Question about current receivers and 1080p

[KevinF]

Sorry if this is a stupid question, but I'm new at all this home theater stuff and am trying to put together my first system. I've scanned the board and the rest of the site, but haven't found an answer to this here (or anywhere else, for that matter).

Some of the existing flagship receivers, and some other soon to be released receivers, boast HDMI and/or DVI connectivity, and the HDMI protocol claims generally to be compatible with the 1080p sets that will be coming out soon. Maybe DVI is too for all I know. However, in my mind it doesn't necessarily follow from this that the electronics in these current generation receivers will be robust enough to actually handle the switching of 1080p content streams. I've had one salesman tell me that they would, but I remain skeptical.

Anyway, the question is whether I am correct to assume that the video switching in current generation receivers (either through HDMI, DVI or even component) will NOT be able to support or take advantage of 1080p when it arrives? In that regard, I noted that the Yamaha press release regarding its soon to be released 4600 receiver with HDMI appeared careful to limit its claims of HD compatibility to 1080i and 720p. I even emailed Yamaha with this question, but their answer was something to the effect that there was as yet no available product information on the 4600. I'm not sure how that can be true given that the product is scheduled to be in stores in June, but so be it.

I ask only because I want to buy a new receiver, but don't want to buy an expensive receiver that I will be tempted to junk in 2 years or so when 1080p content shows up. I've already decided to wait on 1080p before buying new TV. I know some will tell me I won't be able to see a difference, but I want it anyway.

Thanks.

 

[BMXTRIX]

When I was murking about in the 1080p world trying to find info, it looks like the only thing related to what you are asking was this answer: "No"

The statement was something along the lines of: 'None of the current breed of HDMI circuit boards are 1080p compatible. They just haven't been designed that way yet. So, any product that exists right now with HDMI, does not support 1080p. 1080p is capable of being handled via HDMI, but nothing exists that supports it yet.'

Planned obsolesence... oh yeah.

 

[KevinF]

Thanks. That's what I figured.

Bummer.

 

[awesomebase]

HDMI support

As far as what I've read HDMI should support 1080p when content is finally available, however there is no direct requirement for HDMI to support 1080p. However, I wouldn't be remotely concerned with this. For one thing, there is really no great reason to route HDMI through receivers yet. Hardly any receivers even incorporate HDMI and those that do merely have one or two HDMI inputs (no more than what your TV has). Your thought to have 1080p content in two years is pretty optomistic. It will likely be more than 5 years before true 1080p content is available. Even with HD-DVD and Blu-Ray, 1080p is not specified as a standard yet and in all likelihood will come out in later revisions of players/recorders when the discs themselves can hold more (currently I think they allocate something like 23.3MBytes / sec for true 1080p throughput) (1920 x 1080 x 3rgb x 30fps / 8bits = 23.328MB/s) which means that a full-feature film (considered to be 90 mins) would take (23.328 x 60secs *90 mins) = ~125GB without compression and without audio or special features. That is currently much higher than the 30GB and 50GB capacities of HDDVD and Blu-Ray discs. Even getting that kind of capacity and throughput over cable is problematic without severe compression techniques. The only real hope for providing that kind of sustained band-width is through satellite. Satellite providers would need to have enough capabilities in their current satellites to provide that or be ready to launch ones that have that kind of capacity.
Of course, the even larger problem is for display systems to be able to keep their processing systems cool enough without significant noise from fans to make their products perform properly. Also, the processing delay can have great ramifications with audio synchronization since audio can be processed much more quickly (a common problem with DLP rear-projection systems that use external receivers with HDTV content at just 720p and 1080i resolutions).
So, don't worry that your system will be obsolete in two years. I think 1080p is a long way from reality, especially here in the U.S. Content at that level will be slow to arrive and chances are that it will take a good two or three years just for receivers to be able to accept three or four HDMI inputs.
Oh, and forget about DVI... that is dying off as quickly as it arrived as HDMI is clearly replacing it in the marketplace for a variety of reasons.
Happy receiver hunting!

 

[BMXTRIX]

That is not correct.

Blu-Ray disc calls for 1080p/24 to be an included video standard so that movies can be put on their discs at their native frame rate at full 1920x1080 resolution. This is from the standards for Blu-Ray Disc on the Blu-Ray website.

Video compression/encoding is 100% guaranteed. There won't be 'uncompressed' video on any disc, just as there really has never been. Windows Media and MPEG 4 are ensuring that with the same compression rates that are being used now, higher quality video will become the norm. Blu-Ray has the ability to handle less encoding, but still requires some form of encoding to achieve it's current full potential.

I would expect that while we may not see it on players right away, there is a chance that discs will be encoded at 1080p/24 right from the beginning to ensure the highest quality video possible and the player will make the conversion to 1080i/720p before outputting the signal over HDMI/DVI.

Of course - the final outcome of what actually ships is truly unknown and will be until we see a HD format released. But, 1080p is most definitely a part of whatever format is released.

 

[awesomebase]

Point misunderstood...

I think my point was misunderstood. Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are battling it out for high-def DVD supremacy. Their current formats allow for a MAXIMUM of 50GB and 30GB respectively. That is if they use their multi-layer technology. Even using MPEG2 encoding and MPEG4 for higher compression rates, you still have little overhead left, if any, to add special features, full surround-sound digital audio, and advanced menu-systems. Here is what is written from www.blu-raydisc.com website.
"Video highlights
The BD-ROM format for movie distribution supports three highly advanced video codecs, including MPEG-2, so an author can choose the most suitable one for a particular application. All codecs are industry standards, meaning easy integration with existing authoring tools, and choice from wide range of encoding solutions. All consumer video resolutions are available:
- 1920 x 1080 HD (50i, 60i and 24p)
- 1280 x 720 HD (50p, 60p and 24p)
- 720 x 576/480 SD (50i or 60i)"

While they say that all consumer video resolutions are available, they are NOT required by the authors to include on the disc. So if the compression is not high enough to put a full-length video on the disc, resolution will be sacrificed to make room.
Remember, one of the goals for both blu-ray and HDDVD was to be able to fit high resolution movies, digital sound, specifial features, etc. all on one disc. It is doubtful that 1080p movies would even be offered if it meant producing two discs while the initial costs of the technology are still high, particularly for HDDVD which, while having a significant cost advantage on blu-ray, is not able to store nearly as much information. That would cause a competitive disadvantage to either group if they do end up battling it out in the marketplace.
Both blu-ray and HDDVD are in talks to see about combining for a mixed format of somesort. Another alternative is by a small company in Japan that has been able to get 200GB of information on a single disc and is proposing their technology for use as an alternative.
In any case, even the 1080p 30fps spec is not included, only the 24fps spec is. It is not clear from the web sites why they are not included but that might have to do with memory, throughput, etc.
Getting back to the point. The fact that the possibility for encoding 1080p movies is not really enough justification for waiting for receivers to offer video-switching at that level. It may be years before anyone ever sees that. However, anybody with a Mac and the HD versions of FCP or FCE technically can encode in those high-frame rates given the proper equipment and you could theoretically distribute that high resolution through an RGB connection from a computer to a 1080p native TV set or projector, but, even then it would have been converted to an analog signal from its native digital format. Recording it onto standard DVD would only result in the DVD player down-converting it to its max. output resolution. So, until there is something that can physically output 1080p resolutions, I wouldn't worry too much about waiting for a receiver that can switch it out...