AfterDawn: News

YouTube now supports 4k resolution

Today during the VidCon 2010 conference, Google has announced that YouTube will now support video with 4k resolution, over double what the current 1080p standard allows for.

4k has a pixel resolution of 4096 x 3072, whereas 1080p has resolution of 1920 x 1080.



"To give some perspective on the size of 4K, the ideal screen size for a 4K video is 25 feet; IMAX movies are projected through two 2k resolution projectors," says Ramesh Sarukkai, a YouTube engineer.

Many users will not be able to even run the videos at this point, as it requires "super fast broadband," likely with 15Mbps as a bare minimum.

You can test out streaming a 4k video here (click on the link and switch resolution to "original"):



Written by: Andre Yoskowitz @ 9 Jul 2010 16:43

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• 5 comments

• cleverick

  When you click to in large the screen on my 5yr old Vaio laptop, it does not distort like other videos on youtube. I have an upload speed of around 7 mbps and works fine.

  9.7.2010 22:18 #1

• KillerBug

  That is cool, not that there will be much use made of it, but it is nice to know that if I buy a $10,000 camera, I can upload to youtube at original resolution.

  9.7.2010 23:51 #2

• NHS2008

  It will not play instantly but if you pause the video at very beginning and wait a while it will play just fine over a standard 2 mbps connection that I have. of course provided you have the right hardware to handle that high resolution. Actually this video is fairly abysmal in quality, I downloaded it. it's just around 90 Mb! total bitrate is 6500 something and for audio it's just 119. I have some 1080p videos with greater bitrate. It plays fine with Quicktime. Lags a bit with Media Player Classic..but thats just the filters I've set in codecs probably.
  
  

  
  
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  10.7.2010 03:23 #3

• blueboy09

  Ummm, why? Isn't 1080p good enough for people? The tech isn't even the standard yet. Nice way to show it, but unless you have a 4K resolution screen (I know I don't), this doesn't make sense, and on top of that, it eats your bandwidth like a mother. Sorry guys, try again in 8-10 years.
  

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  11.7.2010 12:02 #4

• oappi

  it played fine with 8mbit dsl connection. maybe it was the original video but colors didn't seem very deep. Then again it might just be because my highend monitor is being repaired and im now using low end LG monitor =/.
  
  4k is kinda pointless now, but it is nice to see google pushing the limit, even if there wont be any comercial 4k monitors for a while. Better to have way too much than not enough. i wonder how much traffic these videos will generate =).

  11.7.2010 18:34 #5