4K television....are they worth it?

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
I just saw a jaw droppingly beautiful display on a new 55" 4K TV from Sony. Breathtakingly beautiful, even with a magnifying glass held directly above the screen. The image is so realistic, so smooth, you cannot detect pixellation that is even apparent on a 1080p display. But wait....how will you use a new 4K TV?

  • No channels over the air or on cable will be broadcasting in 4K anytime soon.
  • Movies being released to consumers mostly are not in 4K nor will they be.
  • Games are not going to be designed for 4K, but will merely "fill in" to display in 4K.
  • The cost of a 55" 4K TV is around $2000, where you can get a 55" HDTV (1920x1080) for about $700.00
At 4K, nothing higher would be detectable with the human eye. It is that smooth. Like a painting or looking through a glass window at a scene. More phones are going to be coming out with 4K displays. The Galaxy S5 and LG phones already have them.

Im not about to trade up right now. Anybody else?
 

Bluce Ree

Tech Admin / Council Member
I just saw a jaw droppingly beautiful display on a new 55" 4K TV from Sony. Breathtakingly beautiful, even with a magnifying glass held directly above the screen. The image is so realistic, so smooth, you cannot detect pixellation that is even apparent on a 1080p display. But wait....how will you use a new 4K TV?

  • No channels over the air or on cable will be broadcasting in 4K anytime soon.
  • Movies being released to consumers mostly are not in 4K nor will they be.
  • Games are not going to be designed for 4K, but will merely "fill in" to display in 4K.
  • The cost of a 55" 4K TV is around $2000, where you can get a 55" HDTV (1920x1080) for about $700.00
At 4K, nothing higher would be detectable with the human eye. It is that smooth. Like a painting or looking through a glass window at a scene. More phones are going to be coming out with 4K displays. The Galaxy S5 and LG phones already have them.

Im not about to trade up right now. Anybody else?

Smart TVs all the way. Maybe next year those 4K TVs will drop down by 25% - 50%. I may get one.
 

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
Smart TVs all the way. Maybe next year those 4K TVs will drop down by 25% - 50%. I may get one.

Dude, if you have not seen one of these displays up close, go over to your nearest Best Buy. They all have at least one on display by some brand. When 720p "HD" became 1080 HD, I did not really see that big of a difference. But damn...4K looks almost liquid, like the colors are "alive". Visually, it is a HUGE difference. And you cant help but want to look up close to see why it looks so mind numbingly real, and the magical spell remains. You can even use a magnifying glass and you will still be impressed. But the demo video was filmed in 4K and so I do not see how this is going to perform for me like that in everything I watch. Half my movie collection is still in 720p! My TV shows are mostly .mp4 HD.

And for $2000? Reality is a bitch.....even in 4K.
 
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Bluce Ree

Tech Admin / Council Member
Dude, if you have not seen one of these displays up close, go over to your nearest Best Buy. They all have at least one on display by some brand. When 720p "HD" became 1080 HD, I did not really see that big of a difference. But damn...4K looks almost liquid, like the colors are "alive". Visually, it is a HUGE difference. And you cant help but want to look up close to see why it looks so mind numbingly real, and nthe magical spell remains. You can even use a magnifying glass and you will still be impressed. But the demo video was filmed in 4K and so I do not see how this is going to perform for me like that in everything I watch. Half my movie collection is still in 720p! My TV shows are mostly .mp4 HD.

And for $2000? Reality is a bitch.....even in 4K.

The Sony Store at the Aventura Mall has had these on display for months. The image was as picture perfect as you can get, IMO. :D
 

heisenberg

Earl Grey
Currently nothing supports ultra HD. Most of it is upsampled from 1080p. They do look nice though, but wait till you get OLEDs that support 4k-8k native resolution. ;). OLEDs look far superior to current LCDs in terms of picture quality. Here is what's to come from LG!
http://www.cnet.com/news/lg-prices-big-4k-oled-lcds-at-up-to-100000-eyes-on/

On the 4K OLED front, there are two models, the 65-inch 65EC9700, and the 77-inch 77EG9700. The 65EC9700 will be available in October for $9,999, while the 77EG9700 will be available in November for $24,999.
Still cheaper than plasma were when they first came out. Though this is just crazy
If you're keeping track of TVs with screens larger than 100 inches and prices larger than six figures (and who isn't?), Samsung has also shipped a 105-inch curved 21x9 TV for $120,000 and a flat 110-inch set for $150,000.



It will be a while until we get full 4k support. The sheer size needed to render 4k native is enormous. You need a LOT of bandwidth for one and two, you need an enormous storage capacity; like Terabytes of data just to get uncompressed 4k. The amazing spiderman was 500 gb
http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/home...d-disk-space-you-will-need-for-4k-video-files
Everything that comes on bluray will be compressed because of the current size limitations but technology is moving fast so we won't have to wait too long for another storage peripheral to come out
 

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
Currently nothing supports ultra HD. Most of it is upsampled from 1080p. They do look nice though, but wait till you get OLEDs that support 4k-8k native resolution. ;). OLEDs look far superior to current LCDs in terms of picture quality. Here is what's to come from LG!
http://www.cnet.com/news/lg-prices-big-4k-oled-lcds-at-up-to-100000-eyes-on/


Still cheaper than plasma were when they first came out. Though this is just crazy




It will be a while until we get full 4k support. The sheer size needed to render 4k native is enormous. You need a LOT of bandwidth for one and two, you need an enormous storage capacity; like Terabytes of data just to get uncompressed 4k. The amazing spiderman was 500 gb
http://www.expertreviews.co.uk/home...d-disk-space-you-will-need-for-4k-video-files
Everything that comes on bluray will be compressed because of the current size limitations but technology is moving fast so we won't have to wait too long for it.

I imagine 4K and 8K media will make the circular optical disc finally obsolete, eh? All I know is that the jump from 1080p to 4K visually is nothing trivial. 720p to 1080p, better but meh. 1080p to 4k, just damn. WOW!
 

heisenberg

Earl Grey
I imagine 4K and 8K media will make the circular optical disc finally obsolete, eh? All I know is that the jump from 1080p to 4K visually is nothing trivial. 720p to 1080p, better but meh. 1080p to 4k, just damn. WOW!
What you are viewing is still 1080p upsampled to 4k :p but yes, 1080p even upsampled looks gorgeous!

I don't think discs will go obsolete. Consumers will demand tangible discs. There will always be a market. Technology in the storage world continues to improve at a rapid rate. We now have liquid drives that can store terabytes of data. What it really depends is what becomes the standard for storage medium. Discs can hold an infinite amount space because we have the technology to do that.
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/...e-a-terabyte-of-data-in-a-tablespoon-of-fluid

However, what you need to worry about when it comes to large storage is errors which become a big problem the bigger you go.

While the world's internet is growing, it's still way behind in what people want, thanks to the ISP scumbags who don't want to spend money on infrastructure and the government not willing to spend money on infrastructure either. I don't think streaming tv will takeover disc based entertainment.

If you want the best of the best currently, here is a professional grade projector ;)
http://www.christiedigital.com/en-u...christie-d4k3560-3-chip-dlp-4k-projector.aspx
 
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Joelist

What ship is this?
Staff member
Isn't the real question about the perceptual limits of the human eye? I've read before that the human eye can't tell anything past 60 FPS for example.
 

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
Isn't the real question about the perceptual limits of the human eye? I've read before that the human eye can't tell anything past 60 FPS for example.

YES. Exactly this. I said earlier, anything beyond this level of resolution is just not discernable. How could it be? If you have seen one of these displays up close, you know what I mean. I dont think I would be able to tell 8K from 4K. I will never see infra-red or ultraviolet with my naked eye. And you are right Above 60fps, the optical nerve no longer processes the images. Only the light itself.
 

heisenberg

Earl Grey
Isn't the real question about the perceptual limits of the human eye? I've read before that the human eye can't tell anything past 60 FPS for example.
huh? Where on earth did you read that?People who can't tell the difference b/w 30fps/60fps/90/120fps they must have visual impairment or their monitors don't support high refresh rates because there is a substantial difference between those. The human can tell the difference b/w 60 and 120fps easily. They also have vsync on and consoles are locked to 30fps which is probably why many can't tell.
 

Joelist

What ship is this?
Staff member
Actually OM read it too. There IS a very definite limit on the fps the human eye can perceive. This stuff also came up in forums about gaming rigs where people kept bragging about their overclocked dual GPUs in SLI that yielded ridiculous FPS and when it was pointed out the FPS was actually past the visual limits of the human eye boy did people get defensive and sheepish.
 

Bluce Ree

Tech Admin / Council Member
huh? Where on earth did you read that?People who can't tell the difference b/w 30fps/60fps/90/120fps they must have visual impairment or their monitors don't support high refresh rates because there is a substantial difference between those. The human can tell the difference b/w 60 and 120fps easily. They also have vsync on and consoles are locked to 30fps which is probably why many can't tell.

No, actually, it's much more difficult than you think unless you play it back in slow motion. Although 60 fps is not the upper limit, it gets more difficult to distinguish from there. It's even more difficult with digital movies because the frame to frame transition is smooth, there's no flicker like old stock film shown frame by frame.

There are informational videos that show you a visual comparison of different frame rates. It's not as easy as you think with digital video.
 

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
What you are viewing is still 1080p upsampled to 4k :p but yes, 1080p even upsampled looks gorgeous!

There was a demo video playing that had actually been filmed in 4K, so it wasnt 1080p. But yeah, absolutely gorgeous. Video of going through a jungle, walking along a beach, flying on a hang glider, diving underwarer. OMFG. There was a field of wheat moving in the wind and that was the point that I had to walk right up on the screen and use my magnifying glass no more than 3 inches from the display. OMFG then I could see grains in the wheat. :icon_e_surprised:. Like liquid, with no discernable pattern in the display like you can see on a 1920x1080p display. Like living paint or something. I was blown away. Unlike the jump from 720 to 1080.

I don't think discs will go obsolete. Consumers will demand tangible discs. There will always be a market. Technology in the storage world continues to improve at a rapid rate. We now have liquid drives that can store terabytes of data. What it really depends is what becomes the standard for storage medium. Discs can hold an infinite amount space because we have the technology to do that.
http://www.extremetech.com/extreme/...e-a-terabyte-of-data-in-a-tablespoon-of-fluid

Tangible, yes. But discs that are inserted into devices which spin them and eventually wear them down? Storage of these discs is becoming a problem for people who have been collecting them throughout their lives. You can now hold the equivalent of somebody's lifetime collection of music on a flash drive hanging on your keychain.

However, what you need to worry about when it comes to large storage is errors which become a big problem the bigger you go.

Yep, and also the more physical you go. :)

While the world's internet is growing, it's still way behind in what people want, thanks to the ISP scumbags who don't want to spend money on infrastructure and the government not willing to spend money on infrastructure either. I don't think streaming tv will takeover disc based entertainment.

If you want the best of the best currently, here is a professional grade projector ;)
http://www.christiedigital.com/en-u...christie-d4k3560-3-chip-dlp-4k-projector.aspx

Welllll...........A person's home collection of movies and music on a home storage area network (SAN) is playing the file over your home network or over the internet to wherever you are (depending on your setup). That is where it's going. Storage is the next big leap.
 

Overmind One

GateFans Gatemaster
Staff member
Actually OM read it too. There IS a very definite limit on the fps the human eye can perceive. This stuff also came up in forums about gaming rigs where people kept bragging about their overclocked dual GPUs in SLI that yielded ridiculous FPS and when it was pointed out the FPS was actually past the visual limits of the human eye boy did people get defensive and sheepish.

http://www.100fps.com/how_many_frames_can_humans_see.htm
 

heisenberg

Earl Grey
No, actually, it's much more difficult than you think unless you play it back in slow motion. Although 60 fps is not the upper limit, it gets more difficult to distinguish from there. It's even more difficult with digital movies because the frame to frame transition is smooth, there's no flicker like old stock film shown frame by frame.

There are informational videos that show you a visual comparison of different frame rates. It's not as easy as you think with digital video.

Wha... Since the fresh rate is higher it shows the same stuff faster. This is a fact.
 

Bluce Ree

Tech Admin / Council Member
Wha... Since the fresh rate is higher it shows the same stuff faster. This is a fact.

You do know what fps is, right? The more frames shown per second, the more fluid the motion becomes. However, there is a point of saturation, cramming more frames within the span of 1 second becomes unnoticeable at some point.

It's like resolution. If I show you an image at 16k then the same image at 32k, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference. There is a point where pixelation becomes too small for your eye to distinguish.
 
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