- Kaleidescape launches the first 8K movie player certified by the 8K Association
- But the new 4K Cinematic format for higher quality 4K is the exciting thing
- $4,995 (approx £3,777 / AU$7,180)
Kaleidescape makes some truly spectacular 4K video players, and now there’s an 8K version. It’s “the world’s highest fidelity movie player,” says chairman and CEO Tayloe Stansbury. “It brings movie lovers closer to the filmmaker’s intent with cleaner detail, true-to-life colors and a more natural presentation that dramatically enhances the viewing experience of any screen.”
It is also world news. Kaleidescape Strato K is the first 8K movie player to be certified for 8K by the 8K Association.
That’s good, but the fact that it’s the first such accreditation points to the problem with 8K. Buying 8K hardware right now is a bit like being the first person in the world to buy a fax machine: who are you going to send faxes to? Likewise, with 8K movie players and 8K TVs, what 8K movies are actually there for you to watch?
This means that the Strato K, while impressive, is a bit of a gamble: you’re buying hardware in the hope that the 8K footage will be a flood, and I’m just not sure it will ever rain.
So the most important new feature might not be the 8K support, but instead a new format that Kaleidescape calls “4K Cinematic”.
Kaleidescape Strato K: key features and price
Kaleidescape’s 4K Cinematic is a format designed to deliver even better 4K picture quality, and it does so by using less compression. Movies are encoded at around 110 Mbps using the HEVC codec. Kaleidescape says that compares to around 60 Mbps for 4K Blu-Ray and around 17 Mbps for standard 4K streaming services.
It’s worth noting that these figures are not the maximum bitrates of the formats – for example Blu-Ray can go up to 144 Mbps, although 80 Mbps is a more standard ceiling – but are the bit rates typically used in commercial releases.
In addition to the higher bitrate, 4K Cinematic uses 4:4:4 chroma sampling instead of 4:2:0 in most commercial film releases, which means more accurate colors and less ‘banding’ or other color artifacts.
The downside to the higher bitrates is that you need a lot of storage space: As FlatpanelsHD notes, the player only has 1TB of storage space—the equivalent of about seven 4K Cinematic titles, since they’re 1.5 times the size of normal 4K movies. Like other Strato players, it’s really meant to merge with the company’s Terra servers.
Kaleidescape will label higher-quality movies as 4K Cinematic in its movie store and on the Stratos K interface to distinguish them from standard 4K versions. Prices will be from about $10 to $30, and the first row of titles includes Top Gun: Maverick, F1: The movie, Superman, Project Hi Mary, Dune: Part Two; Sinners, Predator: Badlands, Mortal Kombat II, Avatar, Throne: Ares, Thunderboltsand others.
4K Cinematic supports Dolby Vision, Dolby Atmos and DTS:X — but Dolby Vision is not supported by the Stratos K player in 8K movies, which are SDR or HDR10. The maximum frame rate for 8K is 30 fps via HDMI 2.1.
The Strato K has an MSRP of $4,995, which is $1,000 more than the five-star 4K Strato V. We’re really looking forward to seeing what the new film format looks like…
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