NEWS: 4K TV content struggles to find audience

I was watching Our Planet on Netflix in HD, my eyes though it was 4k it looked pristine. Quality 4k down scaled to 1080p can look stunning but then you get Football in HD on the BBC which has been put through the ringer destroying detail and looks a mess compared to quality 4k Footy. I would be happy with quality HD but these days its not possible, well not when the broadcaster has to filter the sh#t out of it and shoe horn it into an abysmally low bitrate allocation. I guess the majority get used to the crap and just live with it.
 
Audience struggles to find 4K TV content.
Where is the rest of Game of Thrones in 4K ? And garbage in 4K remains garbage. 4K blu ray being unrealisticly expensive, often 3 times the price of the blu ray. Now they are trying to sell 8k TVs... how long before such content is available. 1 UHD channel on my Belgian tv distribution (and only rubbish)
 
Lack of 4K content is the reason as pointed out, TV companies wants customers to upgrade to 4K sets, but watch HD & SD content mostly and if u don’t like or want crap Netflix & Amazon TV shows or don’t want Sky football, then it’s all HD.

BBC, ITV C4 have no regular 4K content, with BBC showing 4K in Iplayer, once in a blue moon!
 
A better title may be "Audiences struggling to find 4k content" because I know on my 4k TV I often have to actively look for 4k feeds for programs I know are in 4k because it doesn't tell me otherwise.

The promotion of streaming 4k is terrible in general and you also need to factor in the staggering bandwidth requirements that mean it automatically rules out vast swathes of people, especially in the US where Internet access is generally terrible (both speed and cost).

The Quote is right about them forgetting 8k as the streaming infrastructure is probably 5 years or more off for that.

G
 
Interesting how tv manufacturers are now starting to roll out 8k but 4k has barely taken off after 3-5 years
 
All a bit odd really.

You couldn't get game of thrones in 4k in the UK. In fact a lot of people got it in 720p via Now TV, me included.

There is no price premium in buying 4k as its pretty much all you can buy 43" and above, so your getting it, but barely an upgrade in PQ over HD for most people, most of the time.
 
It’s a business of buying useless TVs and fools are vulnerable into upgrading.

Yeah, I was in currys the other day and the guy i was speaking with was helpful - telling me about nanocell technology - this would mean absolutely nothing to 90% of consumers (myself included if I didn't read avforums! :)) but they fall for it because it sounds good and probably end up buying OTT TVs for their needs.

Honestly i reckon most (not all) people would be happy with a £500 TV - HD or 4K - for the next 3 years or so.
 
one reason could be down to viewer indifference in the image quality gains from HD to 4K
It could also be because there actually aren't any image quality gains between a high-quality 1080p source and a 4K SDR source - or rather, at typical screen sizes and viewing distances, the human eye isn't sensitive enough to detect them.

But that won't stop manufacturers from marketing 8K, or people from buying it, because obviously 8 must be better than 4. :(
 
Nothing to do with content, all manufactures in all industry’s move forward over time with new equipment, which while initially expensive soon drops so that it cost no more (And sometimes less) to make than previous generation products, thus previous generation products become unviable to manufacture.

Early HD sets are coming to the end of their lives (They just don’t provide or work properly with the modern tech that people are now used to) so an auto upgrade takes place, which means that as there are no HD sets at the most common sizes (55 & 65 are the most common these days) 4K sets becomes the norm. (The same will apply to 8K and beyond)

Bill
 
I'm still rocking 1080p. I actually went from a 4k LCD to a 1080p OLED. Most of our content is streamed and it's very rarely above 720p due to slow internet, so 4k just didn't make sense given it's poor upscaling. Yeah there is 4k discs, but the GF refuses to rewatch anything, so spending 25-30 for a single watch is a huge waste of money.
 
Ignorance and indifference are big factors - loads of people buy 4K TVs because they're the latest thing (and more readily available these days)... then continue to watch SD channels because they appear first in the program planner of most broadcasters.

Every time I used to visit my parents they'd be watching BBC/CH4/ITV etc. in SD despite having an HD TV.
 
My previous HD LCD cost a fair bit less than my last CRT TV and a 4K TV needn't have cost much more except I went for OLED. HD Freeview looks pretty good on the OLED and even SD is watchable so if thats what people want to watch and enjoy on their 4K TV then let them.

But its hardly a well hidden secret that you can get a 4K Sky or VM box or a 4K Netflix plan. On Itunes many HD films will play in 4K only requiring that you know to buy a ATV box. On sale you buy Itunes 4K films for £2+ so there's no need to buy £20+ UHD disks to get 4K content. On the other hand BBC 4K output is virtually non existent considering the £150 annual fee.
 
It doesn't help when in an age where people are looking at being more thrifty with their money, that services offering 4K will mean an upgrade to people's outgoings too. If we are talking about a general take up of UHD, then the general public will in no way pay circa £24 for a new release. It also doesn't help when you have the likes of Now TV putting out an absolutely dross service. As an aside you only have to look at Sky's lack of HDR content to see another problem. They've marketed the heck out of Sky Q's Ultra HD service, yet not offered the main component that actually does improve picture quality. No wonder people are apathetic over 4K when the largest UK Pay TV service either offers a poor 720p for the low income masses, or subpar 4K for the niche.

Also, it's actually worthwhile noting that there's a good portion of us even on this forum that know full well a decent 1080p source still can look stunning, so we can hardly bemoan the less than picky general public for not bothering with 4K.
 
Most people I know are still using their 1080P sets from 5-7 years ago, which are still going strong. They all have plenty of money too, but just aren't bothered by 4K, and wouldn't have an idea what HDR is, nor that it is the bigger PQ improvement.

And I have a bit of sympathy with that view. I tend to like to have the best of the best, but a Blu-ray on my 65inch high end plasma is still so gorgeous, I'll happily keep the 3-4k in my pocket required to update.
 
Our 4K TV is generally used for 4K Disks, Apple TV, & a few series on Amazon Prime. Except for some American Football, we don't watch "regular" TV channels. Its upscaling is very good, so regular Blu Rays look great as well - often I only upgrade to the 4K Disk for better sound (Atmos, or a redo of the original Blu Ray recording), otherwise we stay with the Blu Ray.
I can see 8K mostly appealing to people who can fit big TV's in their viewing Room, but our 55" is about as big as we could fit in our TV Alcove (Maybe a 65" at a pinch). Along with the price and the limited Market I agree that 8K is going to be very niche for a very long time.
 
If a survey was made on UK habits, I'm sure it wouldn't be an issue of indifference, instead appalling software and delivery combined with below par broadband and wireless capability.

I don't have experience of Virgin but nothing at all on SkyQ is delivered as broadcast TV. For football you need to watch the live HD feed and enter a combination of remote button presses to switch to UHD, and you can't setup the box to automatically record the UHD feed. For shows that you season pass, you have to record the HD version, and wait at least 30 minutes and then browse or search fir the On-Demand UHD version and download it. Even the default download UHD is buggy often making you check for UHD over HD when you select the download.

For Amazon they have a single membership level that gives you UHD/4K fir free but they don't easily highlight the option in the App and the UHD version must be searched and selected separately from the standard version. Why on earth its so hard to unify the show and just offer the option on playback will never know.

Netflix at least dies unify the search/browse by the show and offers you the best version on playback detected by the App on startup. But you only get UHD if you a) have a modern app iteration on your smart playback device b) have detected suitable Internet bandwidth and c) pay for the highest tier even if you don't need the multiple device playback bundled in.

And don't let's ignore the whole inconsistency on any number of options such as 4k/HDR/HDR+/Dolby Vision/Stereo/DD/DD+/Atmos across the device app implementations, or the limitations of 4K TVs on HDMI 4k/50/4:4:4 output or sound format pass thru via ARC, etc from inbuilt apps.
 
If a survey was made on UK habits, I'm sure it wouldn't be an issue of indifference, instead appalling software and delivery combined with below par broadband and wireless capability.

I don't have experience of Virgin but nothing at all on SkyQ is delivered as broadcast TV. For football you need to watch the live HD feed and enter a combination of remote button presses to switch to UHD, and you can't setup the box to automatically record the UHD feed. For shows that you season pass, you have to record the HD version, and wait at least 30 minutes and then browse or search fir the On-Demand UHD version and download it. Even the default download UHD is buggy often making you check for UHD over HD when you select the download.

For Amazon they have a single membership level that gives you UHD/4K fir free but they don't easily highlight the option in the App and the UHD version must be searched and selected separately from the standard version. Why on earth its so hard to unify the show and just offer the option on playback will never know.

Netflix at least dies unify the search/browse by the show and offers you the best version on playback detected by the App on startup. But you only get UHD if you a) have a modern app iteration on your smart playback device b) have detected suitable Internet bandwidth and c) pay for the highest tier even if you don't need the multiple device playback bundled in.

And don't let's ignore the whole inconsistency on any number of options such as 4k/HDR/HDR+/Dolby Vision/Stereo/DD/DD+/Atmos across the device app implementations, or the limitations of 4K TVs on HDMI 4k/50/4:4:4 output or sound format pass thru via ARC, etc from inbuilt apps.

Not sure about that - yes you've accurately showed why the user experience is messy and broken, but we're also far from content being widely available in 4k, let alone HDR.

There are niche things that get discussed on this forum, and UHD is not quite as niche as some fo those things, not suggesting that. But most people are happy enough with HD. Of course if you ask them an open ended question like "do you want to be able to watch everything in the highest possible quality, such as UHD", they'll say yes.

But that's not illustrative of the broader publics actual habits. I'm sure they are generally aware of 4K, know that he next big TV they get will likely be 4k, but beyond that couldn't tell you much more.
 
I thought I had nigh on stopped buying discs as having so many that never get watched . But after buying a oled and 4k player I'm back buying discs again . I never pay more than £12 I tend to buy 2nd hand or wait for deals . The quality of HDR 4k just blows me away . More than happy with Netflix and Amazon just wish Amazon was easier . Next is weather it's worth going Atmos but that means more speakers and changing the amp . My amp cost more than the TV a few year's back and really can't justify the cost so stuck with plain old hd master audio . After watching Dunkirk I think I am more than happy it sounded amazing . People in general just couldn't care about 4 k i believe and have a amp and speakers
 
Netflix 4k content is a bit of a letdown. Don't have sky q but I expect its no different. The only 4k content which has blown me away is 4k blu ray
 
I think the best innovation we have had in terms of picture quality for televisions in the last 2.5 years has to be OLED regardless weather its 4k or 1080p its something which is noticeable the only downside is its still to expensive for the average Joe hence why I'm still sitting on my 1080p TV till the price starts to come down further.
 

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