This is what the 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray format will look like

4K
Yes, 4K is definitely the future

The Blu-Ray Disc Association (BDA) used CES as its opportunity to expand on its previous announcement that 4K Blu-ray discs will be on shelves by Christmas 2015.

The organization has revealed the format's official name will be Ultra HD Blu-ray, says The Hollywood Reporter, while tech site Hexus has the specifics.

The BDA's board has defined Ultra HD Blu-ray as discs that can handle resolution up to 3849 x 2169 and frame rates up to 60fps.

The new format will also feature a wider color range (to up REC 2020 or BT2020) and 10-bit color depth, Hexus says, and a mandatory, open HDR specification will be crucial to the format overall. Though not all 4K movies have HDR at this time, that may be a future-proofing measure.

The new Ultra HD Blu-ray discs will range from 66GB in dual-layer to 100GB in triple-layer, while Ultra HD Blu-ray players will include the HEVC (H.265) codec, support HDMI 1.2 and 2.0 and be backward-compatible with existing Blu-rays, DVDs and VCDs.

Rising from the dead

Panasonic already announced a 4K Blu-ray player at CES, and it seems it may have been the first, though it won't be the last.

Early in 2014 Sony's own reports suggested 4K Blu-ray discs were dead before they even arrived, and now here we are, less than a year later, reading announcements about the format's specs. It just goes to show that things are sometimes not as dire as they seem.

Michael Rougeau

Michael Rougeau is a former freelance news writer for TechRadar. Studying at Goldsmiths, University of London, and Northeastern University, Michael has bylines at Kotaku, 1UP, G4, Complex Magazine, Digital Trends, GamesRadar, GameSpot, IFC, Animal New York, @Gamer, Inside the Magic, Comic Book Resources, Zap2It, TabTimes, GameZone, Cheat Code Central, Gameshark, Gameranx, The Industry, Debonair Mag, Kombo, and others.


Micheal also spent time as the Games Editor for Playboy.com, and was the managing editor at GameSpot before becoming an Animal Care Manager for Wags and Walks.