Soon after the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) began licensing the Ultra HD Blu-ray format Samsung officially unveiled to the world their first curved ultra-high-definition (UHD) Blu-ray player the UBS-K8500. The player will support 10-bit colour gamut along with the new HDR standard and the ability to play back UHD content up to 60fps via it’s HDMI 2.0 port.
The new UHD Blu-ray player also supports object-based sound formats such as Dolby Atmos and DTS:X which makes home movie experience both in terms of picture and sound a way more engaging and immersive. The price of the device wasn’t announced yet, but its suggested that it will cost around $500 and will hit the shelves in the US and Europe in early 2016.
Yet, the main problem with these devices remains the content. Currently, most of the UHD media is streamed digitally at much lower bit-rates and there are hardly any physical sources that can handle these files as they are huge and hard to be streamed and stored considering the average bandwidth capabilities available out there.
Unsurprisingly, 20th Century Fox will be one of the first major studios that will release several UHD Blu-rays for the launch of Samsung’s players. There will be both original UHD content, along with some remastered older titles. After the release and relatively fast adoption of UHD TVs and monitors, UHD streaming services and UHD ready players (that simply upscale the HD footage to UHD resolution) in the recent years, it seems that the announcement of the Samsung UBS-K8500 is the next logical step in the 4K evolution.
For pixel peepers, filmmakers and enthusiasts alike this means broader colour gamut, faster frames rates, true UHD resolution, more advanced sound environment and at last but no least, the possibility to preview their 4K content in its true glory without any bandwidth limitations and quality sacrifices. We are definitely more excited to see what the other brands are going to bring to the table, but one thing is for sure – 4K acquisition is getting closer and closer to its tipping point as we speak and it’s definitely here to stay.
[source: Arstechnica]
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I believe that Panasonic is also coming out with a UHD Blu-ray player. Can’t wait to see what my TV can produce hopefully this will rejuvenate the local video stores. I film in 4k so it would be nice to have a player/recorder also.
They did back at CES in January, but we’re yet to see it anywhere https://www.4kshooters.net/2015/01/09/panasonic-4k-blu-ray-player-ultra-hd-blu-ray-discs-details-from-ces-2015/