SKY UHD 4K

[jjjkiuj]

Had my new 2tb box installed yesterday with the UHD upgrade.      Very disappointed with the difference between HD and UHD.  I have looked at an Attenborough documentary, films and Sky Sports Main Event and can hardly tell the difference between HD and UHD.  I have a Samsung 48" tv that cost me around £1000.          Is this normal?

[stereohaven]

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@jjjkiuj wrote:

Had my new 2tb box installed yesterday with the UHD upgrade.      Very disappointed with the difference between HD and UHD.  I have looked at an Attenborough documentary, films and Sky Sports Main Event and can hardly tell the difference between HD and UHD.  I have a Samsung 48" tv that cost me around £1000.          Is this normal?

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It depends.

Number of factors including:

1. The state of your eyesight
2. If you have correctly enabled  UHD HDR in your TV (you sometimes have to go into settings to enable "deep colour" or similar
3. If the TV is bright enough (nits) to show a decent 4K picture (price paid does not guarantee this) 
4. If the TV has a 10 bit panel, then HLG HDR content can be quite dark on many TVs without decent brightness 
5. If the TV is only 8 bit, then you won't get HDR and the difference between HD and UHD is narrowed for many
6. Some content is just HD upscaled to UHD anyway
7. Picture quality, whatever the format, is subjective

[PandJ2020]

Are your display settings set to 2160P?

[jjjkiuj]

Yes they are on the sky box.  the engineer made sure this before he left.

[nigea99]

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@jjjkiuj wrote:

Had my new 2tb box installed yesterday with the UHD upgrade.      Very disappointed with the difference between HD and UHD.  I have looked at an Attenborough documentary, films and Sky Sports Main Event and can hardly tell the difference between HD and UHD.  I have a Samsung 48" tv that cost me around £1000.          Is this normal?

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hi @jjjkiuj 

As @stereohaven says UHD 8 bit is often very similar to HD, there is a slight increase in definition

The big difference is when using HDR, so make sure that the box is set to 10 bit & make sure your TV is set to accept this.

I think more modern TVs may allow this by default but most did not & still may not so check the settings for the HDMI - I can;t remember the specific setting for Samsung but look for settings such as Deep Color, enhanced, Signal Plus (AI suggested this for Samsung)

Also check that the box you received is capable of HDR :

Home - Settings - System Info - Hardware Version

(If it is 32Cxxx then you have an older 1TB non-UHD Box - should not be relevant after an upgrade)
If it is 32B0xxx then you have a (V1) UHD but non HDR 2TB Box
If it is 32B1xxx then you have a (V2) UHD HDR 2TB Box (which has a separate Power supply)
If it is 32B2xxx then you have a (V3) UHD HDR 1TB or 2TB Box

[jjjkiuj]

When the Euros were on last time, I watched the football in their HDR on the Iplayer and that was a huge difference in quality.    Just doesnt seem to be much better through Sky.      I will check the TV settings when I get home.   Thanks!

[PandJ2020]

Personally, most HD upscaled by a modern TV is pretty damn good.

Pre-encoded material (esp. downloads) in HD are likely to be more than adequate for a 48" TV.

There's always some feedback in the forum that live Sports events can be noticeably better in UHD.

But as noted HDR tends to enhance the picture more than the resolution bump alone.

I have a 65" LG OLED and the picture never ceases to amaze me, even in HD.  UHD is marginally sharper.

[GD1]

@jjjkiuj  On a screen that size the distance between you and the TV will be a factor as per the link attached

https://www.samsung.com/uk/tvs/tv-buying-guide/what-size-tv-should-i-get/ 

[Chodley]

which model TV is it?

[TimmyBGood]

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@jjjkiuj wrote:

    Very disappointed with the difference between HD and UHD.  

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Worth remembering that if you had a UHD television then you were already watching UHD, otherwise the television screen would have been 3/4 empty.  The difference between native UHD and HD upscaled to UHD is far smaller than, for example the difference between SD and HD.

[jjjkiuj]

Thanks for all the help yesterday.   I now have more info:

Samsung QN90 CA 50" tv

32b106 SKY BOX

On the TV, I have gone into picture settings and set picture mode to dynmaic, HDR Tone mapping to active and AUTO HDR Remastering is greyed out.

Sky engineer set screen at 2160 (8 bit) but I have changed this to 2160 (10 bit)

I am sat about 3 mtrs away as the standard 1.2 x the size of the TV screen feels far too close.

I have watched the US Open Tennis on 401 and Sky FI reruns.

Picture is better and colours are more vibrant but I am still not blown away.

I am guessing I need to lower expectations.

[TimmyBGood]

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@jjjkiuj wrote:

I have watched the US Open Tennis on 401 and Sky FI reruns.  Picture is better and colours are more vibrant but I am still not blown away.

I am guessing I need to lower expectations.

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Probably, yes: remember live Sports capture and instantaneous transmission cannot have the precision and post-production refinement of good cinematography played from a high bit-rate storage medium.

[Chodley]

"Dynamic" mode is usually unrealistically vibrant

[stereohaven · Accepted solution]

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@jjjkiuj wrote:

Picture is better and colours are more vibrant but I am still not blown away.

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I do mean this in the politest possible sense, but you bought the wrong TV and are using inadequate source material if you want to be "blown away".

Go and have a look at a Sony OLED running a title from BRAVIA Core or an LG or Panasonic OLED running a 4K Ultra HD blu-ray, then you will understand how important the type of screen is and how throttled the bit rate is on HLG HDR satellite delivered content.

[jjjkiuj]

Thanks for your honesty.  As long as I know I am getting the best I can with the equipment!