Ultra HD Blu-ray Players

[Jonnie1266]

Panasonic first off the line with this

Come on Sony - too late to win the Grand National !

[Anonymous]

Wow - just looked at UK prices.  Best part of £600.

Official Sony line for an announcement is.... This year. 

Then there is Playstation 4.5.  I only got one at Xmas !

[Jonnie1266]

Yeah, I wouldn't rush out and buy one either but the sooner they are available the sooner the prices will fall.

I heard on the jungle drums Sony were holding out such is the desire to stream 4K (albeit compressed to within an inch of it's 4K title) over here. They want to see how well the competition does selling UK models. I say bravo to Panasonic for having the b***s in the first place !

Regards

[Anonymous]

What are you looking for most when these players are available?  Proper 4K content? More content? 

For me personally i want to see a rapid growth in the 4K content industry.  Most 4K content is a smattering of TV shows, movies at a high price...  And then there is porn - loads of content already available....  

[Harleyfatboydd1]

Now here's the thing ..... My first experience perhaps like many into the world of Home Cinema goes back to pro-logic & Laser disc's, now I remember the disc's being £25 then and the big downside feature being halfway through the film you had to turn the disc over to see the rest of it. Then we had DVD's that would play the film and then just momentarily pause and then finish the film ( changing layers ) ...... then came 3D which as a Person who wears glasses had to wear 2 pairs of them at the same time to view the film. Now on offer in this country at least for the moment is 4K DVD and player to match, ( 8k waiting in the wings ready to ... ta dah! Its presence when the time comes ) I'm sure like the rest of us we seek the holy grail of Home Cinema viewing but I sometimes think the expense is like non stop AV cosmetic surgery ( nothing's breaking down ... so stop looking in the bloody mirror ) .

[Anonymous]

Unfortunately this is all part of our capitalist based society. One principle of capitalism is that a company must make a profit in order for a business to exist.  Companies only archieve this by constantly churning out new products - whether we want or need them.  It is then up to the company to make us consumers want or need their product in order to make a sale and hence hopefully make a profit.

Coming back to 4K Bluray players - Do we actually need them?  The answer no.  However due to sucessful marketing by the industry, they have made us consumers want them.

And then it comes down to how many times do i have to pay George Lucas by constantly purchasing StarWars over and over again on different mediums.  But wait, this extra super duper version has 6 seconds of unseen footage too!

[Jonnie1266]

I am looking for as close to uncompressed 4K as is possible - I have just bought the 4K FDR-AX53 camcorder which I have yet to hook up to the telly and actually watch some 4K. Even that will be compressed in the XAVCS format and only 2ch stereo to boot - so optical discs in my mind are still viable, they are the way forward for ever increasing definition and sound quality.

Reading articles on the interweb suggest that 4K will be the last great leap and that 8K will not be commercially viable. It is already more than a push and a shove for companies to get Joe public into the (currently) expensive world of 4K when most are happy with HD or streaming. Besides Ultra HD Blu-ray discs are triple layered, how thick will the discs have to get ? Solid state media would be the next step forward. So, if you want the best quality definition and sound in your home then 4K will be it (probably!). Out of interest even old movies filmed in 35mm when converted to 4K still have room for more than this as the native resolution of 5300 x 4000 already surpasses it.

Regards