3D Is Dead. Will 4k And 8k TV Make It?

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Are we taking bets? Will 4k and 8K TVs make it or will they go the way of 3D TVs?

There's just one problem: the content. As it stands now, you can get HD programming via cable but the bulk of it isn't even true HD, it's 720p resolution. That's not really a factor in many cases, it's just a reality that cable wires simply cannot handle the bandwidth of a true 1080p image. For example, AT&T U-Verse's DVRs cannot handle more than 4 simultaneous streams.
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I don't care if 3D, 4k and 8k don't make it...all I want to make it is OLED
 
I think 3D is going to become more prevalent with 4K. Glassless 3D will look much better with so many more lines of resolution available for sacrifice.
 
Most people can't tell the difference between good 720p and 1080p

That combined with the poor quality content, and cheap TV's that are not even close to being calibrated correctly means that 4k and 8k TV's are largely a waste of money for most people.
 
The only reason HDTVs caught on in a big way was because they were light and slim and could be wall mounted, where CRTs were gigantic, heavy, and had small screens. Your average consumer doesn't care about resolution. Most of them can't even eaily discern the difference in picture and sound quality between a DVD and a Blu-ray.
 
I'm betting no. I really haven't seen any significant advantage to 4K, let alone 8K. I do like the higher refresh rates of the 240Hz 1080p TVs, though. That actually does make a huge difference in visual quality. It makes them look so much more real.
 
Pfft, I love watching 3D movies (144hz active shutter) on my bigass projector screen with a bag of Kirkland's Signature popcorn. But 3D on small sets or the wrong viewing distance or some passive sets can be unimpressive. Some directors also go overboard with a childish level of "pop", when I prefer a more subtle 3D effect.

I haven't found many major movies yet that don't have a 3D version on bluray, and with regard to what TV can broadcast... what TV? I haven't had cable in a decade.

I think higher resolution will be a no brainer to adopt and make sense as 60"+ TVs are already quite inexpensive and only getting bigger every year. So really you're keeping your 1080p pixel density from when 1080p was the new standard, but just on a much bigger screen.

Personally, I can't wait for a nice 3D 4K home projector and media to go mainstream, as it really is quite epic. Problem is, they need to abandon the theater-first business model. Home theaters are simply getting to the point you don't need to drive somewhere, stand in line, fight for a seat in the crowds, deal with some jerkoff kicking your seat, with sticky shoes from spilled coke and candy, all for a lovely $50 entry fee for you and your girl and a drink or two.

And cable as a business model needs to go away entirely. You should just have ISPs giving you hyperfast internet connections and competing with each other only on speed and capacity, and then consumers using the web to pick the streaming provider of their choosing. If you want HBO or Fox, great, just buy those channels straight from the source without a middle-man packaging what you want with telemundo and evangelist and golfing shows you have no interest in. That's how it should be.
 
I personally don't think you really can compare the 2 in an apples to apples fashion.

The 4k technology is anupgrade path already proven to be beneficial and done before... From VHS, DVD, then HD. It is only inevitable improvements will continue to be made.

Granted it may not be 4k exactly but I doubt 4k adopters would be completely screwed if a better resolution comes out, they just would only benefit up to 4k.

3D on the other hand is more of a new feature entirely rather than an existing one. It would have a larger hill to climb to become "standard".

As for 4k being skipped or a failure... I think that is moot already. Major content distributors are already developing 4k support. Dish has already announced 4k capable hardware.

Seems pretty likely, though I suppose bandwidth limitations could make 4k not cost effective given how much they compress HD right now.
 
3D is like a side show, and half the consumers don't like it, there's a division on the value of the feature. 4k is directly affecting the panel quality. It also comes with other image quality improvements under the umbrella of the UHD standard.

I don't see 4k going away especially with panel costs dropping rapidly due to mass production. It may not be a killer feature, but it'll be easier to sell as a "sure why not" check mark, especially for larger panels imho.
 
Most people do not even have the bandwidth for 1080p much less 4k. I hate these burgeoning standards that are solutions looking for a problem.
 
Methadras said:
Most people do not even have the bandwidth for 1080p much less 4k. I hate these burgeoning standards that are solutions looking for a problem.
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80" screens look like ass at 1080p. That's the problem its going to fix.

Seems ridiculous now, but so did a 46" screen to people in the 90's.
 
First of all Uverse isn't coax. and coax can handle 1080p just fine, it's more on how your cable company compresses everything on their end. The quote alone tells me the author really has no clue on what they are talking about.
 
I just want a standard. It's hard to back any of these when a new better version comes out 6 months later and nobody had even adopted the first.
I don't think any of these will have any lasting power until we get a solid standard established.
 
When 720p came out people stopped and looked. I remember people gawking because it was a plasma display and the quality is significantly better. 4k is also really nice to look at.

The content is what makes or breaks this stuff. If it's really expensive or difficult to shoot in 3d then it won't get made if the consumer response is luke warm. That also turns into a chicken/egg issue as well. Which comes first? the content or the devices to use that content?
 
I don't think most people care about TV resolution, remember we had that lousy analog TV standard for more than 60 years. 720p HDTV will probably satisfy most viewers for years, the TV manufacturers are just trying to push us all into a shorter upgrade cycle. I'm planning to buy a new set sometime in the next year or so because I want a bigger one, but otherwise I don't think I'd care much. Not until we have 4K content to watch on our 4K screens (I'm mostly interested in games rather than video because I personally don't mind lower-res video). I can't see any real reason to use 8K for home use at all, that's a real stretch.

As for 3D, I don't like it. You have to sit specifically to optimize it and I just don't find it that convincing an effect. I see it more as an annoyance than a feature and I'm not the only person who thinks like that. If they really manage to get real 3D holographic projectors out there then I'll care.
 
4 and 8K TV's have a chance if they aren't priced any more than 1080P TV's. Realistically, your average HD TV in your average home won't look any better from the couch.

I can see the 4K TV's selling ok if they aren't too expensive because people always compare TV's in stores standing only a few feet away. That will be enough to sucker people into buying them. But from the normal viewing range, people would be very hard pressed to tell the difference unless it's a MASSIVE TV.

IRSmurf said:
I think 3D is going to become more prevalent with 4K. Glassless 3D will look much better with so many more lines of resolution available for sacrifice.
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3D will never make it unless you can remove the need for wearing 3D glasses. It's inconvenient at best and down right annoying of you wear glasses. Glasses over Glasses is never a fun experience.
 
The problem actually isn't content, as plenty of movies are already mastered in 4K and Hollywood is salivating at selling everyone their favorite movies yet again.

No, the problem is distribution as Blu-ray never eclipsed DVD, and it's incredibly unlikely that Blu-ray 4K will ever pass even Blu-ray, much less DVD. No, the future of 4K is streaming, and the shitty Internet infrastructure can barely handle 3Mbps ~720p Netflix streams, there's no way it will handle in the near future 15-20Mbps 4K streams. And then there's the fact that broadcast and cable systems aren't even pushing 1080p despite 1080p TVs existing for a decade or longer, because they are still using the piss-poor MPEG-2 codec from freaking 1992!

So unless you want 4K in name only with a terrible bitrate that will look worse than 1080p, getting a good 4K picture even when 4K TVs are plentiful and cheap in a few years will still be a struggle.
 
If we were buying a TV today we would be getting a 4k one. Eventually we will move the 1080p 70" into the bedroom and go with something a bit larger in the movie watching room. No one I know is looking at a 4k tv, though. They just say I will get a large 1080p now and wait for prices to come down.

Spending close to $2000 on a TV every few years is ridiculous. Even switching them out every 5 years seems too fast.
 
dgingeri said:
I'm betting no. I really haven't seen any significant advantage to 4K, let alone 8K. I do like the higher refresh rates of the 240Hz 1080p TVs, though. That actually does make a huge difference in visual quality. It makes them look so much more real.
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I agree that 120 and 240Hz TV's appear to look better than other TV's, though my theory isn't that the refresh rate makes much of a difference, but that they are usually a higher quality panel.
 
Cmdrmonkey said:
The only reason HDTVs caught on in a big way was because they were light and slim and could be wall mounted, where CRTs were gigantic, heavy, and had small screens. Your average consumer doesn't care about resolution. Most of them can't even eaily discern the difference in picture and sound quality between a DVD and a Blu-ray.
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TVs will eventually get cheap enough that 720p TVs die off and 1080p TVs are relegated to only basement bin models. Granted, that's 10-20 years from now probably, but it'll happen soon enough.
 
jpm100 said:
80" screens look like ass at 1080p. That's the problem its going to fix.

Seems ridiculous now, but so did a 46" screen to people in the 90's.
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Only because a 46" screen in the 90's was massive. A modern 50" TV takes up a fraction of the space and weight of 90's era TV's.

80" TV's will remain ridiculous. It's just too much screen for you average living room. It's really only good for Commercial use and dedicated home theatres. Anything else is like using a monster truck for a daily driver.
 
I cared 0% about 3D when it came out. 4K seems like it would be a nice advancement if the content is there and we are a ways off from 4K being standardized for broadcast. Regardless of the resolution the cable/SAT providers tend to compress the crap out of it which makes it look bad on larger TV's.
 
I think you would be crazy to think that in 2-3 years more than 50% of the TV's being sold won't be 4k by default.

Once Netflix and Amazon have more streading 4k , along with Itunes etc , it'll be used much more than people think.

My wife who used to think she couldn't tell the difference between standard def and 720p now balks at non blu-ray level definition and the 4k in Best Buy caught her eye immediately.

3d requires you to physically wear something , something annoying often , 4k doesn't.

Of course 4k will survive , it will become the main standard just as 1080p has.

1080p will become like the 720p TV's around today , few and far between.

And 65-70" TV's are becoming more and more common I've noticed in folks houses , and the higher def certainly starts to show at that size even more so. 50" seems also small to me for a TV.
 
Still waiting on consumer HDR displays, hopeless as that front may be. Dolby still wants a huge return on those patents they bought 8 years ago and did crap all with. Hell, most folks still think HDR refers to crappy, over-processed Flickr photos, if they've heard the term at all.
 
I think 4K TVs will become the standard as TV get bigger. If you are 60" or under you don't really need it, but as we start to see more 80" TVs come out the 4K resolution makes sense.

Also since movies theaters are now mostly in 4K, they can market it as true theater quality. As for 8K? I don't see it. The files are too big, and you won't be able to tell. If you said movie theaters were moving to 8K, I would buy that.
 
nutzo said:
Most people can't tell the difference between good 720p and 1080p

That combined with the poor quality content, and cheap TV's that are not even close to being calibrated correctly means that 4k and 8k TV's are largely a waste of money for most people.
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Yea, initially, the 4k markets will be driven less by TVs and more by 3d-gaming computer monitors (and I don't mean stereoscopy when I say "3d"...;)), imo. Also, the first 4k commercial sets and then later, all of them, will scale 1080P (at the moment anyone can do 1080P with BluRay) up to 4k res, and it will look *way better* than HD TV looked in the early days when trying to scale NTSC to 480/720/1080P....;) Completely different situation, imo. Expect to see 4K integrate much faster than progressive-scan TV did into NTSC.
 
4K is sure to make it when prices drop and features stabilise.
But this has little to do with 3D other than there will be more 3D 1080p capable (not 1/2 res) and higher "passive" glasses 4K TVs, so a benefit if anything.
My main bugbear with 3D atm is the lack of full 1080p passive TVs.

There will always be a market for 3D but it wont go nuts until glassesless becomes decent.
It should get a fair bump with Oculus Rift and the many other VR headsets on the way.
 
Another factor missing in this conversation is the fact that allot of ISP's have download caps. Traditional TV is slowly dieing and that leaves 4k content to be delivered over internet through services like Youtube and Netflix. What's the average size of a 4k movie? 50+ GB? If I'm on a 300 gig plan, I can maybe watch 5-6 movies. I surely would not want to buy into 4k.
 
Z3r0k3wl said:
Another factor missing in this conversation is the fact that allot of ISP's have download caps. Traditional TV is slowly dieing and that leaves 4k content to be delivered over internet through services like Youtube and Netflix. What's the average size of a 4k movie? 50+ GB? If I'm on a 300 gig plan, I can maybe watch 5-6 movies. I surely would not want to buy into 4k.
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It can be used as an argument that 300GB/mo is not sufficient or reasonable, even for a relatively average user.
 
3d was a gimmick feature that had a long list of problems. 4k is just the natural evolution of video. Just like 1080 most just don't care but the note common it becomes the more it will sell. Never underestimate a salesman's sway over the average consumer, it's damn easy to show people the difference between 1080 and 4k. With 3d, there where so many people that flat out didn't like it or got headaches from it or hated the glasses, viewing angle etc. That made 3d a hard sell.
 
dr.kevin said:
that 3d is more like 2.5d. It's always been a gimmick.
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The question I have is why anyone expected 3d TVs that needed bulky, not-included, sorta-expensive, fragile glasses to watch 3d content with a poor framerate and/or resolution which gives many people headaches to catch on.

4k is nothing like that. As long as 4k TVs come down to reasonable prices (excluding the crappy ones that have terrible color reproduction and such) then people will buy them.
 
they should push wider colour gamuts and accuracy

i think 1080P was quite good for the home environment... 8K is just diminishing returns at this point
 
720p? Maybe on a good day. The only station I get on FiOS in any kind of real HD is AWE. Most of it is lossy, pixelated shit. Sucks. Forget 4K, we cannot even get 1080p.
 
Heck, I hope they make it, but given the current situation, it's really hard to stay positive. Like the header said, today's stations still have trouble delivering true HD, heck, in Canada HD still feels like luxury in cable. It should be a frickin standard everywhere by now, seeing standard def channels should be a surprise, nor a norm!

I don't have netflix, but from the trial I did a year ago, the "HD" streams looked crappy.

So I agree with the article's premise that content is the deal-breaker here. And that stems from people not caring enough. People still don't really care about DVD vs Blu-ray so how will they get convinced by 4K? At least 3D had a distinct effect that's noticeable more easily than just higher resolution (not saying it was a good effect in all cases, but just that it's something that might seem more obvious to the avarage viewer).

Here's to hoping that quality content wins.
 
Ryokurin said:
First of all Uverse isn't coax. and coax can handle 1080p just fine, it's more on how your cable company compresses everything on their end. The quote alone tells me the author really has no clue on what they are talking about.
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I can actually answer this as i work for a cable company and i understand exactly how the cable system works, 1080p is possible on the current cable system however there is a problem and reason they use mostly 720p and some 1080i
it works like this a cable channel is 6mhz wide, cable use to be analog based and a tv channel would use the whole 6mhz space for that given channel, which is why cable system is slowly migrating to a all digital systems. some cable systems have both analog and digital but eventuly everything will be 100% digital, anyway with digitial channels you can fit 10 to 12 SD channels is that same 6mhz space, that's why when you have cable directly to a TV set and you tune something like 55.14 and 55.22 those are digital channels located on the same frequency on channel 55 in that same 6mhz space. anyway moving along you can fit 2 to 3 720p HD channel in that 6mhz space and maybe only 1 1080p would fit, and there lies the problem if all channels where 1080p you would not have very many channels to chose from there is only 125, not to mention channels used for broadband the current dosis 3 standard uses 8 channels for download and up to 4 for upload as well. I guess with better compression we can get there possibley but really the compression they use now looks pretty bad compared to say bluray, lots a compression artifacts if u pause and look for it. Another thing they can do is increase the QAM for more bandwith however that has problems to the higher the QAM then less room you have for error. QAM is kinda like comparing a CD to a DVD same media size smaller holes and dots to fit more stuff but more prone to skipping with scratches
 
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