No 4K Video Streaming Support for Upcoming Apple TV Set-Top Box

[dampfnudel]

A 4K TV doesn't force anyone to buy a 4K TV now. It will be able to downscale to 1080p or 720p just fine. So anyone who feels as you imply, can simply wait until TV technology gets to whatever standard of 4K they need before they buy.

Anyone buying an Watch right now will probably need to replace it in 3 years. So we shouldn't buy Watch? Anyone buying an iPhone right now will probably need to replace it in 3 years. So we shouldn't buy iPhone? And so on.

Why does such thinking only apply to this ONE thing... but not pretty much everything else that Apple makes?

----------

People tend to keep their TVs longer than they typically keep their smartphones, smartwatches, tablets, laptops, etc. That means their decision what to buy is even more critical when it comes to future compatibility. I usually keep my TVs 7-10 years. I never said people shouldn't buy the Apple Watch, next iPhone or anything else other than 4K TVs that are not compatible with 4K blu-ray players and/or lack anything else that will be the standard by this time next year. Sometimes as you know, it actually pays to wait.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

I can't follow what you're saying. I think you're saying people should wait to buy a 4K TV. If so, buying a 4K TV (set top box) is completely disconnected from such a decision. They could immediately go buy a 4K TV too or wait years... or NEVER buy a 4K TV and still use that TV box with the 1080p or 720p HDTV they already have.

If it's something about waiting until 4K standards are completely set for all such hardware, a cheap set-top box in which Apple guesses wrong on such a standard will not cost much to replace if the hardware cannot be adapted with the software to make it work with some other 4K standard you think(?) will be finalized next year.

 

[SteveW928]

4K Blu-Ray players and content will be out at the end of 2015.
http://www.cnet.com/au/news/ultra-hd-4k-blu-ray-what-we-know/

Maybe the people you dismiss as "clueless" are future-proofing with their tv purchases and have the money to afford it.

Most of the current 4k sets people are buying are garbage. And, most of them have no need for them, now or in the future. It's not future-proofing... it's a gimmick.

Now, some day, for some people who use projection or have HUGE screens in their home theatres... I suppose it's something to consider. And, I'm sure some day everyone will buy a 4k set, as they all will be. But, that won't be because the average home TV viewer will get anything extra out of it, now or in the future.

 

[SteveW928]

How many people said cell phones were stupid and were a waste when they first came out?


Same with HD TVs. When they came out, same BS argument was made. Why? There is no HD content out there.

People buy 4K TV because hey, shiny. Content providers say "Hey, people are buying this, maybe we should start producing...

As for the person who said that net neutrality will bring data caps, ugh.

For the people saying you can't see the difference anyway, either YOU can't or you haven't actually bothered.

re: cell phones - they did?

re: same BS argument - Really? I do remember arguments to wait for prices to drop because there wasn't enough content.... but I don't recall anyone saying HD wasn't clearly better on displays over a certain size (which is pretty small because SD is pretty horrible, actually).

re: 4K TV because hey, shiny - This might be Apple's one misstep. I agree, people will buy 4K because 'shiny' and then want 4K content and not buy Apple because not 4K. This is because these people are idiots, but that's long been a problem for Apple. Idiots often buy based on shiny and price. Apple generally hasn't played that game. But, they've done OK I guess.

re: net neutrality - Agreed. People are REALLY clueless on that one. If anything it might bring competition, which might bring better prices, higher caps, etc. The only reason we have such slow Internet, low caps, and excessive prices is because of zero competition. While net neutrality is addressing something completely different, it might help. On the other hand, it's quite likely the evil government will sneak in some 'lawful content' language in, which even if Net Neutrality (as defined by the FCC) sticks (which I don't think it will), we'll be screwed in the long-run by censorship net neutrality was designed to get rid of.

re: USA vs world - Agree, but unfortunately, a lot of places take the lead from the USA on this stuff. I'm in Canada and it's even worse here.

re: can't see the difference - Baloney! Of course you could see the difference between 480p (if lucky) and 1080p unless the screen was quite small or you were a good distance away. That's a massive quality leap and screens got WAY bigger fairly quickly. But, the jump from 1080p to 4k is far harder to see unless you're REALLY close or have a REALLY big screen. I don't know many people with 80+" screens or where they only sit a few feet from the screen... do you?

 

[SteveW928]

Nobody needs 4K just like nobody needs Retina displays but you still get one when you buy MBP. And 4K makes a lot more sense than tiny high resolution displays.

It's actually the opposite. The closer you are to a display, the more high resolution (i.e. Retina) is needed. The reason *most* people don't need 4K TVs, is that few have screens over 80" or site just a few feet away. Many use phones, tablets, and sometimes even laptops just a foot or two away (where your eye can actually see that kind of pixel density, or lack thereof).

 

[SteveW928]

This seems a little odd to me. It's pretty clear that we are on the verge of widespread 4k adoption, and a device like an ATV is likely to be kept by the average buyer for 5 years or so. Sure, 2015 may be a little early, but I would expect that by this time next year most of the TV's for sale will be 4k. Why would Apple want to stay so far behind the curve?

Well, we're on the verge of many people buying 4K TVs... because that's what the stores might stock. But, we're far from 4K adoption.

 

[zhenya]

Well, we're on the verge of many people buying 4K TVs... because that's what the stores might stock. But, we're far from 4K adoption.

Maybe, but with many Streaming Services offering it more, I don't think it's quite as far off as people might think. On the other hand, I'd really rather see Apple adopt uncompressed (or at least much less compressed) 1080p content before worrying about 4k.

 

[DaveN]

Really? People have the dumbest excuses for criminality. How about you not buy things on Amazon if you are that cheap? Use your legs for delivery if you don't want to pay for it. I'm too cheap to tip a pizza guy to deliver a pizza for less than a mile. But I don't still get delivery but stiff the delivery guy. I get off the couch and go get it myself.

P.S. I'm from MN. Heard plenty of jokes about Wisconsin people over the years but being cheap wasn't one of them. Not an excuse anyway.

How is that criminal? I'm accepting Amazon's offer and paying them for items that they are selling. The price I pay is the price they ask. No more. No less. Don't get mad at me because I am better at it than you are.

 

[cbautis2]

Forget 4K for 4K TVs, 4K would look better on a 1080p set just because of the chroma resolution upgrade.

It's always odd how Apple is so purposeful in dragging their feet for some technologies, but goes balls to wall for adopting certain features/interfaces for the latest and greatest.

4K does look better than 1080p at a closer range. You get less screen door effect for sure. Well that is really the selling point of 4K. 4K on a 1080p will still look like 1080p since the screen door effect is still there while 1080p (uncompressed) will look better on a 4K screen of the same size.

 

[laurim]

How is that criminal? I'm accepting Amazon's offer and paying them for items that they are selling. The price I pay is the price they ask. No more. No less. Don't get mad at me because I am better at it than you are.

Ok, not criminal, just dishonest and immoral. Is that better? You are accepting Amazon's offer under false pretenses just to get free shipping because you never intend to get Prime. Bad enough to do it once but you do it repeatedly. Are you really proud that you are scamming Amazon out of shipping costs? Would your parents be proud? My parents didn't raise me to be that kind of person. We have standards. But hey, keep stealing shipping costs from Amazon and people like myself will make up the difference for you *patting your head*

It's sad that you would admit to doing it in a public forum. It tells us your moral compass doesn't work when you don't realize you are doing something you should be ashamed to tell other people about. But it gives people the opportunity to let you know it's not cool.

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Apple still doesn't support DTS or any of the other newer BD type surround formats so I guess I shouldn't be suprised that they won't support 4k video. There was a time when Apple used to LEAD the pack in new features and sadly these days they now lag way way WAY behind everyone else. You can't even view a damn .AVI video from your digital camera that still uses on an Apple TV without converting it first. OS X can't preview such formats or MKV or anything else without converting. Honestly, Apple has a pretty myopic view these days. If I have a 4k set and want to use 4k Netflix, they have simply assured I will NOT buy an AppleTV for the job. How is THAT good business when the next generation box has the chips to support it an they are simply artificially ensuring it won't work because they say so? It's more like we'd expect iTunes to support 4k movies as well and they don't want to do THAT right now so no one gets ANY 4k support from them all while they're selling a 5k iMac that won't get any support from Apple either.

I don't understand the negativity in these posts. I've got a 4K UHD TV by LG and it only cost £650 ($970). I don't think that's expensive at all, 4K is getting cheaper and more people are buying them. I know other people with 4K TVs.

It's because some people take Apple's position just because they are Apple fanatics that always side with and defend everything Apple does no matter how bad a move it may seem to the rest of us (and then tell us how Apple makes so much money so they MUST be right about everything).

 

[springsup]

Who cares about USB type C? In a couple of years, USB type D will be here and offer twice the speed.

Who cares about the iPhone 6S. In a couple of years, iPhone 8 will be here and it will be far superior.

Who cares about the Apple Watch. In a couple of years, the Apple Watch 3 will be here and it will be...

Read on. What you just did is an absolutely perfect example of taking a quote out of context.

I wasn't moaning about the general March of technology, I said that 4K offers marginal benefits and that a real breakthrough that we can quantify is in advanced stages of development. People should not buy the questionable benefit of 4K if it means they won't be able to afford to upgrade to the more widely accepted benefits of better colour reproduction.

 

[Keirasplace]

It's because some people take Apple's position just because they are Apple fanatics that always side with and defend everything Apple does no matter how bad a move it may seem to the rest of us (and then tell us how Apple makes so much money so they MUST be right about everything).

Saying 4K in low end small sized sets is total crap is not Apple's position, it is the position of anyone who is really knowledgeable about the subject. Netflix can't stream UHD to half those garbage sets. That you couched it in an Apple VS the world POV is entirely your own work. Those sets are true horrors. You'd be better off buying a 720P second hand plasma for 1/3 the price than buying these.

4K is only worth it very large sets, (mucho expensive) or if you sit real close (like a computer monitor).
I posted the industry chart for distance vs size of the set vs resolution on this thread 2 times already.

 

[toke lahti]

No, this isn't a fact at all. You really think that the masses are going to rebuy their entire library of perfectly great 1080 blu Rays in the 4K version? No freegin way. Sure, a few hobbyists or whatever will buy some but 4K blu Ray will be as much of a niche as 3D was.

Many movie buffs like myself that own over 200 blu Rays won't even consider rebuying the films again. That's because as me and much of the industry has found: from regular viewing distances, 4K is barely discernible from a good 1080p feed. And, as its also known, many of these 4K LCDs are lousy TVs that can't get basic image quality correct. Poor blacks, bad viewing angles, etc, etc.

No way the public is going to rebuy their entire video catalog AGAIN. NO way!

Fact is that there will be 4th shelf in stores next to dvd's, bd's and 3D-bd's. This has nothing to do with your movie collection or if you are going to buy same movies again or just new movies.

If you keep buying physical copies, when you need to buy a new player why not 4k model? After that, why not buy 4k movies? Then after a dozen or so 4k movies in your collection, you end up checking new fancy curved big tv's at the store, which all of course happen to be 4k...

 

[BigBear14]

Why do they have to "gimp a feature set" to roll out a 4K TV? Did they have to gimp a feature set to roll out a 5K iMac? How about retina 4.7" and 5.5" iPhones? Should we not be buying those Apple products because apparently, building in higher video resolution requires gimped feature sets?

Somebody please resurrect another goodie from back when Apple was clinging to 720p over 1080p, "I'd rather have a high quality 1080p video stream than a low quality 4K stream" as if those are the only 2 choices too. Why not a high quality 4K stream on an un-gimped 4K TV?

I hear 4K boxes kill kittens and lead to world wars or global pandemics. I'd rather save the kittens, avoid global war and resist deadly diseases, so let's stick with 1080p.

No i meant they'll purposefully withhold it from this TV in order to make the next iteration more desirable, that 4K is a selling point.

 

[HobeSoundDarryl]

Got cha. Hopefully not. Apple seems to only modestly care about TV. There are LONG spans of time between significant hardware upgrades. If a new one rumored to be coming out later this year is not 4K, I fear the next one that could be 4K might be upwards of 3 or 4 more years out.

With 1080p, they were very late to that party (relative to just about every other kind of AV hardware having already long-since adopted 1080p) so I prefer to hope they'll be a step ahead this time.

There's already 4K televisions (out for a long time now) and 4K camcorders/DSLRs, and some 4K content on Netflix, Amazon, Youtube, and streaming services associated with some of the TV manufacturers, etc. There is Apple hardware and software that can import 4K footage, edit it and render it out as a 4K video. I'm guessing a 4K QT video will drop right into iTunes and play in iTunes too. So only this one link between our Macs running iTunes and a 4K TV in the living room would stand in the way of running that 4K video on a 4K TV.

 

[DaveN]

Ok, not criminal, just dishonest and immoral. Is that better? You are accepting Amazon's offer under false pretenses just to get free shipping because you never intend to get Prime. Bad enough to do it once but you do it repeatedly. Are you really proud that you are scamming Amazon out of shipping costs? Would your parents be proud? My parents didn't raise me to be that kind of person. We have standards. But hey, keep stealing shipping costs from Amazon and people like myself will make up the difference for you *patting your head*

It's sad that you would admit to doing it in a public forum. It tells us your moral compass doesn't work when you don't realize you are doing something you should be ashamed to tell other people about. But it gives people the opportunity to let you know it's not cool.

It is no more dishonest and immoral than Amazon delaying the boxing and shipping of orders to get people to pay more for faster delivery and always changing their price to maximize the amount a customer will be charged. In my case I'm minimizing my cost which is the other side of the coin of Amazon maximizing their charges. Two sides of the same coin IMHO. I don't fault Amazon for maximizing their charges. That is life in a capitalist economy.

There is no extra shipping expense to Amazon. The only difference between receiving the free standard shipping option and the expedited Prime shipping is that Amazon boxes and sends the order in a day versus delaying the shipping for up to two weeks. Basically Amazon is using your urge to want something sooner to get you to pay more. Now if you want to pay $100 a year to get something two weeks sooner than you would otherwise, be my guest.

 

[laurim]

It is no more dishonest and immoral than Amazon delaying the boxing and shipping of orders to get people to pay more for faster delivery and always changing their price to maximize the amount a customer will be charged. In my case I'm minimizing my cost which is the other side of the coin of Amazon maximizing their charges. Two sides of the same coin IMHO. I don't fault Amazon for maximizing their charges. That is life in a capitalist economy.

There is no extra shipping expense to Amazon. The only difference between receiving the free standard shipping option and the expedited Prime shipping is that Amazon boxes and sends the order in a day versus delaying the shipping for up to two weeks. Basically Amazon is using your urge to want something sooner to get you to pay more. Now if you want to pay $100 a year to get something two weeks sooner than you would otherwise, be my guest.

Sigh- all this does is make me appreciate my parents more. Apparently, they did an exceptional job teaching me right from wrong that many parents just aren't doing. Keep doing what you do. It just makes people like myself look even better.

 

[\-V-/]

Those 50 inch sub $1000 4K TV'S are close to garbage (just like most cheap LCDs TVs).

And no, streaming on 4K on the net is not even close to being adequate considering the effect of compression and possible latency on anything but the fastest networks

This inadequacy is especially true on a 50 incher, unless you:
- Have bad eyesight and sit more than 3 feet away (then you don'T need 4K)
- Normal vision and sit more than 6 feet away (then you don't need 4K)

If your talking about 75 inch $5000+ dollar 4K TVs with native content and are siting at 8-10 feet away with normal vision (a more classic distance for a living room). Well, yes that's totally fantastic and the perfect size for a TV like that.

Anyone who has looked at seating distances for 4K TV's were you can actually see the difference with native 4K content
- less than 6.3 feet for 50 inch (that's pretty close...)
- less than 10 feet for 75 inch
- less than 12 feet for 90 inch

You can look this up here. I'm going to guess that even Apple owners don't routinely own 75 inch high quality 4K tvs....

http://www.rtings.com/info/television-size-to-distance-relationship

So, the whole thing is crazy tiresome. I'd bet most people clamoring for a 4K look at their 50 incher from more than 10 foot away were 720P is adequate like many people I know.

Seeing a 4K 3 feet away in a store with native content is not how you'll be looking at generally at home.

If your really into 4K content right now, at least for your own native content, buy a nice 27 inch computer monitor with good color and contrast and see it that way. Then, your going to get the best experience right now, and not be a victim of some spiel the guy at best buy has spun to sell you some crap.

Apple provides support for something when it is worth it. The first Iphone wasn't even 3G... I guess they sucked then too hey!

That's a whole lot of words to say a bunch of useless crap.

 

[LordVic]

That's a whole lot of words to say a bunch of useless crap.

actually, it's basically true and it's exactly what "retina" refers to

there's a point of diminishing returns where average eyesite can no longer differentiate items of a certain size.

this will entirely depend on density of those items and the distance those items are viewed from.

Normal human visual acuity, is very close to those numbers which he linked for you (if you're looking for a source)

What most people tend to attribute to higher pixel count, in video quality beyond these normal viewing distance is more related to other technology that is in these newer displays, such as better contrasts, higher brightnesses, better greyscale representation and faster response times.

these tend to put a far greater visual performance improvement once you've reached the threshold of ones visual accuity. And more display manufacturers are saving these advances for the 4k displays since they cost more and have higher profit margins. 1080p displays have hit the product maturation point of their product lifecycle, which means high volume and low profit.

 

[laurim]

I don't know where I come down on this. Of course, I would love to have every possible future thing in the next AppleTV but not at any price. I usually watch movies on my 110" projection screen. I don't know if 4k would help me any since a projected image is going to be softer regardless and my projector is only 1080p, but it already looks as good as an actual theater to me so I don't really care about 4k. My Onkyo receiver is supposedly 4k ready (at least the manual says it will upscale media to 4k) and I have the latest version of hdmi cables so I'm ready in that regard. There are simply several items related to cord cutting that are much higher on my priority list than 4k capability.

 

[toke lahti]

People should not buy the questionable benefit of 4K if it means they won't be able to afford to upgrade to the more widely accepted benefits of better colour reproduction.

I also think wider gamut and deeper bitdepth are more ipmortant things, but just like with cameras, it's just easier to sell pixelcount.
But since there's no existing screen that can produce even 60% of rec.2020 (Canon's $18k 24-incher might make a record in this in next fall with it's rgb-leds, even oleds are using only white oleds these days...), there won't be sudden revolution. Gamut will widen slowly, if people buy wide gamut screens and very slowly if people just buy the cheapest 4k tv's.
Too bad that they forgot to add 48fps to rec.2020...

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

Saying 4K in low end small sized sets is total crap is not Apple's position, it is the position of anyone who is really knowledgeable about the subject. Netflix can't stream UHD to half those garbage sets. That you couched it in an Apple VS the world POV is entirely your own work. Those sets are true horrors. You'd be better off buying a 720P second hand plasma for 1/3 the price than buying these.

4K is only worth it very large sets, (mucho expensive) or if you sit real close (like a computer monitor).
I posted the industry chart for distance vs size of the set vs resolution on this thread 2 times already.

I don't know WTF you're talking about. Who said I have a small set? I've got a 93" screen.

 

[SteveW928]

Maybe, but with many Streaming Services offering it more, I don't think it's quite as far off as people might think. On the other hand, I'd really rather see Apple adopt uncompressed (or at least much less compressed) 1080p content before worrying about 4k.

For sure, less compressed 1080p would be better than heavily compressed 4K. Unless the telcos are broken down a bit, the bandwidth and data caps for $x are going to mean that's the tradeoff we'll face.

Of course, people will probably buy 4K sets and then want 4K content. Since most of them have no clue about quality (and can't see the difference anyway from where they sit), the streaming providers will probably just offer highly compressed 4K and these folks will be happy.

 

[SteveW928]

There was a time when Apple used to LEAD the pack in new features and sadly these days they now lag way way WAY behind everyone else. You can't even view a damn .AVI video ... all while they're selling a 5k iMac that won't get any support from Apple either.

I'm not sure there was a time when Apple was ahead on every feature in every product line. But overall, they were the best, and IMO, still are (otherwise I'd be using something else).

But, I think the main use for the Apple TV is streaming services and computer/iDevice -> Apple TV. It's not intended to be the hobbyist-play-anything device that some are hoping it to be. That said, if you get a bit creative about 'serving' your media from your computer or through iDevices, it actually does work pretty good as a media hub. Otherwise, you're probably better off looking at a Mac mini.

5K iMacs are for media pros doing editing and pro work. It makes a lot of sense to have 4K+ on a pro editing platform... not as much on a consumer media consumption device. I realize that's not what the high-end home-theatre crowd wants to hear, but unfortunately, Apple's mass-consumer products are aimed at the higher-end average users these days instead of the pros.

It's because some people take Apple's position just because they are Apple fanatics that always side with and defend everything Apple does no matter how bad a move it may seem to the rest of us (and then tell us how Apple makes so much money so they MUST be right about everything).

No, it's because we realize WHY Apple probably doesn't care much about 4K in the Apple TV. It's pointless for the majority, unless you're just going for spec-wars. And, once it's 4K, then you have a whole host of issues trying to stream 4K to it. It's hard enough, for most people, to get a good 1080p stream to one.

----------

If you keep buying physical copies, when you need to buy a new player why not 4k model? After that, why not buy 4k movies? Then after a dozen or so 4k movies in your collection, you end up checking new fancy curved big tv's at the store, which all of course happen to be 4k...

I suppose someday if that's my only choice. But, I have no plans to ever have a screen over about 60", which makes 4K pointless. If I buy 4K media, then I just have to figure out a way to rip it and use a bunch of extra computer time to process it into 1080p content anyway.

And, I sure hope next time I'm in the market for a new TV, I don't have to buy a curved one! At least I never have to use 3D or 4K.

----------

There's already 4K televisions (out for a long time now) and 4K camcorders/DSLRs, and some 4K content on Netflix, Amazon, Youtube, and streaming services associated with some of the TV manufacturers, etc. There is Apple hardware and software that can import 4K footage, edit it and render it out as a 4K video. I'm guessing a 4K QT video will drop right into iTunes and play in iTunes too. So only this one link between our Macs running iTunes and a 4K TV in the living room would stand in the way of running that 4K video on a 4K TV.

As mentioned above, there's a good reason to have 4K on video editing platforms. There's just little reason to try and stream it to most living room TVs. The high-end home theatre crowd is the exception. But there are other solutions for that crowd, and I doubt that's where Apple is aiming the Apple TV.

----------

I also think wider gamut and deeper bitdepth are more ipmortant things, but just like with cameras, it's just easier to sell pixelcount.
But since there's no existing screen that can produce even 60% of rec.2020 (Canon's $18k 24-incher might make a record in this in next fall with it's rgb-leds, even oleds are using only white oleds these days...), there won't be sudden revolution. Gamut will widen slowly, if people buy wide gamut screens and very slowly if people just buy the cheapest 4k tv's.
Too bad that they forgot to add 48fps to rec.2020...

Well, that's the thing though. Most people don't have a clue about what you just said and instead look at the stickers... more pixels... yea, I'll go with that one.