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The future is here: Sony 4K TV to cost $25,000

Mario007 said:
How many times do you have to be told that this particular piece of tech has sold out or Sony and it is a pride-product, used to show that Sony is willing to innovate into the future and to try out their technologies as well as a chance to get money back on the R&D as these things are also sold at a hefty margin.

This is a win-win for Sony.

The challenge is, bringing the costs down to average consumer level quick enough before LG or Samsung get there first.
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Because it doesn't look like innovation or trying out technology or any shit. Seems like too much. It's fine if I'm wrong, but that's my opinion. Let's see if the people will embrace it.

And that challenge is the one thing I expect Sony to botch.
 
The Spoony Hou said:
Because it doesn't look like innovation or trying out technology or any shit. Seems like too much. It's fine if I'm wrong, but that's my opinion. Let's see if the people will embrace it.

And that challenge is the one thing I expect Sony to botch.
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Oh I expect them to have at least LG beat them to it, and I'm a huge Sony fan, don't get me wrong. But a 84 incho 4K TV is a huge new technology that is just going on the market and Sony are only the second manufacturer that is able to offer it, with Samsung and the rest catching up and having rumoured similar models being unveiled at CES.

There is no way you can say that 4K resolution on a TV is not an innovation, nor that getting an 84inch panel out not being innovation. Remember when 32 inch TVs came out? They seemed like too much as well.
 
If it isn't cheap day 1 it's a failure... Gamer/GAF logic.

Oh and mobile devices must have PPIs into the stratosphere. But it's useless/tasteless for TVs. More gamer/GAF logic.

Complain about stuff breaking more quickly while paying rock bottom, inflation adjustment value destroying prices. And claim planned obsolesce.
 
Mario007 said:
There is no way you can say that 4K resolution on a TV is not an innovation, nor that getting an 84inch panel out not being innovation. Remember when 32 inch TVs came out? They seemed like too much as well.
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It's not an innovation if it's more of the same. But if there aren't any TVs as big as that, I guess that's cool for the people who want that. I follow technology somewhat, but not TV sizes.

And I do believe the Sony TVs are better than the Corean ones, so that's good for the enthusiast. I'm just thinking mass market. There's a point where people just say "screw it" and ignore these things.

AstroNut325 said:
If it isn't cheap day 1 it's a failure... Gamer/GAF logic.
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I don't know about other people, but I'm really not arguing about this first batch for the stupid rich, I'm thinking mass market.
 
The Spoony Hou said:
It's not an innovation if it's more of the same. But if there aren't any TVs as big as that, I guess that's cool for the people who want that. I follow technology somewhat, but not TV sizes.

And I do believe the Sony TVs are better than the Corean ones, so that's good for the enthusiast. I'm just thinking mass market. There's a point where people just say "screw it" and ignore these things.



I don't know about other people, but I'm really not arguing about this first batch for the stupid rich, I'm thinking mass market.
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Have you seen 4k in real life compared to HD? Because if you didn't you can't really say if it's more of the same. It's pretty much the same jump if not bigger than what happened with the HD revolution.

As the post above says, people are obsessed about PPI for phones and go mad for the made-up 'Retina display', so you can bet the PPI is pretty damn important in TVs.

Also consider the fact that Sony's TV division is pretty much what is dragging the company down. To be able to show off new technology that's pretty much unrivaled in this category is a huge ego boost for Sony. Further, as I've already said, the end game here is for the TV to be 1000-2000 euro a few years down the line. Thankfully they can sell a few SKUs before they reach that target at a nice profit that'll help with further R&D costs.

4K for mass market is a few years downn the line. Trust me, people will upgrade. Having a 'huge ass TV' is still a bit of a boasting point.
 
Mario007 said:
Have you seen 4k in real life compared to HD? Because if you didn't you can't really say if it's more of the same. It's pretty much the same jump if not bigger than what happened with the HD revolution.
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Maybe I'm not looking in the right place, but I don't see people going crazy even for HD. Did blurays start selling well already?
 
AstroNut325 said:
Oh and mobile devices must have PPIs into the stratosphere. But it's useless/tasteless for TVs. More gamer/GAF logic.
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Mobile devices need such high PPI's because people operate them from as little as 6-10 inches from their faces. The further away you get, the lower the PPI needs to be. Logic.
 
Foliorum Viridum said:
How much were 1080p sets when they were first introduced?

4K is surely the future, just like 8K after it, etc etc, but it feels too soon at the moment. I'm sure when the time is right the prices will be suitable.
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They were upwards of 10k when the Ps3 was announced. It was why the entire crowd burst into a fit of laughter at the suggestion that the PS3 would have dual HDMI 1080p outputs.

It's all very well having 4K TVs but there is barely any footage to warcg.
Sony are loaning Media Servers with one of Several awful Sony Pictures movies to watch in 4K.

Unless they have a new disc format ready to go, then 4K is going to be nothing more than enthusiast product.
 
Nibel said:
Will 4K content be available when this thing launches?
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I thought 4K was the res necessary to match a 35m film print (i.e. Blu Ray is still below the image quality you see in the cinema) so outside games there should be no lack of content on the film side (unless I've completely got this wrong).
 
The Spoony Hou said:
Oh yeah, I did forget that. Won't change my opinion on 4k, but that's nice to know.
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It took years for HD to become mainstream and have HD content ready on TV. No one is saying 4K will be ready next year, what is being said in this thread is that this is the natural progression and the future.
 
At least for video games, 4k resolution is about the point where you stop seeing obvious temporal aliasing, which is a very good thing indeed. 4k resolution + post-AA (FXAA, SMAA, etc.) can look VERY good. Not perfect, but perfection won't be reached until we hit 16k (which is unlikely to happen because, frankly, most non-video game applications don't benefit from that high a resolution).

$25k for an 84-inch TV doesn't seem that bad to me. I wouldn't bother because, frankly, that's just overkill and at that price I'd rather just get a projector, but it's obvious they're gunning for a rich early-adopter market here.

I suspect prices will go down considerably as more options appear on the market.
 
Mario007 said:
It took years for HD to become mainstream and have HD content ready on TV. No one is saying 4K will be ready next year, what is being said in this thread is that this is the natural progression and the future.
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Of course it's the natural progression, I just think it's about 10 years too early for that. More technology will just confuse the mass market. But yeah, ok, maybe I'm wrong. Whatever. Long live Sony and shit.
 
Raistlin said:
Sony is actually one of the pioneers of OLED, and is continuing to work on it. As a matter of fact they recently partnered with Panasonic to work on consumer displays.

http://www.engadget.com/2012/06/25/sony-panasonic-oled-partnership-is-official-aims-for-mass-prod/



As for CLED advantages vs OLED:


  • Cheaper to manufacture in the short-mid-term. CLED uses fabrication that's derived from semi-conductor fabbing. There are some interesting OLED processes in the pipeline that may make it cheaper in the future (cheaper than LCD even), but it's unclear when (and maybe even if) we'll get there.

    As with Sony's tradition in display R&D and production, they are betting on more than one technology here. Certain technologies are better for certain uses. Also, differing technologies have different cost and maturity timelines. It doesn't make sense to put all their eggs in one basket given Sony's size and R&D capabilities.

    So for a while at least, it's likely CLED will have price or at least margin advantages over OLED (though LG's technique should at least be more cost-effective than Samsung's OLED).


  • Scalability. CLED is essentially a grid of fixed-size CLED units that are basically lego'd together to make a display. In order to make a larger size display, they simply add more rows/columns of CLED units (can't recall the exact size, but I think each unit is around 1-2" square or so?) and scale the image with a video processor.

    The disadvantage of this method is that you lose 1:1 pixel mapping, however most people won't notice the difference. This is particularly true if they eventually move to higher DPI base CLED units that are intended for 4k.

    Granted there's nothing really stopping LCD and OLED from employing a similar model, but no one's done it yet and there hasn't been any indication they plan to. The difference here is CLED was designed for this model from the get-go. And by using matrixed CLED units, yields are fantastic. With traditional TV manufacturing, if part of the screen has a defect you have to through out that entire panel (or section of the 'glass' if it hasn't been cut yet). With this design, Sony can simply throw out the defective CLED units and replace them with functioning ones.

    I should point out there's nothing fundamentally stopping Sony from using different DPI base units (so they can get 1:1 pixel mapping at different display sizes) ... but the logic in keeping it down to one or only a few base DPI's, and using video scaling to hit different display sizes, is to reduce costs. It's always cheaper when you have fabrication lines producing the singular design.


  • Burn-in/color shifting. While the different colored inorganic LED's do not exhibit perfectly linear half-lives either, their time horizon is much better than current OLED (particularly for blue diodes). While it's expected OLED will continue to improve, LED is simply more mature at this point.
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Any idea on when will Sony release CLED HDTV?
 
Totobeni said:
Any idea on when will Sony release CLED HDTV?
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We should see more at CES on the television. The challenges behind the technology are pretty large, but no where near as bad as OLED. The biggest issue is getting the 4k resolution with thei technology. The telvision needs 4X as many LEDs to mantain a 4k resolution, which is just not feasible.
 
Totobeni said:
Any idea on when will Sony release CLED HDTV?
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No idea unfortunately. Hopefully we'll get some news at CES in a few weeks ... but CLED was conspicuously absent from CEDIA earlier this year.


The truth is, we really have no idea if it will ever become a product. Sony never guaranteed it would bring CLED to market. They simply demoed the tech and stated their were continuing to R&D it.

Assuming it does become a product though, we really don't know where in the process they are ... so it's difficult to guess when it would launch. If it is tenable tech though, I'm certainly looking forward to it. Overall it looks to offer many of the features OLED promises, but potentially without the issues current OLED faces.





thuway said:
We should see more at CES on the television. The challenges behind the technology are pretty large, but no where near as bad as OLED. The biggest issue is getting the 4k resolution with thei technology. The telvision needs 4X as many LEDs to mantain a 4k resolution, which is just not feasible.
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Why is 4x as many OLEDs inherently more feasible? I don't think we have an estimation for what the bottom end is in terms of miniaturization with Sony's fabrication process.
 
Best denki takasimaya in singapore got sony 4k tv on display, it look awesome, they also have lg(i think) 80+inch tv side by side and I prefer the sony demo better.
 
I'm just fucking pissed because I'd have to upgrade my movie collection again

Isn't 4K not even noticable until you hit really huge screens anyway?
 
The Spoony Hou said:
Thanks. Er... Things are worse than I thought... You guys sure you think this 4k thing will work? Well, at least the market is picking up again...
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Year on year growth that may have hit the inflection point is worse than you thought?




Quackula said:
I'm just fucking pissed because I'd have to upgrade my movie collection again
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Yep. The studios are coming to your house and forcing you to upgrade at gunpoint.


I'm hoping technology just stops advancing.
 
The Spoony Hou said:
Yes, because it wasn't doing too well before that. I didn't know the last years were so bad.
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The point is, physical media is not going any where. It is an option available to those who want the best quality experience currently available. I don't understand the doom and gloom.
 
thuway said:
We should see more at CES on the television. The challenges behind the technology are pretty large, but no where near as bad as OLED. The biggest issue is getting the 4k resolution with thei technology. The telvision needs 4X as many LEDs to mantain a 4k resolution, which is just not feasible.
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From what i read, the tech is perfect for scaling down.
 
Epic Drop said:
I think streaming HD media has a lot to do with the slow down in physical media sales.
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Yeah, I think that's the case.

thuway said:
The point is, physical media is not going any where. It is an option available to those who want the best quality experience currently available. I don't understand the doom and gloom.
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I'm just saying I don't see a need for 4k stuff.

If Sony finds their market, fine. Great. If they don't overshoot it. And we all know Sony doesn't ever overshoot anything. That's why they are doing great.
 
I really wouldn't worry about upgrading your collection of blurays. While it stands to reason they'll have 4K 3D movies out there I just don't see anyone rushing out to buy them. The difference in quality from 1920X1080 to 4K just isn't large enough. Certainly if you have the right size room with the right size tv AND a decent 4K transfer it WILL indeed look better but ... I really doubt that alone will be worth an upgrade.

My earlier rant still holds true obviously (expect where I got some math wrong apparently) but 4K at home, I feel is just a stop gap. Like EDTV was before HDTV came around. Really, until I can buy not just a 4K tv but an 8K tv for my house for less then 2000$ it's just not worth the time and effort. I'm not a luddite though, so I realize the need for 4K now, there has to be some new kind of gimmick to make tvs made in 2013 and beyond seem better than the previous edition. Even if it's 2-3 more years until they hit that 2000$ price point, the fact is people probably won't buy them until their current tv breaks and the only ones available all support the feature anyway. Kind of like with 3DTV.

Basically- if you've got that 40-50 inch fantastic 1080p hdtv at home and sit the proper distance, have 7.1 sound, your movies can't look and sound any better so simply skip the upgrade.
 
This thread will look a bit silly in a week's time when all the CE companies will talk about is 4K in CES. They'll bring the pricepoints down, force a content standard and all that. It's in the interest of the entire CE industry that a new upgrade cycle kicks off, so everyone will support it.

Sony being one of the first to introduce a flagship 4K set is fairly irrelevant in the industry context and to Sony financially, it's simply a brand building and ramping up competencies activity - so that we'll know Sony always has cutting edge shit, it's who their brand is, plus it will help them get the enthusiasts subsidise their climb the yields curve ahead of the competition.
 
"Basically- if you've got that 40-50 inch fantastic 1080p hdtv at home and sit the proper distance, have 7.1 sound, your movies can't look and sound any better so simply skip the upgrade."

The handful of movies shot in 70mm will look eyegasmic in 8K.

I hope that new releases by that time will be shot in 8K digital. I'll buy a 8K TV as soon as it's in the 2-3K€ range.
 
Going just from 1080p to 1440p on my PC was an amazing jump in terms of games.

I know I will be one of the first in line once 4K can be had for under 4 grand. The biggest thing is that it makes those massive 70"-90" screens feasible. 1080p just does not cut it for that size.
 
Ceebs said:
Going just from 1080p to 1440p on my PC was an amazing jump in terms of games.

I know I will be one of the first in line once 4K can be had for under 4 grand. The biggest thing is that it makes those massive 70"-90" screens feasible. 1080p just does not cut it for that size.
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C'mon. 1080p essentially "cuts it" for 75% of all digital screens in the country.

Not saying that 4K presentation wouldn't be GREAT for large screen presentation. But the difference between 1080p and 2K theatrical presentation is the compression, and that's about it. And the difference in compression isn't THAT big.
 
FatboyRoberts said:
C'mon. 1080p essentially "cuts it" for 75% of all digital screens in the country.

Not saying that 4K presentation wouldn't be GREAT for large screen presentation. But the difference between 1080p and 2K theatrical presentation is the compression, and that's about it. And the difference in compression isn't THAT big.
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I am more talking about pure pixel density on those big panels.
 
sankt-Antonio said:
"Basically- if you've got that 40-50 inch fantastic 1080p hdtv at home and sit the proper distance, have 7.1 sound, your movies can't look and sound any better so simply skip the upgrade."

The handful of movies shot in 70mm will look eyegasmic in 8K.

I hope that new releases by that time will be shot in 8K digital. I'll buy a 8K TV as soon as it's in the 2-3K€ range.
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That's pretty much bullshit. People said that about 720p vs 1080p and they are still saying that which is completely idiotic if we take into account need of high DPI screens.

With thanks to higher DPI we can use those 40-50' as monitors for our PC (i use 1080p 40') which gives bigger size to eye ratio than 70' or 80' tv.

Also most of people don't see difference on blurays (720pvs1080p) because most of films are grainy shit. I mean that all details of 1080p are lost with use grain filter (cammon in almost every BD film).

Also 1080p need very low latency. With films most the time screen is moving and with most of screens you see 2-4 pixel blur making 1080p look like 720p. With 4K standard thanks to blur reduction (higher lower latency and higher DPI) 1080p films will look better than most of today 1080p screens.

Also we should clearly say that now that most of people play games on their TV. DPI for gaming is essentially what it needs to achieve CGI quality. Higher DPI means less need of AA and combined with AA it will give us CGI look which is why most of people who play on PC prefer smaller high DPI monitors.

People play games on 2500x resolutions on their PC, people in Dark Souls fix use downscaling from 6k and we are talking here about need of 4k.

4K ? It is needed. Especially for gaming.

I don't think movies can even compete when it comes to hours ratio and gaming is growing each year and it will be growing. Last gen we had 1 succesfull console with 120mln sold this gen we have 3 succesfull consoles with almost 270mln sold units
 
Quackula said:
I'm just fucking pissed because I'd have to upgrade my movie collection again

Isn't 4K not even noticable until you hit really huge screens anyway?
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You do know you don't HAVE to upgrade your movie collection. Your DVDs and BluRay's will still work. They won't spontaneously combust once a new format is out.
 
Ceebs said:
I know I will be one of the first in line once 4K can be had for under 4 grand. The biggest thing is that it makes those massive 70"-90" screens feasible. 1080p just does not cut it for that size.
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That's the thing though. 4k shows its strength with massive screens, but 1080p is absolutely fine with sub 60" size. I only have enough space for TVs between 40"-50", therefore I would buy a 4k TV only if there aren't 1080p TVs anymore. Kinda like when I've bought a new TV this year with 3D even though I don't need 3D at all - it's included, so whatever.
 
Mario007 said:
Have you seen 4k in real life compared to HD? Because if you didn't you can't really say if it's more of the same. It's pretty much the same jump if not bigger than what happened with the HD revolution.

As the post above says, people are obsessed about PPI for phones and go mad for the made-up 'Retina display', so you can bet the PPI is pretty damn important in TVs.

Also consider the fact that Sony's TV division is pretty much what is dragging the company down. To be able to show off new technology that's pretty much unrivaled in this category is a huge ego boost for Sony. Further, as I've already said, the end game here is for the TV to be 1000-2000 euro a few years down the line. Thankfully they can sell a few SKUs before they reach that target at a nice profit that'll help with further R&D costs.

4K for mass market is a few years downn the line. Trust me, people will upgrade. Having a 'huge ass TV' is still a bit of a boasting point.
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4K looks good. I got to see the sony 84" at their store. But imo it wasn't a night and day difference. Things were more clearer and better resolved, but based on that demo it's not the huge jump everybody keeps mentioning. I was perfectly fine going home and watching my 60" Kuro.

I don't think we're ever going to see that jump in quality again like DVD to BD. Which was 6x the resolution. 4K is only 4x. I think we should of went straight to 8K. The changes from 4K to 8K will be even less.

Still, i look forward to 4K. The differences are there. I would just need an 80" or bigger display.
 
Pachinko said:
Basically- if you've got that 40-50 inch fantastic 1080p hdtv at home and sit the proper distance, have 7.1 sound, your movies can't look and sound any better so simply skip the upgrade.
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Not true at all. I have two really nice 60" 1080p TVs and a 100" 1080p projector. Everything is far superior on the projector. And you know what, I can see the individual pixels and the low res on the projector so I can't wait for 4K. To say that 40-50 inch 1080p is as good as it gets is a joke.
 
Sky Chief said:
Not true at all. I have two really nice 60" 1080p TVs and a 100" 1080p projector. Everything is far superior on the projector. And you know what, I can see the individual pixels and the low res on the projector so I can't wait for 4K. To say that 40-50 inch 1080p is as good as it gets is a joke.
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You basically just agreed with him.
 
Quackula said:
I'm just fucking pissed because I'd have to upgrade my movie collection again

Isn't 4K not even noticable until you hit really huge screens anyway?
Click to expand...

I'm still rocking a 720p projector and it looks good.

IMO 1080p video is good enough for most people's home setups. 4k will be more useful for huge TVs (niche market) or for passive 3D, and fed with upscaled content.

Higher colour depth would be nice if they do spec a 4k bluray spec
 
Perkel said:
That's pretty much bullshit. People said that about 720p vs 1080p and they are still saying that which is completely idiotic if we take into account need of high DPI screens.

With thanks to higher DPI we can use those 40-50' as monitors for our PC (i use 1080p 40') which gives bigger size to eye ratio than 70' or 80' tv.

Also most of people don't see difference on blurays (720pvs1080p) because most of films are grainy shit. I mean that all details of 1080p are lost with use grain filter (cammon in almost every BD film).

Also 1080p need very low latency. With films most the time screen is moving and with most of screens you see 2-4 pixel blur making 1080p look like 720p. With 4K standard thanks to blur reduction (higher lower latency and higher DPI) 1080p films will look better than most of today 1080p screens.

Also we should clearly say that now that most of people play games on their TV. DPI for gaming is essentially what it needs to achieve CGI quality. Higher DPI means less need of AA and combined with AA it will give us CGI look which is why most of people who play on PC prefer smaller high DPI monitors.

People play games on 2500x resolutions on their PC, people in Dark Souls fix use downscaling from 6k and we are talking here about need of 4k.

4K ? It is needed. Especially for gaming.

I don't think movies can even compete when it comes to hours ratio and gaming is growing each year and it will be growing. Last gen we had 1 succesfull console with 120mln sold this gen we have 3 succesfull consoles with almost 270mln sold units
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Sigh. You do know grain is natural right? To me 35mm shot movies have much more detail that these digitally TV looking shot movies. The picture looks more organic and real. There are plenty of movies on bluray that have grain and look amazing.

And most TV's these days have 1080 lines of motion resolution.
 
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