Is HD getting obsolete real fast?

[Ilya]

Yeah, I know, Congress still wants to prolong the analog SD broadcast. How dare we talk about HD getting obsolete?!!

I watched Baraka on Blu-Ray last night. The HD images are stunning! But what struck me the most was what they said in the extras: the movie was shot on a 65 mm film and it's been digitized frame by frame to 8K digital format. That's roughly 8000x4000 (7680 × 4320 to be more precise) or 33 Megapixels (!!!) And then, for the HD release, it was down-converted to 1080p...

That got me thinking. I can only imagine how good the 8K version of this movie would look like! And that's a 15-year old movie! How about The Dark Knight shot on IMAX?!!

Let's put this in prospective. 1080p is roughly 2 megapixels. 720p is about 1 megapixel. A few years ago, when HDTVs only started appearing in retail stores, digital cameras had 1-2 megapixel resolution as well. Today, just a few years later it is hard to find a point-and-shoot camera with less than 8 megapixels. 10-14 megapixels are now the norm...

So, how long will it be before the new 8K Ultra HD (a.k.a. Super Hi-Vision) format hits the market? Well, according to recent reports, not too long! First full-resolution projectors are expected to be developed by the end of 2009. First flatscreen displays with the full pixel count are expected by 2011. Japan plans to begin Super Hi-Vision broadcasting in 2015 with first single-transponder experiments around 2011. First successful satellite broadcast experiment took place in Europe last September...

I think we are still a few years away from seeing 33 megapixel images in our home theaters. But I'll tell you what: time goes fast!!!

 

[yaz96]

Yeah! Bring it on!
But, I want a subsidy from the government to buy my new equipment!

 

[dantheman77]

lol, yeah. hope it dont come out till i can afford it!

 

[Zookster]

I think we are still a few years away from seeing 33 megapixel images in our home theaters. But I'll tell you what: time goes fast!!!

Especially for cable and sat cos. and broadcasters who will seriously need to upgrade their infrastructure again like they had to for HD (and they're still not totally finished with that one!)

 

[Fiveft20in]

Short answer: No.

 

[mike123abc]

Well if you had an 120" screen and 8k resolution, it works out to 72dpi. Almost good enough to be a computer monitor.

 

[Ilya]

Well if you had an 120" screen and 8k resolution, it works out to 72dpi. Almost good enough to be a computer monitor.

Exactly! To visualize the picture resolution of an 8K display, imagine 16 computer monitors side-by-side arranged in 4 rows!

 

[vurbano]

No thankyou. I have spent enough money on boob tube electronics. I am happy with what Ive got.

 

[Pepper]

You'd need some serious compression to fit even one of those on a single satellite transponder.

 

[Ilya]

The bit-rate used in the latest experiment was 130 Mbit/s. 90 Mbit/s is expected by early 2010. Single transponder - around 2011.

 

[mike123abc]

16 Layer BD would be perfect for this...

Soon we will be complaining of HD Lite at 4k resolution...

 

[Stargazer]

It will take lots of bandwidth in order to do this in which cannot be supported in most areas at this time. It will take a lot of advancement in compression and bandwidth along with advancements in televisions along with cheaper prices before it becomes the next HD. I imagine everyone aint going to run out and get a new tv set just to get a little bit of a picture quality enhancement after spending all this money lately on their new HD televisions. Perhaps 3D is the next big thing to go along with increased resolution.

 

[tigerfan33]

It will take lots of bandwidth in order to do this in which cannot be supported in most areas at this time. It will take a lot of advancement in compression and bandwidth along with advancements in televisions along with cheaper prices before it becomes the next HD. I imagine everyone aint going to run out and get a new tv set just to get a little bit of a picture quality enhancement after spending all this money lately on their new HD televisions. Perhaps 3D is the next big thing to go along with increased resolution.

If 3D is the next big thing, you can have it. 3D technology will have to improve 100% before it catches on with me.

 

[Stargazer]

With studios having to upgrade their equipment and the huge costs involved in doing so, it would have to be a vast improvement and something new like HD before we see another overhaul / upgrade / advancement like we seen going from SD to HD before it would be worth it to them.

I agree with 3D needing a lot more advancement.

 

[bhelms]

On one hand, I say "enough" !! I figure my investment difference going from a simple SD only stereo HT system to what I have now was about 10x. (I "first adopted" some items, but not the bulk of it.) So I expect another 10-fold investment to get to Super Hi-Vision (/Audio). In this sense I hope I don't live to see that expansion. My kids' inheritance will all end up in hardware!

OTOH - Bring it on !!! Technology advance is the engine of modern society. We all benefit when science constantly stretches the envelope. Maybe Super Hi-Vision - and all the attendant upgrades - will be exactly what will pull us out of this current recession...!

 

[jayn_j]

On one hand, I say "enough" !! I figure my investment difference going from a simple SD only stereo HT system to what I have now was about 10x. (I "first adopted" some items, but not the bulk of it.) So I expect another 10-fold investment to get to Super Hi-Vision (/Audio). In this sense I hope I don't live to see that expansion. My kids' inheritance will all end up in hardware!

Is it fair to compare a low end HTIB to a full featured system? It's kind of like saying that 5 years ago I bought a $10k Ford Focus and I just now bought a $100k Porsche. Does that mean that the cost of cars went up 10x in the last 5 years? No, because you can buy a Focus today for not much more than it cost 5 years ago.

I bought my first stereo back in 1972. It consisted of a $300 Pioneer receiver, a pair of Advent speakers at $300/ea, a $200 Dual turntable and a $150 Teac cassette deck, for a grand total of $1250.

I did my first real upgrade in 1992-1995, and that cost a lot more.

However, my current system is not much more costly than that first one:
Onkyo 605 refurb - $265
Klipsch mains: $600 (closeout)
Klipsch center $250 (woot)
Klipsch Surrounds $350 (amazon)
Velodyne subwoofer $400 (used ebay)
Toshiba A30 HD-DVD $70 with 4 free discs (ebay)
Insignia Blu-Ray $220 (best buy)
TOTAL: $2155

I do have a Panasonic Laserdisc player hooked up as well, but don't know how to value it into the system.

Anyway, my point is that both systems were middle of the road, state of the art for their time, and the cost didn't even double, even though there are twice as many components in the new system.

 

[bhelms]

OK, So I'm guilty of some exaggeration here. But maybe not by as much as you think...

My first "decent" stereo that I put together in the mid 70s and that comprised the audio part of the a/m first HT came in around $2K, similar to yours (JBL, Kenwood, Technics for the main pieces). (Some of that stuff I'm still using in my recently upgraded system: turntable, R-R and cassette deck!) The TV (an old 25" color console) was a freebie that I resurrected back when you could actually work on TVs. (That one got a CRT transplant!) Add about $500 for the Hi-Fi VHS deck in '85 at which point I could call it a "theater" and we're in somewhere around $2.5K total invested. At the time that audio gear would have been considered "mid level".

There was no real benchmark in the consumer TV world in those days. Most TVs were standalones and not designed to be a component in a system. A good Curtes Mathes would set you back about a grand, but most average consoles were in the $500 range if memory serves and mine fell far short of that. Quality monitors for home use were still largely unknown. (I later spent ~$2.5 K on my interim 40" rear projection TV soon after those came out, but that came a couple of years later.) Other than that first TV, everything was bought new at retail with some open-box / floor-model discounts.

My recently-upgraded SS system, net of the old carry-overs, but including all the recent acquisitions, the sat. receiver, and the upgraded OTA system is in at close to $12K including the TV. I also consider this a mid level system by today's standards, again bought at retail with some discounts. So maybe a factor of 4 is closer to reality. Did I slide upscale a bit? Perhaps. But it's still only mid level at best since the range has stretched considerably.

Now the real question becomes what form the new technology takes, and the cost of entry a couple of years past "early adoption". I can easily envision that nothing I currently own would suit as a main component in such a system. So I would expect a mid level system could easily add up to $25K when we consider that almost every essential item would be upgraded and that range extending ever higher. Perhaps the old speakers would still function, but surely there would have to be more of them, and the new higher-tech receiver/processer to drive them all. What will the video gear comprise and cost? What form will the cutting-edge programming delivery systems take and cost, etc.? Computers, servers, and networks I don't presently own at a minimum.

More importantly - will I be bitten by the bug - again - and "forced" to jump onto the wagon ?? Maybe by then my soon-to-be heirs will succeed in having me committed...to A/V mediocrity amongst other things...and it will have all finally plateaued for me...

Musings late on a Fri., after a burn-out week and long after I should have plunged into "Miller Time"... Peace...

 

[jayn_j]

somehow this got into total system cost, and that does carry a premium, mostly because we have gone and added 3-5 speakers plus a subwoofer since the good old days. Not to mention sat receivers, dvd players and other media players that weren't there in the '70s.

Receivers seem to cost about the same for the same quality level, but with more features. I paid $1K for an AVC-3000 in 1993 and that's about the correct street price for the current AVR-3808 today. $1200 msrp if you want to do apples/apples.

Paid $800 for my first laserdisc player. Paid $400 for my last one.

Probably should be about displays though.

My parents paid $1200 for a 19" Magnavox console in 1969. The 25" Heathkits were somewhere around $2300. I remember that clearly because I wanted desperately to build one.

I paid about $350 for a Magnavox 19" monitor in 1983.

A friend paid $2900 for a 72" Acoustic Research FP in 1979.

I paid $3200 for a Sony 53" XBR RP in 1994.

Seems to me that prices have stayed pretty stable or even gone down as resolution has gone up.

 

[bhelms]

Your first comment above was what I was trying to say in my first point. And then how much additional/new equipment will the next generation require, and at that cost in current dollars? But when you consider the time value of money, perhaps the investment has actually shrunk in real dollars (whatever those are anymore!). For a lot of us, our ability to pay for the upgrades has increased. So that segues to my second point: "Bring it on...!"

 

[jayn_j]

Your first comment above was what I was trying to say in my first point. And then how much additional/new equipment will the next generation require, and at that cost in current dollars? But when you consider the time value of money, perhaps the investment has actually shrunk in real dollars (whatever those are anymore!). For a lot of us, our ability to pay for the upgrades has increased. So that segues to my second point: "Bring it on...!"

I think we are in violent agreement here.

We're also forgetting the 800 lb gorilla in the room - software.

The reason I still have a laserdisc player hooked up is that I still have a large number of laserdiscs that I play regularly. At the peak, I had 800 titles that I paid an average of $30/ea. That's a $24k investment which is 10x what I have invested in HW.

I am slowly replacing LD titles with Blu-Ray (and HD-DVD). I'm NOT replacing DVDs, except in special cases as the quality jump isn't worth scrapping yet another collection. I expect some LD titles will be around for a long time, as they were never released on DVD.

Where it gets expensive is when you have to be the first kid on the block. If you bought a Hi Def media player three years ago, you paid between $600 and $1k for it. Wait a bit and you pay $200 or less. Same with the rest of the components, plus you find yourself buying and rebuying the same things as 1080P, Dolby TrueHD, BD profile 2, etc come out.

But, hey, I like to be bleeding edge as much as the next guy. But I tend to wait for the first round of price cuts and the second generation so the features are stable. I've still got the best system of my friends, family and neighbors.