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Ask HN: How long until 4k video is mainstream?

2 points by coralreef ↗ HN
For 4k video to work on the internet, it seems we need a few factors: 1) filming devices/media (which we seem to already have available) 2) high speed internet 3) 4k monitors.

High resolution media and capture devices are a given. So are affordable 4k monitors. And most of the developed world can get 1080p video streaming decently.

But 4k is several multiples larger in terms of bandwidth. It seems that bandwidth is the bottleneck.

Will 4k come sooner, or later?

6 comments

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gablushablu
5-10 years may be, 4K seems promising, but 1080P isn't too bad either, and mostly people upgraded to 1080P just recently, so I do not see 4K becoming very popular (or somewhat popular) in next 5-10 years.
cbhl
I think the limiting factor is hardware.

Software video decoding is slow and causes devices' fans to spin up, which is why people use workarounds (such as visiting YouTube in Safari) to force hardware-accelerated H.264 decoding instead of using software VP9 decoding, despite VP9 using less bandwidth.

By the time VP9 and H.265 hardware video decoding is cheap and ubiquitous, I suspect the rest of the factors will fall into place.

The last TV buying guide I read was still suggesting 720p TVs at certain screen sizes ("it's a better value"), with 1080p for the remainder. But 1080p is starting to see wider adoption; even a Raspberry Pi can do hardware H.264 decode/encode these days.

jolan
H.265 hardware decoding is already cheap. For instance, the $35 odroid-c1 has it.

Between NVIDIA GTX 900 cards out now and the coming support in Intel's Skylake, there will be a nice install base for H.265 by next year.

Unfortunately, there's no hasH265HWAccel property for netflix/youtube to check.

Joona
Really depends on when 4K monitors are affordable and most countries have high-speed internet.

4K monitors are still pretty pricey. I'd be more willing to purchase one once I can replace both my 120Hz monitor and my secondary with them. Then again, what's the point of getting a 4K monitor, when most of what I do is gaming, and GPUs can't really do 4K yet?

Here (in Finland) you can already get cheap, high-speed internet (no caps), so it's not a problem for us, but who's going to offer a service that's more expensive to run (compared to 1080p video) to such a small possible customer base?

When USA (and other large countries) get better internet, I'm sure the services will follow.

flyinglizard
4k will see wider adoption when content is streamed in 4k (Netflix, select YouTube channels) and promoted as such. Someone needs to leverage 4k as a competitive advantage for that to happen (e.g. Netflix doing this to distinguish their service from regular cable).