YouTube moves solidly into the future by supporting 4K content
By Darren Murph 
posted July 9th 2010 6:04PM
posted July 9th 2010 6:04PM
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
posted July 9th 2010 6:04PM
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@sjavvaji I grabbed the video file and opened it in Media Info.
4K Video for "Life in the Garden":
Bit rate : 6 445 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 19.4 Mbps
Width : 4 096 pixels
Height : 2 304 pixels
1080p Version
Bit rate : 3 350 Kbps
Maximum bit rate : 5 728 Kbps
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Probably the most important thing thing, and the number that corresponds most to subjective image quality, is the Bits per pixel/frame. The 1080p manages 0.067, while the 4K halves that to just 0.028. The 720p is higher actually, with 0.085. (The 480p manages even higher with 0.157)
A 1080p Blu-ray can hit 0.567, if not higher.
What I mean by that number corresponding to subjective image quality, is that the higher that number, the closer the it should look to the source video the encoder is taking in.
@zim2411 Thanks for the info, do you know any details about human perception (i.e., the average human with 20/20 vision in both eyes can't tell the difference between a video playing at 60fps vs 200fps, but do you have any information on how much data can be compressed before the source and the encoded data begin to appear different). There are so many variables at play in that question vs. the relatively simple fps example I gave, but you seem like you know what you are talking about and as a fellow Invader Zim/Jhonen Vasquez fan I have even more faith that you hold a wealth of knowledge =p (have you ever listened to the Invader Zim commentaries? It's pretty depressing when they start talking about all the places they were going to go with the series... oh well, my JTHM and Squee comicbook collections will have to do for now).
Typed but not checked for grammatical/spelling mistakes - DeeBG
@zim2411
That metric's a little harsher than it needs to be (even if we assume that you are viewing the videos at correspondingly larger sizes so that it looks equivalently bad if a single pixel is screwed - and by the way if we don't assume that then there is not much point in 4K anyway).
Basically, the higher the resolution of a video, the more self-similar it is spatially (in other words, within a frame if you take any pixel then you go 1 pixel to the right, then at a high resolution, the chance that it's only a very slight colour difference is really high). It is easier to compress this than at low resolution where there will be a higher proportion of abrupt changes. So the bitrate required for a given level of per-pixel quality does not scale linearly with the number of pixels.
Or to put it another way, in order to demonstrate fully that the bitrate here is way, way, way too low, it would be better to use a different quality metric, or to compare with known recommendations for the resolution in question.
It is obviously crap though, so I'm not saying you're wrong, just quibbling with the precise numbers. :)
whats funny is that watching these videos at 480p is still better quality than most 1080p videos you'll find
the camera is really damn good.
I find it funny that there's an error in the article that the picture clearly points out.
Admittedly, no one really ever uses 240P on YouTube, but it's there, and I thought I'd be a jerk and point it out.
@MowDownJoe its actually for phones they just gave it as an option for desktop users and people who live in the 3rd world still having only 56k modem (seriously)
too bad they cap the speed you can DL anything at to something like a 56K modem so itll take 9 years for that to load
My laptop can handle the video with a little lag from time to time. My desktop plays it perfectly smooth. But as they said I need a monitor to support this
hmmm... it didn't look that great on my 27inch imac, or at least no better than 1080p. and yes i know that its not the right res but i expected at least SOME improvement
Fu*K the monitor hell my graphics card cant handle 4K without a 5 lag every frame!
Has anyone tried playing this on a pc with an i3-530? What’s the cpu usage like, and are there any slow downs?
I'm going be building htpcs for several rooms and wondering if the i3 will be enough to play 4k video smoothly (even though it’s completely unnecessary at this point).
@sputnik I think the demand would be mostly on your GPU. I'm not saying a fast processor doesn't help, but it depends under what conditions (or rather what type of video) you want to watch. With GPUs being so powerful these days I would actually put more money towards that instead of a CPU if I was building an HTPC atm (esp. since you seem to be going for an HD system).
Yeah, but it's in flash and I can barely get 720p flash video to play on my laptop, let alone 4K.
Everything getting big scary
Youtube Rocks, but my monitor and computer doesnt :(
Now when can I get a 65" 4k plasma or projector? I can't wait to have to upgrade all my blu-rays I just bought.
@lakersin2025 You can get a 2160p (3840 pixels wide, though) 52" LCD for about $40k...
(Or a WQUXGA (3840x2400) 22.2" LCD for about $800 off of the Japanese used market, once you get the shipping and the buying service fees into consideration. Totally worth it, although I rarely use mine. It's kinda like an expensive meal - you don't use it every day, you just use it every so often.)
I'm kind of surprised they jumped the 2K (the format a lot of people and studios have access to and have been using) and went right to 4K, but since this seems to imply specs "up to" 4k and assume 2K video will be supported as well under the view as "Original" slot. Heh nothing in my place can support over 1080p but when that changes, it's nice to know that YouTube will already be there. I wonder how Google's new (well it's not really new, but you know what I mean) codec holds up compared to others at this resolution.
There goes my 60GB@$45/mo Bandwidth limit for the month
I don't have a screen in that freakin resolution. :(
To bad youtube loads so slow now that I have to wait for 360P to buffer. I should not have to run through a proxy to get decent youtube load speeds, they need to fix their new york servers....
Who cares if it is 4K resolution it is still only a couple mbps. When will people start understanding that bit rate is more important than resolution when the resolution is being down-scaled anyway?
I'm sure they could pump out 8K if they wanted to too, it would still be 1mbps and it would still look awful in comparison to a pirated blu-ray rip.
Why is it 4096 * 3072 which is 4:3 aspect ratio....why not 3840 * 2160 which is 16:9 and almost exactly 4 times HD [1080p=2MP; 2160p=8MP]
Ah. Flash, how I hate you so.
Sent from my PowerMac G5...
@hezz - Tip for other PPC and other Mac owners out there: Minitube.
1080p videos on youtube produce moving slide-shows for me on my old G5, but Minitube plays them excellent!
While introducing 1080p and 720p is a great move, i guess it will be helpful when companies (apple, google) roll devices that would stream movies, tv shows,..etc without the need for internal storage. Sort of pay as you watch scenario. While the trend is going in this way, the question is do we have the infrastructure for people to stream 720p + movies. And on another note, while this is revolutionary, is feel its like a rip off. First ppl wont be able to keep a copy of the shows and there will probably be limits on the number of times you watch the show.
My old PC can't handle even 1080p without lag.. 4k less than 1 fps.. Does it run smooth on an average laptop?
@tauttvisz You're serious right?
cool scene...
power of flash.. doubt HTML can stream 4k videos!!!
WHAT!! Almost ALL computers can't even support 4K video. My computer can't even support 1080p for gods sake!
Does someone have a 4k Sample video?
I would appreciate a link.
@foxh8er read the article. Its in the source link
Stupid lack of GPU acceleration on my 8800GTX.
Side thought: I've always wondered what resolution IMAX films would be if they could be shot in digital format and appear the same to our eye. I actually wish shooting movies in IMAX format would actually be more popular than 3D. The Dark Knight looked incredible in those scenes.
NASA made an IMAX movie a few years ago, rendering it in Shake at 8K.
Amazing how they'll do 4k resolution but they won't do 60fps... because they claim most peoples' computers can't handle it...
I think I heard somewhere that the human eye can only see a max of 5000x5000 pixels at any given time.
I have a 100Mb connection on campus, and after giving it a couple minutes to buffer it plays quite smoothly. Graphics card has little to do with streaming video, this particular computer only has integrated graphics.
The 4K 3d of the '10s is just a step behind the holographic technology of the '20s. Soon we will have a HVD vs 5D DVD format war, but it will matter far less than any previous physical format. These are my predictions.
I wish they would stop deleting the videos I enjoy watching.
Sometimes the videos with the worst lag time are the ones with the crappiest video quality.
How is anyone going to look at this content? TV's only go up to 1K resolution and few monitors go above 1.2K. Even the Apple 30" Cinema Display would need 3 times its current resolution to display true 4K content.
4K is great for big theaters and preservation master material but is there really any need for it in the home? Seeing that most people already cant tell the difference between 720p and 1080p content on screens under 50" what would be the point of upping that to 4096p?
ok buts choppy with my i7 with 4gb ram.... soooo.. what can play it?