Why do we need uhd blu Ray

Jared Rapsey

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Why do we need the next format of uhd or 4K if you like on a disk why not a memory stick like usb.

they are easy to use, can't be scratched and take up less space
 

expat_mike

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The_Lhc said:
Costs too much to produce at a guess, discs are cheap.

It is not just the discs that are cheap, but also the factory time required to get data onto the disc/stick.

For discs:

The retail cost of a recordable bluray disc is about 50p.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TDK-Blu-ray-Disc-Spindle-Printable/dp/B002RT85RW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1446302407&sr=8-1&keywords=blank+bluray+discs

The cost to the music producer will be less than that, plus the music data is imprinted onto the disc when it is pressed, so the physical disc arrives at their factory with no additional operations needed.

The overall cost to the music producer for the physical bluray disc, containing the music will be of the order of pence.

For memory sticks:

The retail cost of a blank 32 Gb memory stick is of the order of 8 pounds.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kingston-Technology-DataTraveler-Generation-Flash/dp/B00C5K8E1A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1446302733&sr=8-1&keywords=32+gb+memory+sticks

The cost to the music producer will be less than that, but they still have to get the music loaded onto the memory stick. Anyone who uses a computer will know that it will take several minutes to load the 25Gb of data onto the memory stick. This time represents the bottleneck on how many copies of the music can be produced each day, and leave the factory door. The more discs/memory sticks that leave the factory, the lower the unit operating cost, and the larger the profit.

The upstream costs of initially recording the music, and downstream costs of marketing etc will be the same, whatever medium is used.

But overall the music producer will always see optical discs as the cheaper solution.
 

macdiddy

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physical format like uhd bluray, because until very high speed broadband is available everywhere at an affordable price then uhd bluray will be the best way of providing movies in 4K at the highest resolution.

This is because current 4K streaming services like netflix and BT require constant high bit rates to perform at their best, netflix needs about 20Mbps and BT's 4K sports channel requires around 44Mbps ( you can only access the channel if you sign up for their own top end broadband).

The most important reason imo that we need another format like uhd bluray is that a disc based format is still the only way to get hd surround sound formats like Dolby True hd 5.1 & 7.1, DTS master audio 5.1 & 7.1 and new immersive surround formats like Dolby Atmos and DTS X so we have the best sound to go with the best picture, you can't have one without the other unlike current streaming services such as netflix, amazon etc which only offer boring Dolby digital and have no intention of offering anything else.

*music2*
 

daveh75

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There's no reason they couldn't be offered as downloads or include HD audio, other than its an industry run by dinosaurs with contempt for the consumer.

We don't need another physical format. What we need is the industry to adapt...
 

f1only

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expat_mike said:
The_Lhc said:
Costs too much to produce at a guess, discs are cheap.

It is not just the discs that are cheap, but also the factory time required to get data onto the disc/stick.

For discs:

The retail cost of a recordable bluray disc is about 50p.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TDK-Blu-ray-Disc-Spindle-Printable/dp/B002RT85RW/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1446302407&sr=8-1&keywords=blank+bluray+discs

The cost to the music producer will be less than that, plus the music data is imprinted onto the disc when it is pressed, so the physical disc arrives at their factory with no additional operations needed.

The overall cost to the music producer for the physical bluray disc, containing the music will be of the order of pence.

For memory sticks:

The retail cost of a blank 32 Gb memory stick is of the order of 8 pounds.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kingston-Technology-DataTraveler-Generation-Flash/dp/B00C5K8E1A/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1446302733&sr=8-1&keywords=32+gb+memory+sticks

The cost to the music producer will be less than that, but they still have to get the music loaded onto the memory stick. Anyone who uses a computer will know that it will take several minutes to load the 25Gb of data onto the memory stick. This time represents the bottleneck on how many copies of the music can be produced each day, and leave the factory door. The more discs/memory sticks that leave the factory, the lower the unit operating cost, and the larger the profit.

The upstream costs of initially recording the music, and downstream costs of marketing etc will be the same, whatever medium is used.

But overall the music producer will always see optical discs as the cheaper solution.

The price for a 25gb BDR may be cheap but a 4k film is going to be more than that 75 to 100gb if the quality is good & they are not exactly a common size at present where as a 64gb usb is. Or you could download it as a file, as someone else suggested, this may take a couple of hours depending on your internet connection.

I've just converted a download (I HAVE PAID FOR) from 1080p to 4K as an experiment (it took 4 hours on an 4th generation i7 gaming pc with a fast samsung 1TB ssd drive & 16gb of Hyperx ram) & the 4k file with 5.1 surround is 4 times the size of the original & to be honest was not worth the time or effort to convert... does NOT improve picture or sound quality either.
 

Jared Rapsey

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Where I live ( and lots of other parts of the UK ) the internet connection is very poor no fibre optic etc so I don't steam in hd, medium quality at best so a format would be best for me and the lack high def audio via download has also been mentioned, but think of an sd card and how it's just a small peace of plastic I think mass producing the right size for 4K movies or a new type of memory card for the use of could be the next format
 

expat_mike

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f1only said:
The price for a 25gb BDR may be cheap but a 4k film is going to be more than that 75 to 100gb if the quality is good & they are not exactly a common size at present where as a 64gb usb is. Or you could download it as a file, as someone else suggested, this may take a couple of hours depending on your internet connection.

I've just converted a download (I HAVE PAID FOR) from 1080p to 4K as an experiment (it took 4 hours on an 4th generation i7 gaming pc with a fast samsung 1TB ssd drive & 16gb of Hyperx ram) & the 4k file with 5.1 surround is 4 times the size of the original & to be honest was not worth the time or effort to convert... does NOT improve picture or sound quality either.

Don't get distracted from the bigger picture - even if I have underestimated the cost to the manufacturer of the optical disc, by a factor of 10, it will still be cheaper than using a memory stick.

Making the files available for download will be cheaper still, but this scares the music/film producers. There is a section in the book "The longer Long Tail" that explains the economics, and that the music/film producers are ultimately fighting a losing battle to hang on to physical media. This is not because of consumer rights, but because it has already been demonstrated that they will make less money, if they refuse to use the download route. Ultimately the shareholders will win the argument, because they favour maximising profit.

For the 99% of books/films/music that are not bestsellers, it is far cheaper to maintain one copy of each on a server, and allow it to be downloaded by customers (eg Amazon Kindle), than maintain warehouses full of physical copies, which then require a physical supply chain, to get them to customers. For the 1% of bestsellers, you merely need to use multiple servers, and ensure good internet bandwidth - but this is still much cheaper than printing a million copies of a bestselling book, then storing them, then distributing to shops (the same logic applies to music and film CDs/DVDs/Bluray etc).
 

Jared Rapsey

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Your right it's easier to download a book and cheaper than printing one but can it be signed by the author and dose it have the same effect when given as a gift and can you imagine in court swearing on an iPad to tell the truth the hole truth and nothing but the truth rather than a bible
 

f1only

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expat_mike said:
Don't get distracted from the bigger picture - even if I have underestimated the cost to the manufacturer of the optical disc, by a factor of 10, it will still be cheaper than using a memory stick.

Making the files available for download will be cheaper still, but this scares the music/film producers. There is a section in the book "The longer Long Tail" that explains the economics, and that the music/film producers are ultimately fighting a losing battle to hang on to physical media. This is not because of consumer rights, but because it has already been demonstrated that they will make less money, if they refuse to use the download route. Ultimately the shareholders will win the argument, because they favour maximising profit.

Bearing in mind you can download a legitimate copy of a film in 1080p with surround formats included relatively cheaply from the likes of amazon or google to name just 2 sources (why have they not stopped it if the makers / producers are so scared), i cant see the problem of downloading 4K or 8K formats in the future as long as they can get the encoding correct & watermark files in such a way as to stop pirates.

All anyone has to do is buy a NAS drive & download the film purchased directly from the film studios so cutting out the middle men like amazon & others... then stream it from aformentioned NAS drive, easy.

Ok the initial outlay for nas drives & discs are a little expensive to start, but a good one can auto back up your files & uses hot swappable tech, so if a drive fails it's easy to replace & the whole thing takes up a lot less space than 20 Blu-ray films in their cases. A 3TB drive can hold approxamately 580 films (Assuming originally recorded on a 50gb BD) with full 1080p playback & surround sound. The new 4k that we will soon be getting is supposed to be using 100-125gb BD, which would still mean you could get at least 250 films on a modestly priced £85 3TB HDD
 
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Are there any Ultra HD Blu-Ray's on Amazon? Can someone link? Ta.
 

MajorFubar

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f1only said:
I've just converted a download (I HAVE PAID FOR) from 1080p to 4K as an experiment (it took 4 hours on an 4th generation i7 gaming pc with a fast samsung 1TB ssd drive & 16gb of Hyperx ram) & the 4k file with 5.1 surround is 4 times the size of the original & to be honest was not worth the time or effort to convert... does NOT improve picture or sound quality either.

What were you expecting?! You can't put back what wasn't there to start with by upscaling the resolution. Do you think if you upscale a tired old 240p video from a ten year old smartphone to 1920x1080 it's suddenly going to look look HD? True 4K films were shot/rendered at >=4K to begin with, not upscaled from quarter the resolution.
 
D

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I don't know, I just thought they might have done. Not expecting anytime soon them. Zzzzz
 

nugget2014

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Jared Rapsey said:
Don't know memory cards not that expensive plus they will charge £25 plus for udh bd movie when they come out anyway

no they wont. 2d blu rays are at most £15 and sometimes £13 at the moment. you think they will charge DOUBLE? they might be around £17-18 and £20 (since they always have two prices for some reason..)
 

f1only

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MajorFubar said:
f1only said:
I've just converted a download (I HAVE PAID FOR) from 1080p to 4K as an experiment (it took 4 hours on an 4th generation i7 gaming pc with a fast samsung 1TB ssd drive & 16gb of Hyperx ram) & the 4k file with 5.1 surround is 4 times the size of the original & to be honest was not worth the time or effort to convert... does NOT improve picture or sound quality either.

What were you expecting?! You can't put back what wasn't there to start with by upscaling the resolution. Do you think if you upscale a tired old 240p video from a ten year old smartphone to 1920x1080 it's suddenly going to look look HD? True 4K films were shot/rendered at >=4K to begin with, not upscaled from quarter the resolution.

As you may have noticed i did say "as an experiment", mainly to see what size the end file would be to be honest. No need to patronise me I know you can't make a silk purse out of a sows ear, i am not that naive. I ended deleting it all the same day.

So in answer to the original question ... because we will always strive for better sound & picture quality as was said in another part of the forum... because we can.

Amazon are selling 4k On a stick with a Blu-ray 3D £14.50 nothing decent.
 

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