[studlygoorite]

Edit by Dr.Dave: See post 87 for Bell's soft launch info.

Jays and Leafs In 4K
Even though I can't get Fibe in my area yet (In Stony Creek) not a rural area, I will move if I have to to get my Jays and Leafs in 4K. Any chance Bell can get hooked into Rogers excellent offering?

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/37-rogers-cable-tv/247346-rogers-launches-4k-tv-4k-set-top-box.html

Rogers to Offer 4K Hockey This Season; 4K Baseball Next Season - Sportscaster Magazine

 

[thenewdc]

Nobody know what Bell's plans are as of yet. I think Bell might offer 4K but likely only to their customers that have Fiber to the Home. I don't think they have enough bandwidth to offer it on copper.

 

[ticky]

Cool your jets, OP.

Who is to say Bell will be willing to pay whatever price Rogers wants for the 4K feed? Who is to say whether Bell is willing to upgrade their infrastructure and equipment in order to handle a 4K channel that'll only be in-use 101 days of the year?

If you're that keen for 4K sports, maybe just switch to Rogers?!

 

[elyk]

How did we jump to 4K when they don't even offer 1080P yet - Most programming is either 720P or 1080i.

 

[Danster]

^^^^^ Maybe because all of a sudden, providers have gigabit internet to offer and that 1080i is so 2008 so instead, they jump to what is the next transition?
Few weeks ago, the only people who had the "power" to do so was Bell and all of a sudden, Telus is banging their drum as loud as ROGERS can and everybody has unlimited speeds. Go figure.

 

[nitra]

UHD is coming...... I can't really comment beyond that, but if you notice, Bell has been doing tons of new rollouts, depending on the area there's a lot more headroom to handle larger streams.
That said, in general terms, they've been trying to keep the experience largely consistent across all of the base, even FTTN/FTTH the FibeTV experience is the same. They want to maintain this.

 

[thenewdc]

You don't need Gigabit to stream 4K, just a 25Mbit connection and even less if it streamed in HEVC/H.265

 

[nitra]

I wasn't just referring to Gigabit, but they're using pair bonding now as well in wide use.

 

[CamDAB]

And hold onto your hats folks...

A broadcast engineer friend had a promo ticket and thus I saw a live performance of a Shakespeare play in Stratford, and after, had a tour of the video and audio trailers.

The scuttlebutt is, Japan is on the verge of 8K....

Your sports will sure look good I'm sure.

But the infrastructure and market forces will of course determine where it goes...

Cameron

 

[frankmar]

Imagine we get 1080i and signal is compressed, yes the so called 4k will be so compressed and I wonder how good it will look on a 60"tv vs 1080p on 60"tv.

Its another way to rip off customers. Tv stations should start broadcasting real 1080P not compressed 1080i.

You can watch same program on 2 different stations and you can notice that one was compressed more than the other.

 

[57]

Imagine we get 1080i and signal is compressed...

No, Bell Fibe (and Sat) send out 720P signals to the STB. This has been confirmed numerous times in the forum. See FAQ below. Some OD programming is available as 1080P.

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/30-57s-home-theatre-faqs/76129-faq-hdtv-formats.html

All stations "broadcast" compressed signals. The original uncompressed HD signal is over 1 Gbps, while the max allowed currently for (OTA) broadcast is less than 20 Mbps, a compression factor of more than 50:1. That's before the providers send/convert the signal that you get, which may have additional compression (Bell Fibe definitely due to bandwidth limitations). The type of compression can be important as well though, but that's really the subject of another thread.

Some "broadcasters" who don't send signals OTA may provide the service providers with signals up to about 50 Mbps - the kind of signals that some FTA people "see". In that case, Fibe would recompress that signal by a factor of roughly 10:1.

 

[Deanoyyz]

Fibe 4K Coming this month!!

Bell is now advertising "4K Picture Quality at the highest level. Coming to Fibe TV in January".... on Mobile phones, TV, Internet and Home phone service | Bell Canada

Of course Bell support doesn't have any details.

I did a search and learned that "Ericsson is bringing to the market 4K and HEVC capabilities in its Mediaroom IPTV platform, with availability in the second half of 2015"...

I wonder if existing hardware will support 4K and how much 4K content Bell will have at launch. Guessing mostly MLSE content.

 

[thenewdc]

I'm sure they will have access to Sportsnet 4K content but not SHOMI unless they start offering it on their set tops. I wonder if they will step up to the plate with TSN 4K? Oh ya, forgot OLN will have some 4K content available as well.

 

[Dr.Dave]

@Deanoyyz I merged your thread with this prior discussion.

For those that want to see Bell's ad, it is currently the last banner in the carousel on Bell's home page.

@Deanoyyz I looked into the subject when 4K was first raised and again last week. Ericsson didn't have any actual product announcements at that time, but they usually test with providers like Bell before they actually make the public announcement. I just found the same press release that you did. We may see something at CES (Consumer Electronics Show) next week.

4K will probably require new hardware, since there's no indication that the existing STBs are capable of 4K.

There isn't much potential 4K content at this time - the above Rogers announcement, some Discovery 4K programs and the Stingray ambiance channel.

They could offer some paid VOD movies in 4K.

 

[thenewdc]

I doubt they will use something that decodes HEVC with software. I think a new Set-top would be necessary with hardware decoding of HEVC 4k broadcasts. It sounds to me like 4K to the press release because of Rogers announcement.

 

[nitra]

There are new boxes coming.... HEVC will be hardware based.

Can't go into further details, but the Ericsson boxes line up perfectly with expectations.

 

[MCIBUS]

Assuming a new box comes out, i wish it has these features:

1) Displays time on front of receiver panel.
2) PVR can record more then 4 shows at a time(6-8 would be fine)
3) Has dual tuner to feed two TV's(PVR)
4) Has addressable remote(like Bell TV remote)
5) Has bright back lighted keys on remote for visual impaired users & dark time use.
6) Price be reasonable either to buy, rent or rent own.

 

[thenewdc]

Without Fibre to the Home they cant offer a PVR that can record up to 8 programs, not enough bandwidth.

 

[nitra]

Not correct, current boxes on business accounts can record 8 streams.
If there's not enough bandwidth, they can bond 2 connections.

 

[thenewdc]

Ya but it requires bonding. I can get 2 PVR's on 1 Rogers connection and record 16 different programs.