8K Displays – The Latest Specs
Image Credit: 8K Association
If you have read my previous posts on 8K you will realize that my feelings towards the need for these high resolution displays is less than positive.
You pays your money and you takes your choice. So as the price of these very high resolution televisions continues to drop to similar levels of a good 4K display, why not have the best you can afford, and future proof yourself for a media resolution that may never arrive!
If you are buying an 8K TV this logo should ensure it has all the latest 8K specs.
This new 8K device certification is not to be confused with the Consumer Technology Association, which has its own 8K Ultra HD logo and set of protocols. The 8K Association is a cross-industry group that was established about two years ago and is to provide a broader range of performance requirements to be laid out later this year. – Yes that is just what we needed; two bodies providing potentially different requirements and recommendations!
This new 8K certification logo is designed to ensure prospective purchasers that the hardware specifications of their proposed 8K purchase meets the “highest standards”. This new logo will appear on 8K qualifying televisions starting this year,(2021). So what does their old logo now represent? We now have three 8K logos, so I assume that some will go the way of the dodo.
In earlyJanuary Samsung was quick to spread the news about this new organization via a press release on its Newsroom. Samsung, Panasonic and TCL all sit on the board of this new association and it is interesting to note that neither Sony nor LG appear as part of the organization as yet.
See here for further details and a list of specifications that need to be met, plus manufactures must support various advanced immersive and surround sound formats to qualify for this logo certification.
The 8K Association goes on to say: “the organization expects to promote the growth of the 8K ecosystem with a focus on educating video content creators on the benefits of capturing, producing and distributing video in 8K resolution”.
Hopefully the 8K Association will also be providing the financial support for these companies 8K productions to! It is both difficult and expensive to do special effects and CGI at 2K, let alone 4K or even 8K.
Well the television industry is excelling itself here trying to create a demand for a product that has virtually no media, unless you are a gamer. Even IF a tiny percentage of production, like the forthcoming Tokyo Olympics (assuming no COVID cancellation) are created in 8K, it cannot be sent to most homes at bit rates that can justify it. You cannot playback ANY physical media at home that can produce native 8K and probably never will, and there are NO adopted standards for 8K physical media encoding and production. Also until suitable new compression technology is widely adopted current cable distribution systems cannot send sufficiently high bit rates to your set top box to justify the use of such a high resolution. As for ATSC3. That has barely been rolled out anywhere, and even fewer broadcasters support this OTA standards 4K (3840×2160) capability unless it is for sports. Also most broadcasts are still producing native 1080I or 720P HD and it will remain like that for a long time to come. Not to mention the fact that many cable and OTA channels still provide programming that is upconverted from SD!
No, I am not a technological “stick in the mud”, and yes I am aware of the purported benefits of using higher resolution displays to show lower resolution material. As a videophile and audiophile purist, upscaling anything, even using AI (Artificial Intelligence), means that you are inserting something into an image that is a guess. No matter how accurate that guess is that data did not exist in, nor can it be traced back to the original media recording. This upscaled video data is also often digitally processed in order to “improve or enhance” its visual apperance. In my opinion it would be so much better for the consumer if companies concentrated on getting the best out of what we have now and fixing compatibly issues, rather than trying to get the best ROI out of the unsuspecting publics wallets.
Talk about putting the “cart before the horse”!
