Ultra HD Is being touted as the eventual successor to the high definition resolutions we have at home today – most commonly 720p and 1080p.

The BBC and Japanese broadcaster NHK teamed up earlier this week to run an experimental broadcast showing Ultra HD's potential. It could be the next big thing in TV.

What's the big idea?

Ultra HD increases the resolution of broadcast TV and movie video by an order of magnitude way over what we can see today with 1080p flat panel displays.

There are various different implementations known as 2K, 4K and 8K, which have increased resolution accordingly. The result is a potentially massive increase in picture quality.

2K, 4K, 8K - what?

In a nutshell, 2K Ultra HD video doubles the resolution to 2048 x 1920 pixels; 4K increases that to 4096 x 2160 pixels, or 16 times the resolution of 1080p.

Content that's 8K, which is what NHK and the BBC broadcast at IBC 2008, comes out at a staggering 7680 x 4320 pixels. It's this standard that NHK is ultimately aiming for when it starts proper testing in 2016.

Who's doing it?

Ultra HD has the biggest benefits right now for digital cinemas and other commercial applications where massive screen sizes are essential.

However, gadget makers like Samsung would ultimately like us to get our hands on it, which is arguably one of the reasons why Samsung showed off a 4K 82-inch TV during IFA 2008.

Toshiba also says it has the technologies in place to deliver 4K displays whenever the public demands them.

So, move over Sky HD?

Hold on. Although Ultra HD looks sexy, there simply isn't the infrastructure around to deliver it into our homes.

NHK's take on Ultra HD, dubbed Super Hi-Vision (SHV), originally required a bandwidth of 28Gbps to broadcast, but it's now cut that down to 120Mbps by developing suitable algorithms in conjunction with the BBC. But...

Compare that to the 17-19Mbps bit-rate of existing Sky and BBC HD broadcasts and you'll appreciate that it's going to be years – 20 years, in fact – before it makes its way down to your TV aerial.

The IBC 2008 broadcast used MPEG2 compression, according to a PDF press release on NHK's website. It's not yet clear whether the BBC and NHK are also toying with more efficient video codecs like H.264.

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