Tata Skys 4K set top box with first ever 4K live broadcast in India
Tata Sky was first Direct to Home (DTH) service provider which displayed the first 4K broadcasts in India, during the Germany vs France Quarter final tie at the first in first out ( FIFA) Football World Cup 2014. On 10th Jan, Tata Sky publicized the retail launch of 4K UHD set top box (STB) at Rs. 6,400 for new subscribers and Rs 5,900 for existing subscribers.
Subscribers can buy a brand new 4K set-top box or use Tata Sky’s multi TV connection option. Apart from 4K content, the STB can displayed SD as well as HD streams. Users can pre book the 4K STBs using the Tata Sky 24×7 helpline, Tata Sky website and through dealers.
Tata Sky 4K offers Ultra High Definition picture quality and Dolby Digital Plus 7.1 surround sound. 4K at 8.3 MP (3840×2160) has approximately 4 times the pixels as that of 2K (1920×1080) the current HD standard.
With ICC Cricket World cup is beginning next month, the time is ripe for Tata Sky to capitalise on 4K frenzy. In fact, Tata Sky had displayed its first live 4K broadcast last year, during the time of football world cup.
They did first hand preview of the live 4K broadcast, and came away impressed with picture quality and overall 4K experience. Here is general idea of experience. This being first ever 4K broadcast in India, naturally it had annoyed the fancy. Tata Sky also had an HD broadcast as well as standard definition (SD) broadcast on 2 different TVs on display as well. These TVs were surrounding Sony 4K UHD TV. This immediately gave an idea of details being shown by 4K broadcast visa via the full HD and SD broadcasts. Unnecessary to say, the details were remarkable. Naturally, since 4K (3840×2160) has 4 times the pixels as regular full HD stream, that is expected. We were observing the 4K broadcast from distance of around 20 feet and could not really notice any kind of pixillation on 4K broadcast. Having said that, we would have liked to see at least the HD and 4K broadcasts on similarly sized TV sets, as that would have given us true idea of quality difference.
Now it is just up to TV channels to start contribution of 4K streams. We wonder what the pricing would be like for such channels. Tata Sky has not mentioned any 4K ready channels which it plans to start off with.
