Archive notice: This article was originally published on February 4, 2013. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
At the CES electronics trade show in Las Vegas, numerous television manufacturers have already presented 4K-capable devices, but content for these devices is still lacking. Eutelsat’s new 4K test channel is now stepping into this gap – a French company said to be the world’s third-largest satellite operator.
The 4K channel is intended as a test object for technology manufacturers, production companies, rights holders and pay-TV operators, allowing them to gain experience in distributing 4K signals. For the technical implementation of 4K transmission, Eutelsat is working with Ateme, a company specialising in the compression, encoding and transmission of digital video signals.
For satellite transmission, the 4K video signal is split into four HD streams, which are then encoded into an MPEG4 data stream with a data rate of 40 Mbit/s at a frame rate of 50 full frames per second. The test channel is intended to run via the Eutelsat 10A satellite, and the Eutelsat teleport near Paris is used for the uplink of the signals to the satellite.
Anyone now expecting a 4K channel for normal home viewers soon will have to be patient. Several more years are intended to pass before the new technology is transmitted into homes as a normal television format. Eutelsat does not expect television sets for 4K content to come onto the market in greater numbers until 2015.
You can find all further information here.
