Consumers are now discovering a technology that promises to redefine the

home entertainment landscape as decisively as high definition TV did a

decade ago. Called 4K Ultra high-definition (4K Ultra HD), it offers four
times the resolution of 1080p HD.
In the Fall of 2011, Sony was the worlds first to deliver a 4K ultra highdefinition projector optimized for the home, the VPL-VW1000ES. Now Sony
delivers 4K in a direct-view television with 3840 x 2160 pixels in 16:9 aspect
ratio.
The advantages of this new television are profound:
Four times the resolution of HDTV
Dramatically better color than HDTV
A more engaging television experience than HDTV
Amazing 3D
Not only is 4K Ultra HD a significant advance in television, its also a
significant opportunity for Sony system integrators and installers. These
professionals will be instrumental in helping sophisticated consumers take
full advantage of the televisions capabilities.
The launch of a new television format naturally raises questions. What is 4K
Ultra HD? How does it differ from 1080p HDTV? What viewing conditions
showcase 4K at its best? What makes the color better? What are the
prospects for 4K home entertainment content? These questions are
answered in the pages ahead.

Angle of View
To appreciate the 4K difference, its important to understand that
resolution is a powerful tool to achieve engagement the experience of
moving pictures as exciting, involving and hyper-real. Television becomes
more engaging when you 1) sit closer (for a given screen size) or 2) use a
larger screen (for a given viewing distance). Either way, the television
occupies a larger angle of view from your seating position. Angle of view is
the critical piece of this engagement difference; more on that in a moment.
If you try to sit closer to a regular HDTV in pursuit of a more engaging
experience, at some point the individual pixels will become noticeable. Onscreen objects will become visibly jagged around the edges. The illusion of a
seamless picture will begin to fall apart:

If sitting too close poses a problem, so does sitting too far away. As an
extreme example, if we were to watch a typical home HDTV from a
distance of 100 feet, our eyes would certainly not be able to see the
pictures fine details. The same holds true at less-extreme distances.

Threshold Point
Somewhere between too close and too far is the seating distance at which
were enjoying maximum picture detail, without becoming aware of
individual pixels. This threshold point depends on human visual acuity
and screen resolution.

For standard definition television, the threshold point is the distance at

which the picture occupies roughly 11 degrees of horizontal angle.
Television engineers have historically defined viewing distances as a
multiple of Picture Height (PH). The standard definition TV threshold point
corresponds to a seating distance of 7.2 times PH:

While 25-inch TVs were undoubtedly impressive to the home viewers of the
1950s and 60s, they appear puny in comparison to the televisions of today.
Our perceptions were irrevocably changed by the generational shift to high
definition TV.

When high definition television was first proposed in the early 1980s, its
backers promised that HD television screens would be bigger and HD
television viewing would be more engaging. A quick look at the numbers
substantiates these claims.
While analog standard definition did not have pixels, the standard
definition DVD had 720 horizontal x 480 vertical pixels for 345,600 total
pixels. In comparison, 1080p HDTV has 1920 horizontal x 1080 vertical for
2,073,600 total pixels.
From this, we can say that 1080p HD has six times the resolution of
standard definition.
The 1080p threshold point is the distance at which the picture occupies an
angle of about 31 degrees of horizontal angle and a distance of 3.2 Picture
Heights.

To find the 1080p threshold point in feet, divide the screen diagonal inches
by 7.7.

As screen sizes have grown, viewing distances have also changed. Modern
home theater design attempts to reproduce the viewing conditions of
stadium seating movie theaters, where viewing distances are extremely
short relative to picture height.
The best analogy to describe the relationship between todays viewing
distance and screen resolution is to imagine a smartphone or tablet.
Viewing distance is very close. Consider a tablet with a 10 picture height:
youre always viewing within a couple of feet, and often closer.

Readers accustomed to 720p and 1080p HD may find 4K an

unfamiliar phrase. It comes from the digital cinema industry. 720p and
1080p describe a TV screens vertical pixel count, but in the movie industry,
resolution is measured horizontally, and its twice that of full HD.
In digital cinema, one K equals 210 or 1024 pixels horizontal. 4K digital
cinema describes a picture thats 4 x 1024 or 4096 pixels wide.
Therefore, the generic term 4K can refer to either of two pixel counts:
4096 x 2160 (cinema 4K)
4.27 times the resolution of 1080p HD
Implemented in movie theaters and Sonys VPL-VW1000ES
home theater projector
Wider aspect ratio: approximately 17:9
3840 x 2160 (4K Ultra HD home televisions)

Exactly 4 times the resolution of 1080p HD

Implemented in XBR-84X900A/65X900A/55X900A televisions
16:9 aspect ratio
Sometimes called Ultra HD or Quad Full HD (QFHD)

Many consumers (and some sales associates) will hear 4K and associate it
only with the fact that its four times the resolution of full HD 1080
television. Thats okay, too. After all, thats the main point. However, its
important to know the origin of the term when asked.

Either way, its critical to remember that 4K Ultra HD has 4 times the
resolution of HDTV because the pixels are 4 times smaller.

This means that we can fit four times as much stuff in the same area we
currently do with HD 1080, and that produces finer detail:

So how have things changed in the living room from standard definition, to
HDTV, and now to 4K Ultra HD? Clearly, the threshold point has decreased
in distance while the angle of view has increased.
This big leap in resolution and detail pushes the 4K Ultra HD threshold point
to 58 degrees of viewing angle and a distance of just 1.6 Picture Heights.

REMEMBER THIS!
A wide viewing angle means more of the screen fills your field of vision, so
youre more engaged with the content. Thats the thrill of 4K Ultra HD.

If youve seen the XBR-X900A 4K Ultra HD TVs for yourself, you already
know exactly what were talking about. Custom installation professionals at
the CEDIA trade show in Indianapolis and the broadcast professionals at IBC
in Amsterdam were blown away when they saw it. The picture has an
intense hyper-real effect thats way beyond HD. 4K Ultra HD is engaging
and involving in a way that 1080p cannot equal.
To find the 4K Ultra HD threshold point in feet, divide the screen diagonal
inches by 15.6.

Just as you dont need to turn an audio system up to rock-concert levels to

appreciate high fidelity, you dont need to sit at the threshold point to
appreciate the engaging 4K experience. The threshold point represents the
distance at which viewers with 20/20 vision will experience full resolution.
In that sense, its a minimum viewing distance. Certainly, anyone
uncomfortable with the full engagement of 4K is free to sit further back.
Actual viewing distances will depend on many variables including room
design and individual visual acuity.
The Sony XBR-84X900 has an 84-inch screen (viewable area, measured
diagonally). At this screen size, the 4K threshold point is 5.5 feet (5 6or 1.7
meters). With the XBR-84X900, any distance closer than the 1080p
threshold point (11 or 3.3 meters) will put you into the action as never
before.

It is important to understand that Sony 4K Ultra HD is not only about

resolution, its also about better color reproductioncolor that not only
goes beyond HDTV, it surpasses other Ultra HD televisions you might see.
Sony has developed an exclusive color technology called Triluminos Display,
which works with the resolution increase of 4K Ultra HD to create
remarkable improvement in overall detail. So how does it work?

A TVs color gamut is the range of colors it is able to display. Triluminos has
a wider color gamut than HDTV, which allows the XBR-X900A to display
more of the colors that exist in nature; thats why the picture looks so lifelike. Its like having a larger box of colored pencils to draw with.

When you watch content on a Sony 55, 65, or 84 XBR-X900A you notice
detail like youve never seen before on a TV. Why? Because detail is part
shape and part color.

What is the user benefit of having a wider color gamut available? It means
the Sony 4K Ultra HD television gets closer to what your eyes actually see in
real life than any other TV weve ever made.
Triluminos Display reaches farther into the visible light spectrum to display
reds that are more vivid and lifelike. Hard-to-produce greens and blues look
more natural. What you see on the screen looks more like real life than
ever before.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Triluminos Display is available on XBR-X900A 55 and

65 models but not the 84 model, which was manufactured earlier.

In the world of 4K, Sony is unique. We are the only 4K Ultra HD TV

manufacturer to cover the entire 4K spectrum including professional 4K
cameras, recorders, and monitors, 4K editing software and postproduction, as well as our own 4K movie title releases and 4K cinema
projectorsin over 13,000 theaters worldwide.
Sony 4K professional cameras. Introduced in January 2012, the Sony
F65 CineAlta professional camera is the worlds first digital motion
picture camera with true 4K resolution. The camera has already been
used on the movies After Earth and Oblivion, the TV series The
New Normal and the Taylor Swift music video, We Are Never Ever
Getting Back Together.

Sony 4K recorders. Sony supports the F65 camera with the SR-R4
SRMASTER portable recorder and the SR-R1000 studio recorder.
Sony 4K pro monitors. The SRM-L560 TRIMASTER monitor has
Quad Full HD resolution (3840 x 2160), the same as the XBR-84X900,
while the PVM-X300 monitor has 4096 x 2160 resolution.
Sony 4K editing software. Sony Vegas Pro 12 nonlinear editing
software handles SD, HD, 2K, and 4K alike in either 2D or
stereoscopic 3D.

 Sony Digital Motion Picture Center 4K training. This facility on the

Sony Pictures lot in Culver City educates professionals on digital
technology, including 4K acquisition and postproduction.
Sony Pictures Colorworks 4K postproduction. This leading digital
intermediate facility provides 4K color grading, mastering and
restoration.
Sony Pictures 4K releases. Nobody has more 4K releases than Sony
Pictures. 4K releases have also come from Warner Brothers,
Paramount, Twentieth Century Fox and Disney.

Sony 4K servers. The LMT-300 media block is part of the world's first
4K projection system certified by the Digital Cinema Initiatives.
Sony 4K projectors. Sony launched the worlds first commercial 4K
projectors back in 2005. Today Sony is the leader in the category with
more Digital Cinema 4K projectors installed than all others combined.
Sony also leads in 3D theaters with a market share of nearly 50%. Our
line includes models designed specifically for Digital Cinema (SRXR320P and R515P) and projectors for visualization, simulation
auditoriums and postproduction (SRX-T410, T110 and T105).

When Sony launched 4K professional projection, many in the motion

picture community had never even heard of 4K. Now theres a complete
ecosystem to support 4K digital cinema. Efforts are under way to develop
the same type of ecosystem for 4K ultra high-definition in the home. For
example, HDMI Licensing, LLC has already established the HDMI 1.4a
specification, which enables one home entertainment component to send a
digital 4K signal to another. The future may also see consumer 4K
camcorders, digital still cameras that output 4K over HDMI cable, 4K native
Blu-ray Disc titles and 4K native Blu-ray Disc players.
As in professional 4K, Sony stands alone in home 4K Ultra HD. No company
has developed more 4K home entertainment products.
Sony AV Receivers with 4K upscaling and pass-through. Just as AV
receivers have been developed to support HD, HDMI and 3D, the
Sony STR-DA5800ES, DA2800ES and DA1800ES offer 4K pass-through
while the DA5800ES and DA2800ES add 4K upscaling!

 Sony Blu-ray Disc players with 4K upscaling. The Sony BDP-S790 is

one of the new-generation BD players that upscale HD output for
presentation on 4K televisions.

Sony Pictures Blu-ray Disc titles mastered in 4K. Sony Pictures

already has dozens of 4K digital masters and is rolling out a series of
Blu-ray Disc releases that take advantage.
Sony 4K user-generated content. 4K is the equivalent of 8.8 (or 8.3)
Megapixels, a mark already surpassed by most digital still cameras.
Sony PlayMemories Studio software for the PlayStation3 console
enables you to load still pictures onto the console for viewing in 4K
on a television or projector.
Sony 4K home theater projectors. Introduced in Fall 2011, the Sony
VPL-VW1000ES was the worlds first 4K projector optimized for the
home.

And of course, Sony 4K Ultra HD television

More than Sonys first 4K direct view televisions, the 84, 65, and 55 XBRX900A are Sonys best televisions, period. While engaging 4K entertainment
is the highlight, weve gone even further with amazing 3D, high fidelity
audio and rich Internet video streaming. In addition, delivering the full
benefit of 4K requires a thorough reengineering of the entire television.
Compared to 1080p high definition, 4K imposes incredibly stringent
requirements:
4x faster serial processing
4x as much bandwidth in parallel processing
More advanced backlight to maintain uniformity across the 55, 65,
and 84-inch diagonal screens (viewable area)
More accurate color management
More intelligent signal delay compensation
Sony is uniquely prepared to deliver this technology. With our background
in digital cinematography and broadcast HD production, we bring unrivalled
expertise to one of the critical challenges of 4K television: upscaling HD
signals to approach the quality of native 4K signals.

While the XBR-X900A Ultra HD TVs can accept native 4K content over the
HDMI 1.4a input, most content will still originate as HD. For this reason,
Sony developed an extraordinary system to upscale HD content to 4K.
This is the 4K X-Reality PRO Engine, the eighth generation of Sonys Digital
Reality Creation circuitry.

IMPORTANT NOTE: The 84 XBR-X900A utilizes a 4K Ultra HD X-Reality

PRO engine consisting of three chips, shown in the image above. The 55
and 65 models, however, have a version of the Engine in which the first
two chips (with all their capabilities and databases) have been combined
into one processor. So for the following 3-stage processing description, the
first two stages happen in one chip for the 55 and 65 XBR-X900A TVs.

Originally developed for and incorporated into the Sony VPL-VW1000ES

projector, the 4K X-Reality PRO Engine operates in three stages to upscale
HD content to 4K.

Stage 1 can be thought of, generally, as cleaning up the picture. The XReality processor is a Full HD large scale integrated (LSI) circuit that
analyzes the scene and selectively applies six processes, as needed.
Variable-level Intelligent MPEG Noise Reduction dramatically
reduces block noise and mosquito noise.
Adaptive Random Noise Reduction addresses camera
limitations.
Adaptive Dot Noise Reduction corrects the dot crawl often
found in old, composite video signals.
Interlace-to-Progressive (IP) conversion and upscaling,
prepares interlaced content for progressive display on a
modern flat panel television. Film-based 24 frames-per-second
content undergoes special IP conversion to reduce the
stairstep jaggies that can form at high-contrast edges.
Intelligent Image Enhancer divides the signal according to four
characteristicstexture, outline, contrast and coloranalyzes
the quality of each part and applies only the processing
required.
Flat Tone Area Adaptive Processing maintains image
smoothness in areas of gentle gradation, such as sky and skin.

Stage 2 is where reality creation takes place. The XCA7 is a second Full
HD LSI that complements the X-Reality processor. Unlike competing
designs, the XCA7 draws from a vast and exclusive Sony image database
to enhance images based on stored patterns, shapes and colors.
Over many years in the refinement of the Digital Reality Creation
circuit, Sony engineers have gathered an enormous reference library of
video images from all over the world, produced and distributed at all

levels of quality. Content from this library is stored inside the chip, in a
database containing thousands of pixel patterns. From this, the engine
knows what a cloud, the edge of a building, or a tree looks like. The
system also knows that a diagonal line is not a stairstep. Instead of
merely interpolating or filling the gaps in a picture (like other
systems), the XCA7 matches picture patterns for superb quality.

Stage 3 is where the final content is upscaled to 4K. The XCA8-4K

processor contains a recently developed 4K image database, to extend
the advantages of Digital Reality Creation circuitry to 4K imagery. It
upscales HD to 4K and applies database pattern matching both to
upscaled HD and native 4K signals.

The 4K X-Reality PRO Engine is an especially powerful image processor.

When connecting HDTV sources via upscaling Blu-ray Disc players or A/V
receivers, you should bypass the 4K upscalers of these source components,
use the HD outputs, and rely on the 4K X-Reality PRO Engine to perform
upscaling of exceptional quality.

In 3D theaters, Sony Digital Cinema 4K projectors present a full-resolution

2K signal to both eyes at the same time, while still offering the lightweight
comfort of passive glasses.
Until now, direct view 3D televisions in the home have not been able to
match this performance. A choice had to be made between the
performance of active 3Dwhich presents a full HD picture to both eyes
or passive 3D, which sends half resolution to each eye but offers
comfortable and inexpensive glasses.
Today, the Sony XBR-X900A 4K Ultra HD televisions produce 3D with the
benefits of active, plus performance that exceeds passive.
How current 1080p 3D works in the home
Active: Presents a full HD picture to each eye, but does so with alternate
flashes of a 240 Hz panelleft, right, left, right, etc. This flicker results in
a 3D picture thats slightly less smooth, and also requires heavier glasses
that use batteries to actively process the action. The benefit is better
resolution in 3D; the drawbacks are heavier, less comfortable glasses that
require batteries, plus potential eye strain from flicker for viewers who are
sensitive to it.
Passive: Presents a continuous (full-time) 3D image to both eyes at the
same time. The left and right images are overlapped on top of each other
and the passive glasses pull them apart to render the 3D image. Because
theres no left-right flicker the 3D picture is smoother than active 3D.
Unfortunately, this can only be accomplished with half the vertical
resolution of full HD. So the benefit of passive 3D is lighter, more
comfortable glasses that require no batteries and smoother 3D; the
drawback is a 3D picture thats not as crisp or detailed as active 3D.

The best of both worlds

Sony 4K Ultra HD XBR-X900A TVs combine the best of both worlds, and
now home viewers can finally enjoy movie theater 3D performance. The
reason? Sony 4K Ultra HD delivers better-than-Full HD resolution to both
eyes (3840 x 1080), together with simultaneous images to both eyes.
Its passive technology. But rememberthe 4K Ultra HD TV not only has
twice the horizontal resolution of full HD, it also has twice the vertical
resolution of 1080, which equals 2160. When you cut that resolution in
half, as passive 3D requires, the resolution in each eye meets or exceeds
the resolution offered by any active 3D HDTV available.

Heres why: although the vertical resolution is cut in half (its still 1080), the
horizontal resolution remains at 3840. Each eye sees a 3840 x 1080
picturebetter than 1920 x 1080 full HD.

The XBR-X900A screen uses a film-patterned retarder that polarizes the

outgoing light. Alternating horizontal lines of pixels are polarized for leftand right-eye viewing. Corresponding polarized lenses on the glasses
ensure that each eye sees the correct imagein better-than HD resolution!
The result is a breakthrough in home 3D viewingan amazing combination
of high resolution, brightness and flicker-free enjoyment.