4K \ UHD New TV question

[T1berious]

Hi,

I'm getting ready to replace a TV and thought "hold on, what about 4K \ UHD?"

I then had the following arguments with myself, but there's so little content! - there will be.

No broadcasters currently support it and we don't have Sky! I'm sure the Broadcasters are gearing up their 4k trials as we speak, hell Japan is getting ready to broadcast the Olympics in 8K!

And so on and so on.

I just thought I'd ask here, is it daft to jump on the 4K \ UHD bandwagon so early when only Netflix is putting out content?

My initial thought was to replace the 2nd TV with a HD \ 3D unit with good lag response times to put a console in the den at some point but the 4K question popped up.

Just wondered if anyone else has recently faced this conundrum and hear there thoughts.

Cheers,

T1b

[T1berious]

yeah,

I remember getting stung by laser disc while DVD was still in its infancy but waited until the audio format was sorted out before jumping and again waited a bit with Blu Ray until that war had sorted itself out.

The problem(?) at this point is if you read up on it, Cinemas are native 4K (might have read that wrong) but for TV's it isn't actually 4K which is why the UHD moniker is being bandied about. Closer to 3.8k?

but the TV's are now reaching sensible (well almost) price points (<1.8k - 2.5k for a decent one).

I'm guessing the ramp up in picture quality will mean either a BLu Ray rebrand or is there enough storage left to work as it exists?

Anyone know?

Cheers T1b

[T1berious]

Just looked at the "Blu Ray" site and an announcement was made that 4k support for BD (Players and Media) is ear marked for Q4 2015.

Well, that puts paid to that. you'll be looking at Q1 \ Q2 2016 to see any decent content on Blu Ray 4K

I think (gazing into the crystal ball) it will be a niche product like Laser Disc was way back in the day, unless there's an explosion of 4K content broadcast. I think it will HD for the mainstream.

IMHO

[T1berious]

A picture paints a thousand words.



And that's a 55!

[T1berious]

I don't think I've got a problem with the TV's as such, it's more the lack of content and lack of support from any of movie houses till Q4 2015.

Plus will the terrestrial channels support it?

[T1berious]

TheInternet said:

T1berious said:

Plus will the terrestrial channels support it?

On Freeview? Quite possibly never, but you might get it via web stream in a few years.

And there in lies the rub.

Don't get me wrong, I appreciate its all down to personal choice but a part of me still feels that for a format \ standard \ to actually be successful it has to appeal to the masses or if not appeal, be shoved down their throats come upgrade time (I doubt you can buy a mid range set or above without 3D for example).

However, with no terrestrial support, no content for at least a year is 4K in danger of being a niche product eventually trickling down like 3D?

I guess if Amazon jumped in with a 4K streaming service that would work.

[T1berious]

So,

In a kind of summary

1. 1 - 4K currently is awesome for the up scaling
2. 2 - Bandwidth will get strangled if \ when 4K hits broadcast
3. 3 - Curved 4K is awesome (if that's your bag)
4. 4 - It may come into its own with dedicated non broadcast content via dedicated media
5. 5 - Might be good via streaming service (providing you've got enough bandwidth)

So how does the Upscalling work? and at what sort of screen size \ viewing distance is it viable?

Cheers for all the info (especially from those in the video industry)

T1b