHD format shows and movies.

Where? On Netflix? Netflix has never aired anything that resembles 4K. It's a scam.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

No they can't. It's physically impossible; the human eye can't even discern the difference between 720p and 1080p on an average-sized television.

That is only true if they sit very far away from it.

Re:Nope

[Anonymous Coward]

It doesn't matter if the improvement is large or small. Hell, the improvement can be provably zero and it still doesn't matter!

When people buy a new (TV, disk player, TIVO, stereo, whatever), they want a "good deal". What a good deal amounts to is entirely in the eyes of the buyer. However if the new item achieves better specs at a higher price, or the same specs at a lower price, than the equipment being replaced, then that's a decent definition of a good deal. Also, if you can compare 2 different units on the market at the same time, and one outperforms the other on ANY metric that the buyer cares about, then that is a good deal. Also any price less than list price sounds like a good deal to most.

So long as the buyer feels they are getting value for their dollar, and they have a dollar to spend, that's going to generate sales. The whole "improved performance" sales angle is a never-ending sales gambit proven to work.

Re: Nope

[Rakarra]

I used to receive ATSC digital HD broadcasts with a smallish antenna that I placed on my desk that was by my front window. Total space footprint was less than a cubic foot. But yes, I'm just speaking of the local affiliates (equivalent to starter cable). At least back then, maybe only Discovery Channel did any over the air broadcasts.

I won't say it didn't get drop-outs, but if I had line of sight to the broadcast tower it would probably have been much better.

Doubtful

[dugancent]

I just upgraded to an HDTV (from a mid 90s tube tv), so no.

Re:Doubtful

[Z00L00K]

And the content on TV has progressively gotten worse since the 70's.

70's had cheesy TV shows that you could at least smile at. The TV shows today - they are either just stupid or depressing.

Re:Doubtful

[Noah Haders]

It's the golden age of scripted television, man. GoT? I like Veep. What other gems do people like?

Re:Doubtful

[Anonymous Coward]

Precisely - what is the point of UHD/4K if there is no content worth watching?

Re:Doubtful

[sjames]

That's how I ended up with one. It does look nice, but I'm glad I waited until the old TV failed.

I did not upgrade the satellite receiver or the DVD player. That means that oddly enough, I can either watch network shows in 480p over the satellite or 1080p OTA. But I find myself not being enthused enough by the extra resolution to bother switching over even though I can see the difference.

In short, it's not at all bad, but Its not so good that I will actually make any effort to get it, much less pay for it.

The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

The future is increasing frame rates for more realism. Unfortunately, the big manufacturers need to sell 4k televisions, and will keep pushing the dead horse of increased resolution, which is completely pointless for a massive majority of users..

Re:The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

The frame rates have increased a long with the resolution for a lot of 4k TV's.

Re:The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

the frame rate of the content hasn't.

Re: The future is not UHD

[maccodemonkey]

Any TV you can buy today can do 60 fps over HDMI. The frame rate push has been done for years, the content just never showed up:

It's also arguable if that's the future. Everyone seems pretty happy with the current refresh rates of film, and 60 fps Hobbit wasn't well received.

Re: The future is not UHD

[blankinthefill]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't the Hobbit shot at 48fps? Also, one of the reasons it wasn't well received was because people complained that it didn't feel 'cinematic,' or that it reminded them of soap operas. The ironic thing here is that the reason people thought that is that many day time tv shows ARE shot at a higher fps than the cinema standard 24. It is not arguable that the higher frame rate provides a more clear picture, and, honestly, I see this going the way of the vinyl... CDs are better in basically every way, but some people complain that they don't have the 'warmth' of vinyl, or something. They mean the same thing that the people who were complaining about the high frame rate Hobbit did though: It just isn't the same when you take out the flaws introduced by a demonstrably inferior method. Of course, I have been wrong before... but I personally thought the high fps showing of the Hobbit was FAR better than the normal 24 fps version. And I'm convinced that once movie makers get used to it, and how unforgiving it can be, and once audiences see it at little more, they will want it also. I feel like it's waiting for its 'Avatar' moment... one super acclaimed film that uses it that makes others sit up and take notice. (Sadly, the flaws in the perception of the Hobbit seem to have set that back a bit.)

Re: The future is not UHD

[AikonMGB]

For me, The Hobbit wasn't well-received because 300 pages of children's book does not equal three feature length films, and stereoscopic 3D is a detraction. The higher frame rate was in the otherwise barren "plus" column.

Re: The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

Unlike the cd/vinyl thing, there is actually a significant problem with faster frame rates that many consumers don't like (rather than just a small segment like CDs).

It absolutely is a better, more realistic representation of the scene. But it also looks like shit to many people (e.g. why it's denigrated as the soap opera effect, etc.). It actually makes me mildly motion sick in a threater, because all the little body motions (and other motion) which gets smoothed out @ 24fps (i.e. the "cinematic effect") are now visible.

Re: The future is not UHD

[Rakarra]

For me, The Hobbit wasn't well-received because 300 pages of children's book does not equal three feature length films, and stereoscopic 3D is a detraction. The higher frame rate was in the otherwise barren "plus" column.

A big problem is that a set that can look "real" at 24fps can look cheap at 48 fps. It really does look like a "set" instead of a section in the world. The Desolation of Smaug suffered from this problem, the Lake Town interiors in particular.

I still think it's the only way to do 3D, though.

Re: The future is not UHD

[thegarbz]

The hobbit LOOKED amazing.

I then proceeded to give it 2 out of 5 on a few review sites because it was an incredibly crap trilogy with very little in the way of story.

If you want something well received AND technically amazing then you need to provide a complete package. The hobbit wasn't it, but I I do give them kudos for making a movie which wasn't jerky and blurry as hell when watching it in 3D.

Re: The future is not UHD

[thegarbz]

Forget the hobbit. Have a look at all current TVs on the market. Some of their big features are various smooth motion playback schemes to artificially image process up the framerate and make the motion smooth. I appear to be the only person who has this disabled (but only because my bluray player doesn't have a delay audio option and the TV adds about 100ms of lag to the resulting video).

Sorry for double posting.

Re:The future is not UHD

[chris200x9]

>The frame rates have increased a long with the resolution for a lot of 4k TV's. Nope. If anything 4K has set framerate (resfresh rate) back due to bandwidth constraints, you can get 120+ hertz with relatively old 1080p sets but even the most bleeding edge sets can only do 60 at 4K.

Re: The future is not UHD

[Thagg]

Go to a friends house and turn on their flat-panel TV. 99% of the time, it will have frame-rate interpolation turned on; which basically means that any content they see on that TV will be at 60 or 120 Hz. Even movies shot at 24.

More and more often as I do presentations to executives, they don't understand why my TVs look so "juddery" compared to what they expect -- it's because at home they're watching everything at 120Hz.

So no -- most people are happy with high frame rate most of the time, and that percentage is getting larger quickly. I am a big 24fps fan, but I believe the days are numbered.

Re: The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

HFR has been around since the 90s. In fact most, if not all, pitiful daytime soap operas run at 48 fps...

Re:The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

The main difference between increased resolution and increased frame rate, from the point of view of the viewer, is that you can actually see the difference if the resolution is increased.

Re: The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

The ironic thing here is that the reason people thought that is that many day time tv shows ARE shot at a higher fps than the cinema standard 24.

By a whopping 4.2%. I doubt that difference is visible to many people.

Re: The future is not UHD

[pterry]

If I had a newfangled TV with motion interpolation I would probably turn it off too, but not because I don't like smooth motion! The ones I've looked at in stores seem to produce inconsistent results which I find distracting - they are good at interpolating camera pans but not much else.

This is because in general you can't recover information that's been thrown away (or not captured in the first place), and interpolating motion is always going to give slightly dodgy results, especially when your processing is limited to what you can do in real time.

I hate interlace for the same reason. In the days of analog transmission it was a good compromise between resolution, frame rate and bandwidth. In the era of digital however, it can be thought of as the worst lossy codec ever, assuming the source is 50 or 60 FPS. 25/30 FPS material isn't harmed if decoded correctly, but interlace seems to have a unique ability to confuse programmers / hardware designers, resulting in anything from "combing", to horrible jittering caused by displaying the fields in the wrong order.

Re: The future is not UHD

[Anonymous Coward]

and 60 fps Hobbit wasn't well received.

The Hobbit wasn't 60 fps, it was 48 fps and in 3D. And the UHD specs don't include 48 fps or 3D. Also, high frame rate in TVs is going to be at least 100 or 120 fps soon. And UHD Blu-ray can't do that either. For the UHD specs they haven't increased the maximum frame rate at all - it's still 60 fps. They've just increased the resolution that you can have at that frame rate from 720p to 2160p (though with 720p you could have 3D, with 2160p you can't in UHD Blu-ray).

Also, The Hobbit at 48 fps was received well by a lot of people, it's just a minority that didn't like it. In fact the 48 fps version in IMAX was more successful (earned more) than the 24 fps version.

Fragmentation of a Market

[BoRegardless]

Rarely works out well.

Lots of Something

[Anonymous Coward]

All that resolution for my 720i ? Take all of my money!

Oh wait, that's quite literally of no use to me.

The answer is always no

[drinkypoo]

When a slashdot submission asks a question, the answer is always no. And this case is no exception.

UHD promises resolutions 4X greater than Blu-ray 1080p as well as much higher data rates, enhanced color space and more audio options. But, will consumers care, and will they be willing to upgrade their HDTV's, AV Receivers, and Blu-ray players

No, no they won't. 1080p is already really good. What we will notice, however, is high-resolution monitors getting cheaper.

Re:The answer is always no

[Pulzar]

No, no they won't. 1080p is already really good.

When it comes to TVs, yes... but projectors would see a huge benefit. When you project 1080p onto a 120+" screen, things definitely start getting a bit fuzzy.

Of course, that's a niche market, but it could be enough to drive the prices down into somewhat reasonable category. Projectors themselves have gotten cheap enough that way..

Re:The answer is always no

[msauve]

Not only that, but they're lying about the capabilities. It's only 2X the resolution (which is a linear measurement). That gives it 4X the pixels.

Re:The answer is always no

[Anonymous Coward]

They just buy the latest technology during the next device recycling event, even if they have no content available. They don't really care until they have seen a meaningful difference at their bashful neighbor's set.

Re:The answer is always no

[Anonymous Coward]

That's bullshit. Resolution is a question of resolving power and is in 2 diminension. Unless you're seriously only concerned with being able to locate the edge of straight lines, the resolving power is really a 2 dimensional measurement. I suppose, we could consider it a 3 dimensional measurement and worry about the rate at which the pixels can flip between colors, but that's probably a bit much.

Anyways it's a bit of a moot point as resolving power is partially a matter of pixels and partially a matter of how accurate those pixels are compared with the scene they're depicting.

Re:The answer is always no

[joe545]

That actually has a term for it. It's called "Betteridge's law of headlines"

Re:The answer is always no

[drinkypoo]

That actually has a term for it. It's called "Betteridge's law of headlines"

What do you call the law about someone always being willing to step up and point out your shortcomings on slashdot? Er, not that I'm actually complaining, I'm genuinely curious — and I was actually wondering what this effect was called, so your comment is +1 informative in my book.

Re:The answer is always no

[thegarbz]

The answer is only no for slashdot users.

We live in our own little bubble of technical genius. Slashdot users here are currently arguing the merits of living room sizes and TV dimensions with plenty for and against a move to 4k.

Consumers however have no such drive. They are driven by shiny and marketing. When they are standing 2ft from a TV in a showroom they will go "whoar" and then will buy it.

The answer in this case is yes. Consumers will buy 4k, just like they bought HD despite at the time everyone on slashdot claiming that NTSC was "good enough".

Eventually even you may upgrade it by basic attrition. Can you even get a non-HD TV anymore?

Re:The answer is always no

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is /. so full of luddites?

I seen 4k and 8k. It looks WAY better than 1080p.

Like one filmmaker said (Cameron?) it's like removing the window from the movie.

Uh

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes! I'll notice. More pixels please.

Don't need this yet

[umdesch4]

I have a 1080p projector that I'm projecting onto a 116" screen. At 1080p, the results are acceptable to me, and it's the only video I ever look at that would really get much of a noticeable benefit from being 4K. So, when 4K projectors drop under $1600 CAD, I'll start to be interested.

Re:Don't need this yet

[Solandri]

I'm projecting a 1080p image onto a 150" screen (my wall). It's damn obvious 1080p isn't enough. From 12' away I can see the individual pixels, and the anti-aliasing is obvious on news and sports graphics. I'd say 1080p video looks about as sharp as 480i video (DVD) on a 50" screen - not very sharp at all. And I'm 45 and my prescription 2 years out of date, so it's not like my eyes are as good as they used to be. If my next eyeglass prescription is sharper, I may have to intentionally defocus the projector image slightly to mitigate the screen door effect.

I'm seeing more and more 70"+ HDTVs for sale in stores, so I have to believe people are buying them. That's about the point when 1080p starts to become limiting at typical living room distances (about 8 ft between sofa and TV). Theoretical max for a room with 8' ceilings is just shy of 200 inches at 16:9, so there's still a lot of room for TVs to potentially grow. Add in more cameras capable of recording 4k, and 4k is going to gain traction in the next 5-10 years whether you want it or not. I've already decided that when the bulb on my current projector deteriorates, I'm just going to replace it with a 4k projector.

Re:Don't need this yet

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm projecting a 1080p image onto a 150" screen . . . I'm 45 and my prescription 2 years out of date, so it's not like my eyes are as good as they used to be.

If you don't care enough to make your vision a priority, why are you spending so much on what sounds like a rather expensive setup?

Re:Don't need this yet

[Rakarra]

If you don't care enough to make your vision a priority, why are you spending so much on what sounds like a rather expensive setup?

If your eyes make things a tiny bit blurry, and your display is a tiny bit blurry, the perceived image with be more blurry.

It might be cheaper than laser vision correction, which some of are still leery about.

Re:Don't need this yet

[BitZtream]

You're doing it completely wrong. You need to get a clue about viewing distance and the ratio between display size and it.

You're one of those guys who thinks he has this kick ass awesome setup because you made it bigger, but really, you just made it shittier.

You should at least get the most basic of clues from wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O...

At no point should your display be larger than the distance you're viewing it from, thats just retarded.

Re:Don't need this yet

[Anonymous Coward]

My CRT projector throws a 12ft 4:3 raster. I can easily count the scanlines on LD and DVD. With the doubler on it's basically the same as a BluRay through it at 1k... scanlines are hardly visible. I can double that to 2k and it's nothing but glass all the way up to 15-20ft. 4K is a pointless joke for consumers because no one's wall is big enough for it, nor can you buy a projector that's truly capable of it. And you're not buying an LCD display that big either. So all you're going to end up doing is jamming 4K into a dinky 5ft LCD just so you can circle jerk your friends about the 300 dpi none of you can see at appropriate distances.
Furthermore, consumers should REJECT 4K, because this time, unlike DVD and BluRay, they won't screw up the encryption, therefore you'll have no way to make copies and use them however you want. And the players and the movies will be stupid expensive forever as the last even remotely conceivable tech bump. You'll have to buy stuff all over because they'll discontinue DVD and BD media and players. And even if you could rip it down to manageable sizes for a library, it'd take days to process a movie. No thanks, I'll stick to the equivalent of 450 BD to DVD-9's on a 4TB disk :)
The only place for 4K is in the movie studio to cinema chain where they blow it up to 100ft.
After that, let them do the downconverting work to sell you a DVD or BluRay disc at Walmart.
BTW, digital sucks. They sell you these shitty one layer one side DVD-4's compressed all to fuck so their costs are low. So you get pixelization and stepped intensity fields. Real DVD-9's and real BD's are quite good. Then there's the lack of true blacks on your backlit junk.
Oh well, you wanted it, you got it :)

Native 2Kp *and* a 30 or 60 frame rate would be a good fit for the home.
But 2K doesn't exist and 1080 i/p native isn't that hot when doubled.
Oh well.

Re:Don't need this yet

[Anonymous Coward]

720P was also acceptable before you saw content designed for and displayed at 1080P.

Re:Don't need this yet

[Anonymous Coward]

At no point should your display be larger than the distance you're viewing it from, thats just retarded.

So ... if somebody has a 10' x 10' room (or 3 m x 3 m), and they project or mount an image to one full side of that room, at no point should anybody be actually inside the room to see it?

Technology is not what you think people ought to be doing with it. It is them doing a thousand objectionably things like twitter, porn, moveon.org, google docs, etc.

Re:Don't need this yet

[ChoosyBeggar]

You're doing it completely wrong. You need to get a clue about viewing distance and the ratio between display size and it.

You're one of those guys who thinks he has this kick ass awesome setup because you made it bigger, but really, you just made it shittier.

You should at least get the most basic of clues from wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O...

At no point should your display be larger than the distance you're viewing it from, thats just retarded.

I think anyone should be able to experiment & decide for themselves what their ideal viewing solution might be. Take me, for example: I use a 50" 4K UHDTV as my main desktop computer display, sitting approximately 30" away from the screen. I love it! Again, if this guy decides he wants a full wall of video at maximum resolution, who are you to tell him he's wrong?

yes I will notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, I have 2 65" 4k TVs and will notice.

Too late!

[namgge]

Anybody able to afford this upgrade is probably too old to be have eyesight good enough to see it.

Re:Too late!

[ColdWetDog]

Man, does that hurt. I'm afraid you're right to a very large extent. I could certainly upgrade from a 42" 1080 p screen, but unless I sit really close with my glasses on, it doesn't make much difference.

The nieces and nephews think the TV is something akin to a slide rule - an interesting historical object of little daily import. If it doesn't go on the laptop screen or the phone, it doesn't get watched.

Except for the Star Wars laser disks but that's another sad tech story.....

Re:Too late!

[naris]

TVs have more than 1 pixel?

Re:Too late!

[AK Marc]

I got one of the last active-glasses 3D TVs from LG. A 55" 720p plasma. They canceled the line, and went to RealD, for cheaper glasses, and when you buy one of the last of a line of 3D TVs, with no glasses available in plasma 720p (hadn't been made for months, not in stock in any official dealers), you pay about 1/4 list price (when the list was already discounted for clearance). I couldn't have gotten a better TC for twice the price at the time.

And I'm constantly asked if my 720p is a 4k. A good receiver for proper scaling, and good input quality make all the difference. Certainly more of a difference than 720p to 4k makes at reasonable watching distance (and not having them side-by-side, as they are in stores).

Nope

[markdavis]

>"But, will consumers care, and will they be willing to upgrade their HDTV's, AV Receivers, and Blu-ray players to adopt a new format whose benefits may only be realized on ultra large displays or close viewing distances?"

Nope

4K is such a crazy marketing gimmick. Most of the population can already barely tell the difference between a quality DVD upscale and a Bluray at any reasonable size or distance. The manufacturers *want* to keep making everything obsolete so people "have" to keep buying new stuff, and re-buying their content over and over.

Uh...no

[Radical Moderate]

I miss the days of NTSC, a standard that lasted half a lifetime. This upgrade-your-TV-every-6 months crap is getting old. And get off my lawn.

Re:Uh...no

[itsdapead]

I miss the days of NTSC, a standard that lasted half a lifetime. This upgrade-your-TV-every-6 months crap is getting old. And get off my lawn.

Some of us grew up with PAL, which made HD even less of a priority.

Quite frankly 720 or compressed-to-shreds 1080i isn't worth the effort c.f. PAL, and although proper 1080p from BluRay is rather more impressive, I can't say it has spoiled me for anything less - a PAL DVD on a ~40" HD screen with upsampling doesn't exactly make you want to claw your eyes out.

Re:Uh...no

[Kjella]

Just because Intel releases a 100 MHz faster CPU you don't have to buy it, you know. And TVs get incremental upgrades, but honestly how many generations of mainstream media has there been? VHS (1973), DVD (1995), BluRay (2006) and this will be the fourth. Does it really kill you that something better comes along once a decade? Sure, marketers will always tell you that you need something new, that's not just in their job description that is their job description. I like the state of the art moving forward, what's so great about being a luddite? Yes, a lot of modern media suck but when you look at the parts of old media that didn't survive the test of time there was a lot of crap in the past too.

Re:Uh...no

[jedidiah]

The idea that the markets for every other concievable consumer product should be turned into the PC upgrade treadmill from the 90s is hardly a selling point.

That bullsh*t isn't even tolerable on PCs now anymore.

People got tired of it. I doubt anyone wants a return of that crap.

Much like the music industry, video needs format churn to fuel unsustainable growth.

Re:Uh...no

[AK Marc]

I have a 4 year old TV (5 if you count the TV model years). It's a 55" 720p plasma. I'm still constantly asked by people if it's a 4k. People buying and upgrading crap yearly are doing it wrong. The kids TV is a 7 year old 46" 1080p LCD. The new one wasn't an "upgrade" but a new TV to fill a new space in a new house with a larger TV.

Re:Uh...no

[AK Marc]

PAL/NTSC doesn't really exist in DVDs (yes, I know people will argue that, but I can put any DVD from any region, NTSC or PAL into my old DVD player and it'll output what NTSC or PAL based on a software switch). That's a function of the player. And my best results in my current player come from having the player output at 1080p, and have my receiver downscale to 720p. Showing a DVD on 720p is much better than broadcast 1080p on a 1080p TV.

Re:Uh...no

[Anonymous Coward]

Claiming (or believing) that you have to upgrade your TV every 6 months is just stupid, unless you're constantly purchasing the crappy $200 "specials."

Re:Uh...no

[Anonymous Coward]

I have a 4 year old TV (5 if you count the TV model years). It's a 55" 720p plasma. I'm still constantly asked by people if it's a 4k

It doesn't matter how many times you repost this drivel Mark, it doesn't make you right. As I've told you many times, those people are used to watching what is in reality a compressed, upconverted 720i source and being told it's 1080. So when they see an actual native 720p it looks better. Shocker. If your friends were used to watching native 1080p content, they'd be looking at your TV and mentioning how nice the colors are with plasma vs. lcd, but the lower resolution for the price just isn't worth it to them.

People buying and upgrading crap yearly are doing it wrong

I've had my 1080p 47" TV for about 6 years now. Spent about $800 on it at the time, which might seem a little much for a TV but hell I was single and made decent money. It's starting to hit end of lifespan, and I'll probably replace it in the next 6 months or so with a set that has similar specs for about $300-$400.
I don't know where you get the idea that some people are out buying new TV's every year, because most people aren't. And the ones who do, have money to burn.

Re:Uh...no

[drinkypoo]

PAL/NTSC doesn't really exist in DVDs (yes, I know people will argue that, but I can put any DVD from any region, NTSC or PAL into my old DVD player and it'll output what NTSC or PAL based on a software switch). That's a function of the player.

Yes, but it's also a function of the DVD encoding. DVDs can even be encoded with interlaced or progressive video, which blew my goddamned mind when I found out. Apparently they decided it was better to enable as-cheap-as-possible decoders which wouldn't even have an interlacer (which is cheap) at the expense of everyone else who wanted to have halfway decent-looking video, who was going to need a deinterlacer (which is comparatively expensive). And DVDs can actually be encoded with PAL or NTSC conventions, which is to say frame size and rate.

Ideally, movies shot on film and edited at 24fps are encoded and shown in "film mode" at 24fps. Most dedicated DVD players support this, and these days probably most TVs as well. PAL DVDs have more lines, and are still 24fps in film mode, so ideally films are presented in PAL film mode for the highest resolution and most accurate frame rate. But anything shot and edited at 30 fps ought to be shown in NTSC mode. And everything should be progressive scan, because if you can even find a DVD player without it today you should take a picture as you gasp in amazement that it still works.

Showing a DVD on 720p is much better than broadcast 1080p on a 1080p TV.

In theory no, in practice yes. But it doesn't have to be that way. On the other hand, who the hell is watching anything where quality matters on broadcast TV?

Re:Uh...no

[AK Marc]

As I've told you many times,

You've told me how many times, and how is anyone supposed to know it was you, when you are just some A/C? That, and wasn't your first reply after my last post saying it? So you've told me no more than once, you just did so in multiple places.

I don't know where you get the idea that some people are out buying new TV's every year,

Do you not know how to read? The post I was replying to said "This upgrade-your-TV-every-6 months crap is getting old."

I didn't question him. I know I don't upgrade my TV that often. Sounds like you are agreeing with me in a most disagreeable manner.

Re:Uh...no

[AK Marc]

Ideally, movies shot on film and edited at 24fps are encoded and shown in "film mode" at 24fps. Most dedicated DVD players support this, and these days probably most TVs as well. PAL DVDs have more lines, and are still 24fps in film mode, so ideally films are presented in PAL film mode for the highest resolution and most accurate frame rate.

So we should use 48 Hz, rather than 50 or 60 for the TV? Interpolate, or double-expose for the frame-doubling?

I have one of the expensive de-interlacers. Comes "free" in any reasonable receiver. I feed it anything, SD, 720i/1080i, 4k at any frame rate and tell it I want it at 720p 60 Hz, and it comes out looking better than "native" all the way through. Something like http://www.cnet.com/products/o... for under $500. Mine is an Onkyo, but not a current model.

Re:Uh...no

[thegarbz]

This upgrade-your-TV-every-6 months crap is getting old. And get off my lawn.

Bluray is now over 8 years old, HD-DVD is slightly older.
3D Bluray is now over 5 years old.

Just what is it that you are upgrading every 6 months?
 

Re:Uh...no

[drinkypoo]

So we should use 48 Hz, rather than 50 or 60 for the TV? Interpolate, or double-expose for the frame-doubling?

No, television makes sense at either 50 or 60 Hz because television programs are shot on video, at 50 or 60 Hz. Ideally the material would always be presented in whatever is closest to the source format, therefore the same refresh rate.

I have one of the expensive de-interlacers. Comes "free" in any reasonable receiver.

I've looked at a lot of receivers, and you typically have to spend over $500 just to get downscaling, let alone deinterlacing. I spent $20 on my DTS receiver (only 5.1, though) and repaired a bad solder connection to a relay. I would have to spend approximately 25 times what I spent on my receiver to even begin to get such functionality. And then, it still wouldn't be half as good as what XBMC can do while playing my media.

Re:Uh...no

[AK Marc]

I've looked at a lot of receivers, and you typically have to spend over $500 just to get downscaling, let alone deinterlacing.

I linked to one that was the first one I looked for (because I have an Onkyo, I am relatively familiar with their general line). Under $500. And does downscaling and deinterlacing. Would you like the link again? Reality trumps your opinion.

I spent $20 on my DTS receiver (only 5.1, though) and repaired a bad solder connection to a relay.

So you bought broken used trash, and managed to fix it up. Not representative of the norm. But then, you assert that $440 is greater then $500.

And then, it still wouldn't be half as good as what XBMC can do while playing my media.

Kodi is software, not hardware. Your DTS receiver doesn't run Kodi. So I'm not sure why you brought up that irrelevancy. How many HDMI inputs does your HTPC have?

Re:Uh...no

[Anonymous Coward]

SD PAL, while slightly better than NTSC in terms of linear resolution, is absolutely horrible in terms of refresh rate, with a noticeably choppy/blinky picture to those used to the higher NTSC broadcast refresh rate.

In short, both formats sucked, and the various HD formats are a vast improvement on either.

Nein

[the_skywise]

I was one of the early (and later) adopters of HDTV. I've currently got a ~5 year old Pioneer Plasma (Kuro baby!) that does 1080p and, frankly, I'm fine with it. I've seen the 4K TVs and the additional resolution, to my eyes, doesn't seem to do much for the picture. I'm sure there's more detail there. I had the fortune of seeing the Hobbit in both the new HiDef projection screen (with LCD style panning, oooh) and in an IMAX theater back to back and I was amazed at how much more sharper and detailed the HiDef projection was vs the IMAX (EG I could see specific details and patterns on emblems on the clothing) But I only noticed it for a few seconds and then that was because I was specifically thinking about the picture quality. On a "smaller" screen (50" TV screens oughta be enough for anybody!) I just don't think those details are going to be noticed as much.

If I NEED a TV I'm sure I'll take 4k screens into consideration (especially if they're commonplace by the time I need one) but it's not going to make me jump from my current setup.

That said, do I want a 4K monitor for my PC? Oh yeah!

why are we still doing this

[watermark]

And again, my media PC combined with torrents is still better. It can already play 4k videos. Don't have to buy any new hardware, don't have to re-buy movies I've already bought. Don't have to worry about the kids breaking the disk. Don't have to worry if that disk you bought in Europe will work back in the States. DVDs were a large upgrade from VHS, the next step is better digital distribution. Blue-ray and UHD are just stepping stones to them realizing physical media is dead.

Give me a digital distribution system that will work even if the company goes out of business. One that I allows me to backup the media. One that allows for offline storage so I can watch when I don't have internet. One that works on all platforms. One that I can re-download the file if I do lose it. The only thing that satisfies all of that is DRM free files. Until they provide that, torrents will still win.

Re:why are we still doing this

[Anonymous Coward]

UHD is just a way for them to sell a few more players, and to try a new DRM scheme. Which will be broken shortly.

But physical media is not dead. There are plenty of places where the fastest available net connection is DSL -- I know because I'm in one of them. (I don't even try to stream anything, even YouTube. Torrents work, just takes a bit of time.) Plus, collectors still enjoy the ownership of physical media.

Besides, from what I hear from coworkers, sometimes the streaming places' licenses are up, and then you don't stream that show anymore. Once you buy physical, it's yours. (Well, for a few decades, 'til bit rot sets in, I suppose.)

Re:why are we still doing this

[JoeWalsh]

Sounds like you want to own what you buy.

What are you, some kind of socialist?

3-format packs coming

[Anonymous Coward]

DVD, Blu Ray and UHD in the same box.
For only $10 extra, be even more future proof than with just dvd and blu ray!

Re:3-format packs coming

[itsdapead]

DVD, Blu Ray and UHD in the same box. For only $10 extra, be even more future proof than with just dvd and blu ray!

Don't forget the 3D Blu Ray version and free Digital Copy (download only, not compatible with iTunes, Linux or any system that our proprietary player takes a dislike to, offer expired 1 month before this disc dropped to a sane price).

How many people have this setup to start with?

[gorehog]

Mostly people don't bother with all this stuff to start with, and the manufacturers are so busy trying to sell new TV's that they don't even bother to build good one to begin with.

For instance, I just set up a Sonos 5.1 surround system. During the process I checked compatibility with my TV and I found this list of televisions that don't pass 5.1 surround data out the TOSLINK port under various conditons: https://sonos.custhelp.com/app... . Some only pass it from specific sources and some don't pass it at all. I'm lucky, my TV works under all conditions. Never mind problems with HDMI/HDCP/CEC/ARC compatibility.

I don't care about increased resolution because I can't be sure that the next TV I'll buy will meet my minimum specs. Purchasing is a gamble these days and once you engineer a working solution why would you upgrade? I didn't jump on the 3D idiocy and I'll bet you didn't either. Even if you have a 3D TV did you buy extra, or any glasses for it?

The producers, in a genius move enabled by "vertical integration", will add a new broadcast or regional flag or change an encryption key or some shit and stop making media in the old format. People will run like lemmings to Walget or TarMart to buy new equipment because the old stuff has been artificailly obsoleted. It's enough to make me stop watching altogether. Good luck selling your advertising time when no one gives a shit assholes.

Re:How many people have this setup to start with?

[silas_moeckel]

I have a 10+ year old 1080 flat CRT no HDCP support hell it's got DVI not HDMI. Screen looks beautiful the whole were going to obsolete your gear because you might pirate our content BS was the last straw for me. The content got pirated anyways and pirated content plays just fine on my "ancient" TV, flankly it works better than the store content no unskippable 30 minutes of ad's and I can trans-code it for any device I care to.

Re:How many people have this setup to start with?

[Little_Professor]

No TVs support 5.1 output over optical/TOSLINK. None. Your TV may be passing out audio to your Sonos but it is just stereo which is being upmixed by the soundbar to fill five channels

Yuh-huh

[maseo126]

Just bought a UHD 4k set and streamed Blacklist and Marco Polo. The difference is without a doubt noticeable. It took a while to get used to the difference and it is almost uncomfortable to watch in comparison to 1080p. Although agreeably subtle, takes that much more of the "je ne sais quoi glow" from the older specs. Maybe the previous posters need to make some appointments with the optometrist?

There's more to it than that

[Kjella]

The new spec also brings HFR (up to 60 fps, probably), wider colors (Rec. 2020), more accurate colors (10-bit seems to go mainstream) as well as double resolution. But hey yes, a BluRay looks pretty sweet already. In any case, it doesn't hurt unlike 3D that some - me included - just doesn't like. I just checked my local version of pricewatch and of 646 TV models for sale 102 now feature UHD. They even sell 40" UHD TVs for $500 now, which makes no sense at all and all this with Netflix being just about the only source of non-upscale UHD content. So I think it's beyond a doubt that mainstream TVs will go there eventually.

Besides, the trend is only bigger TVs. When I grew up we had a 20-something inch TV, now I have a 60" TV. When prices go down, sizes go up. It won't be quick and it's not urgent at all, but just like FullHD settled in - there were a lot of naysayers then too - UHD will too. It's not like SACD and DVD Audio where people listen on the go and want playlists, watching movies/series is still primarily a living room couch activity where you sit down to watch one for 40 mins - 3 hours.

Re:There's more to it than that

[default luser]

But the thing that really kills any interest from me is that the article author expects that will continue to use 4:2:0 Chroma Subsampling. That to me makes the new increased colorspace worthless, as you won't actually be able to see any of it (small chroma resolution).

I remember being astounded that the original Blu-Ray spec carried-over the 4:2:0 from DVD, and once-again this mess will be propagated further. The smart move would be an upgrade to 4:2:2, which is supported by many high-end camera formats, and looks considerably better.

Re:There's more to it than that

[tepples]

A 2160p picture with 4:2:0 chroma already contains as much chroma detail as a 1080p picture with 4:4:4 chroma.

Re:There's more to it than that

[Mr Z]

Of course, I didn't follow his reasoning one bit:

Using 10-bit color may end up limiting chroma sub-sampling to 4:2:0.

The two details are completely orthogonal to each other!

In any case, 4:2:0 at UHD gives you as much color information as 4:4:4 at HD. You'd have a very hard time noticing the chroma subsampling....

depends on features

[hackertourist]

Will the standard contain provisions for unskippable items? Then I won't buy an UHD player.

We want content

[future assassin]

not new disk player that will require the purchase of special 4K edition of Ernest Goes To Jail. Almost everybody wants easy access to all entertainment media yet these media douche bags refuse to do it.

Mr CEO I've got an awesome idea that will let every one around the world get access to all movies so cheap they won't care if they lose them and have to re buy them 10 times over. We'll be riiiiiich!!!

No no jr tech guy lets lock up the distribution, only make certain media available to certain regions of the world and lets charge them the same price as a Blu Ray disk and only have it playable on one device at a time so they have to buy 1 copy every time they want to watch on a different device We'll be riiiiiich!!!

How about a meta-standard?

[davidwr]

How about taking a Yacc-like approach and creating a meta-standard that has each "file" on the disk include a list of codecs required for that file and which has each disk include a description of the various video- and audio-decoding algorithms needed to play the "files" on the disk (excluding the common standards that existed when the "meta-standard" was finalized - those would be baked in to all players), then let the player figure out what to send to the output ports based on the data format, the data, the processing capability of the player, and if known (or presumed, for one-way "outputs" like analog) the capability of the display device.

This way the only "hardcoded" part of the standard would have to deal with the raw laser I/O from the disk to the laser pickup on the player, basic things like the layout of error-correcting code, slightly-less-basic things like the filesystem-layout or equivalent, and a standard way for the player to understand the disk and file meta-data. Then the player could take it from there, creating codecs (or more accurately, de-coders) as needed based on the information on the disks.

The same technique could be used for future-proofing display devices. For display-devices with 2-way communication, the display could communicate its capabilities to the player in a standardized format, and possibly even communicate as-yet-undefined capabilities to the player as well (UV/IR, specialized color gamuts, infra/ultrasonic capability, alarms and sensors, etc.). These capabilities could be matched up with the format of the disk.

Example:

If the disk has a codec that says "supports SENSOR_STD_2019a" and the meta-code for the standard "SENSOR_STD_2019a" says
"if SENSOR_STD_2019a data NO_WARM_BODY_PRESENT becomes TRUE then execute GO_BACK_15_SECONDS_AND_PAUSE"

and the display tells the player
"SENSOR_STD_2019a:NO_WARM_BODY_PRESENT=TRUE"
then the player can act on it, even if the player was manufactured well before SENSOR_STD_2019a even existed.

Ghostbusters 4K

[Anonymous Coward]

The original Ghostbusters film from years back recently had a '4K' remaster released in a 1080P Bluray edition. The film had no more detail than a good DVD version, because the 'original' negative was obviously in a horrid state, and the film had been shot mostly partially out of focus. The 4K did wonders for the GRAIN, though.

4K is great for nature documentaries. Everything else, less so. 4K tears apart the compromises in CGI and VFX, for instance, and the cost of improving the production so it appears 'perfect' in 4K just isn't worth it when ordinary people with ordinary vision watching in the cinema or at a standard viewing distance at home just won't notice the improvement.

Older movies never reached 4K on film, because of lens imperfections, camera judder, film grain, and other 'mechanical' issues. The Bluray transfers of the best 70mm anamorphic movies of the 60s and 70s have been variable, but the best of them definitely benefit from 1080P. Beyond this resolution, almost all of these older movies gain nothing.

Most films shot in the 80s and earlier 90s are noticeable WORSE in image quality than the best from the previous two decades. Their masters are also usually in a terrible state today, and so-called 'digital restoration' largely adds fake detail like edge 'enhancement'.

New material shot digitally CAN exploit any improvements in resolution, but as I said, at a horrible increase in production costs. Sets, costumes, props etc have to be so much better made, and the pipeline skills for doing this don't exist. The DREADFUL Hobbit movies show the problem. Razor sharp images of cheap sets and CGI, with 4K 'detail' of a shoddy and pleasing nature.

The IMAX trick of switching to much higher film quality on specific scenes, like landscapes and crowds, works best for 4K- real detail that isn't created for the movie obviously contains minute elements that 4K captures better. But the synthetic scenes that are crafted for most of the movie will always look WORSE as the resolution increases.

I didn't even need HD ...

[cascadingstylesheet]

... I've often thought "I wish the content/story were better", but never "I need to see more pores".

Re:I didn't even need HD ...

[Bite The Pillow]

Ah the standard marginalization technique where you completely, often intentionally, misunderstand something to get your point across. Exactly like "I'm not going to play Fallout because you're just wandering around in a radioactive wasteland collecting bottlecaps."

They have make-up and post-processing and all kinds of things so you don't see pores. Unless you're looking at bad amateur porn, and then the camera is either poor quality, too jiggly, or out of focus.

I object on a more realistic argument - I don't need more pixels to see compression artifacts better. And I'm not confident that we have the content delivery problem solved. A new physical storage spec helps with the kind of thing people are going less frequently these days.

Re:I didn't even need HD ...

[Rakarra]

... I've often thought "I wish the content/story were better", but never "I need to see more pores".

Yeah, the people making the TVs can't doing anything about that either.
What they can do is make the things you're watching look better.

Re:I didn't even need HD ...

[cascadingstylesheet]

Not even making an argument; just relating what I actually thought.

While hardly ancient, I've experienced most of the major phases of TV, from a snowy black and white TV to cutting the cord with a Roku.

At no point (once past the snow, anyway) did I ever think "man, I wish the picture had more detail". Sure, it's nice, but not something I was ever clamoring for.

Re:I didn't even need HD ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Unless you're looking at bad amateur porn, and then the camera is either poor quality, too jiggly, or out of focus.

Better lighting would help a lot too. I mean, um, that's what I've heard, of course.

GIve me a season full of shows on one platter

[davidwr]

I want large-data formats to succeed because I want my "boxed sets" to take up less shelf space. Give me an entire season at as-broadcast resolution on a single disk (13 episodes of HD or 3-4 times that for a very-good-quality digitization of old stuff that only exists on broadcast-quality NTSC tapes would be nice), including bonus material, and I'll be happier than if the large disks are used only for higher-definition content. My eyes aren't what they once were and neither are my ears.

For the same reason I wish all CD players (especially those in cars) were replaced with "audio disk" players that could play audio from video DVDs, DVD-audio, and all common computer audio formats in addition to the current CD-audio/MP3/WAV formats that seem common for new players today.

Article leaves out the new DRM on the output

[LamaBrew]

The content providers have threatened to require the new HDCP 2.x DRM system on the HDMI outputs instead of the existing HDCP 1.x. HDCP 2.x has required all of the IC providers to design new chips, and the standard is much more restrictive and much more fragile than the existing HDCP 1.x.

HDCP 1.x took several generations of product to get to function ( most people's problems with HDMI in the first few years was due to the HDCP DRM failing, not HDMI, which only specs how to send data).

Given the past history of HDCP it could be years before you can reasonably expect multiple pieces of consumer electronics from different vendors to play together well. I'm sure the message "HDCP violation" will look much nicer in 4K.

good for computer users living in 1080p hell

[Anonymous Coward]

I bought a UHD monitor/TV, not for video but to replace a bunch of 1080p monitors.
And I love it.
If this drives UHD monitor prices down, I'm all for it even though I have never owned a BR player. I totally could use a dual UHD setup in place of a triple 1080p.
Standardizing the interconnects and protocol for higher pixel count and frame rate (dream of a replacement for VGA as the next generation least common denominator) will be wonderful but manufacturers will fight tooth and nail for proprietary and patent encumbered solutions.

I'll Care Because it isn't SONY

[MarkvW]

Sony used to be ultra-proprietary, but they made up for it with very high quality and original stuff. Now SONY is still ultra-proprietary, but their stuff is meh.

Up with the new standard!

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Thagg]

As the article states, two of the most important changes in this standard are high dynamic range (HDR) and wider color gamut (Rec. 2020) images. I have been working on this with Dolby Laboratories for the last few years, and whenever we bring in movie directors, cinematographers, colorists, or studio executives to see our ridiculously HDR wide-color-gamut display, their jaws hit the floor. The ability to reproduce the dynamic range and color gamut of real life is breathtaking. One of the studio executives, when asked if she could see the difference said "Do I look like a potted palm?"

You will see the difference, and you'll be able to see it from across the room. HDR and wide color gamut combined with UHD resolution is a revolution.

I know this sounds like a sales pitch (ok, it is!) but I've been working in the film business for 30 years before I started working on this; I know what creatives want, and this is it. I spent that time working on CG visual effects, and I think that HDR will have a comparable impact on filmmaking that VFX did.

The Dolby Cinema theaters opening in the next few months will have similar extreme dynamic range and wide color gamut. They look astonishingly better as well.

Wait and see. It's coming, and it's not far away.

Consumer Space is obviously the wrong Market

[Anonymous Coward]

What is wrong with the MBA's and business types out there, consumer space is obviously the wrong initial market for this product.

Where is my 40-42 inch 4K 60 Hz MONITOR with DISPLAYPORT? Heck, even 4 ports that cut the screen in quarters would be useful. Previous generation cards can drive that at acceptable rates for office work and the cards just released would have no trouble at all even for video, etc. There is exactly one 40 inch 4K monitor I am aware of that is timidly putting its toe in the water in limited markets.

A 4K 42 inch monitor directly replaces my dual 1920 x 1200 monitors and would give me about 50% more real estate in the same desk footprint with text at a useful resolution for work. We are a tiny, poor shop and we'd be picking these up for any replacements so I can't imagine anywhere worth working wouldn't do the same in short order. Once the price became commodity we would spec these to our industrial customers (why not same for commercial business?), its a market trying desperately to happen.

Once you are at scale, people would see these things at work and think they would be great for home and you would get your second bump. Your third bump is the same thing curved with faster response time same as 1080p.

OT: I want an ATSC signal recorder

[davidwr]

Anyone know of a sub-$1000 device that will record and play back "raw" ATSC signals?

In short,

* a recording device that will take an arbitrary digital TV channel, convert it from analog to digital (all airwaves are inherently analog at some level), and record the bits verbatim, along with some meta-data like the time of day, the frequency recorded, and maybe some extracted data like the digital sub-channels in the stream and information about what is playing on each sub-channel now and in the near future.

* ideally, DVR-like timer recording capability.

* a playback device that will put that recording onto a specific RF frequency. If the RF frequency is the same as the originally recorded frequency, my television should be fooled into thinking it is a channel that the TV already has mapped (e.g. RF channel 14, "display" as channel 20).

* ideally, a DVR-playback capability that would make the box act like a DVR, albeit one that uses a lot more disk space than your typical DVR. The output would go to the TV over a dedicated AV connection not the RF "CATV/Antenna" connection.

* ideally, the ability to recognize a USB device and copy the raw recording to it for storage or analysis/playback on a computer that can read the format.

Q: The use of such a device for legal and engineering purposes is obvious, but why would any normal consumer want such a thing?

A: Because at least then I'll KNOW for sure that I recorded what my receiver (or more specifically, the receiver in this magic box) received, not some partially-processed intermediate version. It will also allow me to record content encoded in formats that haven't been developed yet (as of January 2015), so I can play them back on a TV that supports that format.

Because we have demonstrated, time and again, that

[Grey Geezer]

we will buy anything. Every time we come close to market saturation in the latest Video display resolution and the accompanying disc/digital library, they come out with something new...that we all just have to own. I once worked in R&D for a global consumer electronics company...this has all been planned out, decades in advance because...suckers!

The reason resolutions/color depth increasing fast

[Anonymous Coward]

Aside from baking in ever worse DRM, I would imagine that increasing file size is also desirable to make it less convenient to download and store on HDDs.

As an audio-visuophile, It's not about resolution

[Anonymous Coward]

As an audio-visuophile, all I can say is, seriously, just like the megapixel war in digital cameras, we're now having a megapixel war in TVs. But, what most people realize is that these new, super high resolutions are useless to most people, because while they may have the 4K TV, all of the equipment around it fails to deliver the content to the TV properly.

Cables are a simple example of this. Your run of the mill $10 HDMI cable from Walmart is not going to faithfully reproduce the digital signal between a UHD Bluray player and a 4K TV. No oxygen-free copper. No gold plating (or maybe just a few microinches of it). No super high twists per inch. The bits are just going to get fuzzy between the source and the TV and this makes it impossible to reproduce 4K content accurately.

Even more jitter and fuzz is introduced by poor power conditioning, inadequate and noisy power cables, and lack of solar irradiance dampers (lab tests have shown that even having the sun shine on equipment introduces noise and inaccurate pixels).

It's nearly impossible for a home A/V setup consisting of crap you get from Walmart or Bestbuy to do a good job of presenting UHD or 4K content in the truest, deepest form and with the most clarity.

Some movies skip DVD and go straight to BD

[tepples]

Movies have already started to skip DVD. Ishtar, for example, is on Blu-ray but not DVD. You'll notice the difference between Blu-ray and no movie at all unless perhaps you're deafblind.

Re:Some movies skip DVD and go straight to BD

[jd2112]

Movies have already started to skip DVD. Ishtar, for example, is on Blu-ray but not DVD. You'll notice the difference between Blu-ray and no movie at all unless perhaps you're deafblind.

Do you have any examples of this other than one of the biggest bombs Hollywood ever made? It probably was never released on DVD due to dismal VHS sales.

Re:Some movies skip DVD and go straight to BD

[Anonymous Coward]

Movies have already started to skip DVD. Ishtar, for example, is on Blu-ray but not DVD.

In 2004, Ishtar was released on DVD in Europe, South America, Africa, Asia, and Australia. So it was released on DVD everywhere except North America and Antarctica.

The Hobbit in 48 fps

[tepples]

I thought The Hobbit was shot in high-motion. Besides, a lot of more expensive TVs have an option for motion interpolation to turn 24 fps source into (artifacty) 120 fps.

Re:The Hobbit in 48 fps

[Rakarra]

I thought The Hobbit was shot in high-motion

It was, but no one else seems to be following along. It also seems like 48 fps might hit an uncanny valley spot in the eye -- the better rate might be 60 or 72 Hz. (linked article is speculation, but interesting).

Besides, a lot of more expensive TVs have an option for motion interpolation to turn 24 fps source into (artifacty) 120 fps

It's usually called "Motion flow" or "motion interpolation," and it usually makes the source material look much much worse. Home theater installers worth their salt know to turn it off. It may or may not be worth it for live sports.

Edge detail vs. texture detail

[tepples]

Unless you're seriously only concerned with being able to locate the edge of straight lines

The edges of objects in a photograph are fairly close to straight lines, especially once you zoom in. So when you double the width and height, edge detail doubles and texture detail quadruples. You might be thinking of the latter.

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Blaskowicz]

Will the displays calibrate themselves?, and provide some useful fudge setting for people that like their display brighter to see the details easily.
Most people badly set their brightness or whatever it is (and they don't want me to turn it down) whereas that's really glaring to me as I'm used to deep blacks.
If there were gamma in the TV manus instead of just "brightness" it would be a good thing already (that's what I like anyway, in small amount).
With HDR, you'll vitally need some "smart" setting I believe as we risk to be aggressively blinded by other people's TVs instead of just being annoyed :-)

right terms for once

[dprimary]

It is good to see an article for once use the correct terms. UHD is a consumer format. When you ask for 4k don't be shocked when price has an extra 0 added to it. UHD screen $2000, 4k screen if you are lucky $20,000.

TV system doesn't match

[tepples]

PAL/NTSC doesn't really exist in DVDs (yes, I know people will argue that, but I can put any DVD from any region, NTSC or PAL into my old DVD player and it'll output what NTSC or PAL based on a software switch).

Not all DVD players can do that. I own a copy of Wobbl and Bob, which is "region: all" and encoded in 576i/50. I've owned three "consumer" DVD players: an Apex, a PlayStation 2 slim (NTSC U/C), and a Magnavox, all region 1. Of the three, only the Apex would play it. The PS2 froze on a black screen with an error message "TV system doesn't match", and the Magnavox displayed a similar message with different wording.

Re:TV system doesn't match

[AK Marc]

"TV system doesn't match"

Were you going RCA video out? HDMI is 2-way, and the player and monitor negotiate. But most of the other video standards, like RCA, composite, S-video and such are 1-way. It would be *impossible* for the system to "know" that the TV doesn't match. I found a "cheap" DVD player with a PAL/NTSC output switch, and it was (naturally) region free. It's never had a problem playing anything on everything. Same as playing a DVD on a computer. I've never had any DVD played on a computer (or by association, out the computer's video out) that cared about PAL/NTSC.

At least with HD, PAL/NTSC is gone. They still technically exist, but are now compatible so that everything plays on everything, so long as you are 720i or better.

Re:TV system doesn't match

[tepples]

Were you going RCA video out?

Yes. All three of these devices were pre-HDMI and used S-Video output.

But most of the other video standards, like RCA, composite, S-video and such are 1-way. It would be *impossible* for the system to "know" that the TV doesn't match.

The Apex would scale 576i at 50 Hz to 480i at 60 Hz. The others just threw up their hands and gave up.

I've never had any DVD played on a computer (or by association, out the computer's video out) that cared about PAL/NTSC.

From roughly 1987 to 2006, it was rare to connect a PC to a TV-sized monitor. PCs were for desks, and "consumer electronics" devices were for the living room, and conventional wisdom was that never the twain shall meet. SDTVs of that era that couldn't display the VGA or DVI signals coming from a computer, unlike now where most TVs have VGA and HDMI inputs respectively, and one had to buy an obscure scan converter (or a desktop PC video card with a built-in scan converter) to convert the signals.

Re:TV system doesn't match

[drinkypoo]

The Apex would scale 576i at 50 Hz to 480i at 60 Hz. The others just threw up their hands and gave up.

They may actually have been throwing up their hands at gunpoint... Apex players were generally more willing to do stuff the encoders of the disc didn't want you to do even without unlock codes, and most of them have not-so-secret codes enterable from the remote to make them region-free. Or at least, that's how it used to be. Unfortunately, they also were some of the less reliable DVD players on the market, and their remotes were horrible. I don't know if they're even still around, let alone have fixed any of this, hence my tense.

Re:As an audio-visuophile, It's not about resoluti

[LaoK]

"Hi-fi"larious!

There is one thing that I notice

[Anonymous Coward]

Forget the resolution. Increase the frame rate!

Every fast action movie or sporting event is just so choppy. I want 120 frames per second.

Loudness wars become HDR wars?

[Anonymous Coward]

Crap. Are you replicating the processed-to-hell loudness wars of audio into the video realm by processing the shite out of the filmed colors?

Artificially manufacturing a difference for the sake of difference (or, worse, for the sake of marketing) deserves to burn in the ninth level of hell.

Re:Loudness wars become HDR wars?

[Thagg]

No, we are not doing things that are artificial at all -- we are making things that could be far more real.

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Thagg]

The Dolby Vision TVs will have reasonable controls to set brightness and contrast, but one of the selling points to the studios is that we will strive to maintain the artistic intent of the original. The blacks will be black, the whites will be white, and there will be an unprecedented (but realistic) amount of contrast.

It turns out that in high dynamic range content creation, the most important thing is not that the picture be brighter overall; but that there is an increased range between midtones and highlights. In current production, skin tones are set to about half the maximum brightness in the scene. This means that the brightest things in the image (say, a glint off of a chrome bumper) can only be twice that bright; where in real life it's more that 100 times that bright. So, leaving the midtones about where they are, and giving brighter highlights makes the image look better in a way that you have to see to understand. Or, you can just look out the window.

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Anonymous Coward]

"Do I look like a potted palm?"

Well, did she?

Why not 4K?

[crow]

Why did they not support 4K?

This is the same vertical resolution as 4K, but slightly lower horizontal resolution. Why not support both 4K and double HD? It just seems silly not to try to match the resolution that movies are being produced in.

Too soon

[pbjones]

Blu-Ray isn't even the majority of discs being sold, so how will another format compete?

Awesome!

[Ol Olsoc]

Blockbuster will love this news!

Blueray

[Anonymous Coward]

What is that? I only have DVD players and even that is dying off. What the hell is blueray and why do I need it?

Meh

[Mr Z]

I only hope that formats like these drive production of more UHD displays, bringing their price down. I don't want to watch UHD movies. I want cheap, high-res monitors for my computers.

There is such a thing as TOO GOOD of resolution

[millertym]

Watching any type of movie, with the exception of real life footage or stylized full CGI moves (not trying to look life like) - such as nature shots, or real world scenes, or Toy Story type movies, look cheap and hokie on ultra high definition formats. Anything computer generated, or a prop, or costume, or makeup is easily noticeable. Anything fake, you can see is fake. Personally I think the 1080p high definition is about the pinnacle of combining a good crisp look with still being able to suspend one's visual cues and pretend they are watching something real.

Until they do this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Until they separate sound and voice into unique channels and allow me to decide how load the background noise,err music will be I don't give a rats ass as I'm going to rip them to lower quality anyroads.

Re:Until they do this...

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't you tweak the EQ to bring out the voices? You can do a lot with some good knob twisting skills, it isn't really necessary to have discrete channels.

Re:OT: I want an ATSC signal recorder

[Hamsterdan]

ATSC PVRs already record the raw bitstream received from the broadcaster. what you're describing can be bought for around 70$
http://www.bestbuy.ca/en-CA/pr...

Windows Media Center serves the same purpose in my living room.

Obligatory Onion Article

[Rakarra]

Obligatory Onion Article: Area Man Constantly Mentioning He Doesn't Own A Television.

All in good fun!

Will players be even slower than Bluray players?

[shess]

If it doesn't take at least 30 seconds to get to the unskippable warnings and ads, I'm not going to switch.

Re:OT: I want an ATSC signal recorder

[davidwr]

I have a cheap knock-off of the very box you pointed to.

It works fine as a DVR but as far as I can tell, it's just recording one of the programs not the entire stream. Also, there is no indication of whether it is recording meta-data and other data or if it's discarding it before recording it. In other words, it's not what I am looking for.

I love VLC

[OrangeTide]

VLC is especially nice because I can play DVDs that I have placed on my harddrive for personal use. a 3TB harddrive holds quite a few DVDs. Then I can keep my massive collection in storage instead of having my living room cluttered with DVD racks. (Blu-ray too)

Harddrives

[Karmashock]

The new format is on a harddrive. It is data. Can we be done with these discs? Just period.

What would it cost to put the data on a thumb drive instead of a disc? It doesn't need more space then the movie takes up and it doesn't need to be writable. What would it cost to make a crap thumb drive with the movie on it that wasn't even writable?

Just go with that. We're not going back to the dvd collection days. That's through.

Re:Harddrives

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually - it might not be in the same ball park, cost wise. Optical discs (with data of course) are commonly mass produced by pressing them, rather than recording. I don't think you can mass produce a thumb drive with a movie already baked into it, mechanically. It would need to get copied to each drive - likely making that significantly more expensive to produce than a disc.

Re:Harddrives

[Karmashock]

You're ignoring the cost of new reading drives.

Assuming you sold me the new UHD drive for 30 dollars, that might be acceptable. But since you're probably going to ask me to spend upwards of 400 dollars, the economy of the issue takes a dive.

Add to that, the corner video rental store isn't really a thing anymore. If I want to rent a movie, it will probably be digitally streamed to my home theater. At which point the disc media of the day becomes irrelevant since the data will actually be stored on a harddrive or cached in ram as it is streamed.

The discs are done. If you don't want to sell the movies on little cheap thumb drives, consider this as an alternative. Ask consumers to come to the movie store with their own thumb drive. Stick it into one of the store machines and the store could write the movie onto the thumb drive.

Here someone will pitch some sort of DRM fit. But that war was lost years ago. They might as well sell unencrypted movie files. Any moron can pull the file out of the ether without any trouble. So who are the movie publishers fooling at this point? A few baby boomers and older? Hardly your market for new 4k movies considering that such people mostly want to watch much older movies.

Re:OT: I want an ATSC signal recorder

[TheGratefulNet]

better: hd-homerun (silicon dust). network based tuner, stream to any recorder or play 'live' to a computer. cant' go direct to hdmi, you do need a pc or equiv to do that, but its better to have the pc there to buffer so you can 'pause live tv' etc.

watching live is just stupid, these days. even if you don't record, at least buffer a few minutes ahead so you can skip thru commercials.

I'm red/green colorblind

[rsilvergun]

as are many people (mostly males). So better color space really doesn't matter to me.

Re: I'm red/green colorblind

[Anonymous Coward]

I disagree. It seems color would be even more important for you since you only have two colors to work off of to infer the image.

I'll wait for UFHD

[Virtucon]

I hear the ultra-fucking-high-def (UFHD) standard will be out in 5 years. I'll wait to upgrade my TVs and players when they support that standard. That way I can watch Ultraporn

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Anonymous Coward]

I tend to use a monitor for my TV viewing habits, and I tend to keep my brightness down. Even on my computer monitor that I use for computer-stuff. It might be a preference, or I'm lazy to find a better setting.

Anyway, such shows as Supernatural, Arrow and the like, I'll have to turn the brightness up to normal. Maybe I need to mess with contrast. But it can be difficult to see in the dark scenes. No idea if blame lies with production or not.

Will that kind of technology solve that issue, or is it unrelated? I don't know much about this stuff.

The Technology Treadmill

[nehumanuscrede]

Never, ever be the first person to volunteer to be the guinea pig for new tech. Especially expensive or niche tech. ( cough 3D cough ) You'll regret it when, a year later, you can buy the same gear at a fraction of the cost you spent to be " first ". Assuming they haven't trashed the standard and are moving onto another one.

With a few exceptions, what is even ON TV these days that is worth spending $$$$ on to upgrade all your gear every year or so ? I bought all my favorite movies that I wanted when we switched from VHS to DVD. I didn't even bother when Blu-Ray happened. ( Remember Blu-Ray hardware prices first year or two ? LOL What are they now ? ) Will likely donate the whole collection as I watch the new standards come and go. I don't -think- you'll be streaming UHD or 4K anytime soon as we can barely get decent HD quality across the networks due to compression and bickering over bandwidth consumption. It will only get worse for the newer formats I think. ( US markets only, you folks overseas with enviable high speed symmetric bandwidth, ymmv )

Dunno about you all, but I'm just about done with TV. When the one we have dies, I'll just put the aquarium in its place and be done with it.

Meh.

[MMC Monster]

I've been burnt or nearly burnt with new tech over the decades and consider myself a bit of an early adopter.

4K and UHD are interesting ideas, but I'm really not interested in replacing my entire hardware investment (including the current HDMI cables in the walls) just for a better picture. (Though the improved colorspace is somewhat tantalizing.)

Also, I've just recently gotten comfortable buying bluray discs in any quantity since I know I can rip them to my home media server. What sort of advanced copyright protection are the newer formats going to have? How many years of having to rely on a dedicated player? (I've just detached my dvd player from my TVs and likely will detach the bluray players as well.)

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Blaskowicz]

Thanks.
In particular I believe there should be some sort of wizard with test patterns, helpful and concise language (user tested), easily accessible from the TV's UI and remote, saved profiles maybe, all in good taste.
Maybe such stuff already exist in recent TVs but I'm very far from a TV enthusiast. I wouldn't even want a 55" or 65" TV. But I like something with even remote fidelity.
A high end 32" that looks perfect, with the new improvements, and line out separate from headphone out to plug high quality stereo speakers, that I would find interesting (even if it needs to take 4K input and downsample it to show on a 1080p panel). But I'm fairly atypical.

Re:As an audio-visuophile, It's not about resoluti

[Anne Thwacks]

It is also nearly impossible for any equipment of any origin to deliver descent content given the crap that is the available content. We have an HD setup, but I do not recall watching any content in HD other than the demos, cos there is nothing we want to watch! We have just cancelled our Sky subscription cos we were not actually watching anything on Sky.

Some people just don't want to watch Hollywood stuff or the Bellisario family products, or sport. It seems there isn't much else, and if there is, its in plain old PAL anyway.

And they could probably handle 120fps

[Sycraft-fu]

Most panels in higher end screens are actually real 120fps panels. However that is just used for 3D and for reduced motion blur. The only set I know that advertises support for 120fps input is Vizio. Others could do it, if they wanted to, however.

As you say, the issue with higher refresh rates isn't in the display technology.

Part of it is just getting people used to the idea I think. We've seen shitty, jerky, frame rates in moves for so long people start to associate that with being "cinematic". People need to get used to the idea that's bullshit and maybe they'll start to like it more.

Hopefully sports and such will get shot at 60fps some day and that may help.

Also

[Sycraft-fu]

Why shouldn't they continually improve their products? Even with NTSC sets this was done. New ones would be larger, have better focus, more clearly resolve the signal, have better phosphors, and so on. Why shouldn't this continue? They should keep trying to improve their products as technology allows.

None of that means you need to buy a new toy all the time though. You can stick with what you have until it breaks, or until the new stuff is a big enough leap that you wish to own it.

I think a lot of the whining from people comes down to simple jealousy. They'd like to own the new stuff, but cannot afford it, or do not wish to. So they try and hate on it and act like a luddite. You see it practically any time Slashdot has a story on new technology. People complain about it like it is somehow a bad thing that there might be something new.

It's also a load of shit

[Sycraft-fu]

NTSC stuff is so bad when viewed on a large TV. It is amazing how blurry things look when you flip back and forth between the HD and SD channels. That is part of what lead to the rise of big screen TVs was actually having content for them. With NTSC, a large TV just meant a big blurry image. With ATSC it can mean a nice large image.

Re:It's also a load of shit

[jdschulteis]

NTSC stuff is so bad when viewed on a large TV. It is amazing how blurry things look when you flip back and forth between the HD and SD channels. That is part of what lead to the rise of big screen TVs was actually having content for them. With NTSC, a large TV just meant a big blurry image. With ATSC it can mean a nice large image.

I had a 35" tube, needed to view from far enough away or it looked terrible. Went to a 50" class 1080p LCD, sized so with the wider screen the vertical height was about the same. HD looks good even from silly front-row-at-the-cinema close.

I do think it will be popular, though.

[MtViewGuy]

Here's the reason why: the cost of above-55" flat screen panels have been dropping rapidly, and you can now get a very good 70" LCD flat panel at surprisingly reasonable prices. Once you go past 60" screen size, you can start to see the pixels on even a 1080p display; I've seen Ultra HD display on a Sony 55" monitor and wow, it's so clear you feel like looking through a window. As such, Ultra HD Blu-ray will have a surprisingly fast uptake, especially since the technology is not significantly more expensive that Blu-ray is now, given they didn't have to go to a purple-spectrum reading laser, which would have made the cost exorbitantly expensive.

It's technology for the sake of technology.

[whizbang77045]

Sony and the other set manufacturers need some sort of excuse to force us to all run out and buy new sets. UHD is the latest marketing campaign of many. With BluRay, I could argue that we now had a format that would let us have all the Charlie Chan movies on a single disk. I'm afraid I can't make such a claim for significant technology advance for UHD disks over Blu Ray.

Re:It's technology for the sake of technology.

[Neil Boekend]

With the next format you'll be able to fit them on a disk while using even more draconian DRM! Wouldn't that be great?

there would be no need for new discs

[Anonymous Coward]

br-dl are 50gb. no 1080p movie actually comes close to using this capacity unless it was rip/encoded at a stupidly high bitrate that is much higher than the original which just increases size with no increase in quality. Even an 8k movie would fit just fine on Blu-ray without compression artifacts. The large size of Blu-rays was created for games, not a single video ~2hrs long, even at crazy high resolutions. Also, to the people so naively confused on the frame rate "problem", anything above about 40-60fps tops actually appears less "realistic" since the human eye can't even process life beyond those rates. If youve ever watched a movie at 120fps (usuallyaartificially achieved by the new tvs) youd know just how not realistic it becomes and easily ruins any movie experience. We can increase quality all we want and i don't really see any end to it soon since, yes we can and most definitely do notice the difference. Finally, to settle the resolution to size ratio, its called DPI or PPI and is the main factor in determining observed "quality" on any screen. This is why a cellphone 1080p screen only 4inches in size looks better than even 4k resolution on some stupidly large screen >60". in the case of screens and quality, bigger is not better, which so many people fail to realize when they go buy their idiotic 70 inch 1080p tvs and think they have the best tv in town when really it's a horrible picture.

Then there's still a problem

[tepples]

You'll still notice the difference between a movie and a "wrong region" error. I know the difference is not technical in nature, but one must still work around non-technical problems or do without.

Re:Then there's still a problem

[Anonymous Coward]

Only if you live in the wrong region.

Re:Then there's still a problem

[tepples]

In the present case, Slashdot's home country is in the wrong region.

future is tablets

[Anonymous Coward]

1080p looks great on an iPad Mini

Comcast's monthly HD technology fee

[tepples]

No, because they don't actially offer "SD only service", it's all HD now.

Cable TV is all digital, but not necessarily high-definition. Operators of digital cable systems can and do use conditional access in the digital cable platform to give 480i or 1080i versions of a particular channel to particular customers. For example, Comcast charges a "monthly HD technology fee" if an XFINITY TV customer has HD in his plan. This was true as of this forum post three years ago, and another forum post from three months ago confirms that it still is being charged. Or was it very recently discontinued?

Re:Comcast's monthly HD technology fee

[CronoCloud]

I don't know about Comcast, no Comcast around here. The local cable company is all HD, no extra charge, but only if you have an HD capable cable box hooked up with HDMI or Component connections. They'll upgrade your box, but only if you ask for the upgrade and lots of people don't realize they need the newer box. If you just hook the cable up to the TV, you'll only get the local channels (and WGN) in HD.

Personally, we have DirecTV, a Genie system with an c31 RVU unit on the second TV. These units support HD and SD.

Re:I won't notice [actually you will notice HDR]

[Anonymous Coward]

And here is the perverse effect - I'm 50, been watching the boobtube since forever, it seems.
I got a new 4K TV, and it's got too much detail. Really. I watch the old movies again, and I don't like them so much, because the characters look TOO real. There's a hangover effect from all my years of staring at the screen - the old ones look NORMAL to me, the new ones just look weird.
I watch Back to the Future 1, and I don't like being able to see the makeup and skin tone of all the actors.
It's too distracting. I want to go back to my mindless state of non-contemplative absorption - I don't want to think about how their hair colour is uneven now that I can see it.
I want my cathode ray tube back, and get off my fucking lawn.

What about HFR?

[pterry]

How about "high frame rate"? (whether that is 48, 50, 60 or higher)

If you want video to look "life-like" you need a better frame rate than 24 FPS. Every gamer knows it (and I wish that every movie-goer knew it too).

Is this new format going to support higher frame rates? Each of color depth, frame rate, resolution and 3D independently multiplies the required bandwidth, so current blu-ray can't even do full-HD @ 60p, never mind 3D at the same time.

It would be nice if there was a format compatible with the Hobbit trilogy as it is meant to be seen (and hopefully more films like it in future).

(and BTW, a motion-interpolating TV is *not* the answer!)

Re:OT: I want an ATSC signal recorder

[Anonymous Coward]

Dreambox/Vu+?