Video 4K UHD TV is it really 4K? or it is Full HD Lowscaled from 4K??

E

eTernity2021

Disciple
Hi, I have recently bought a 4K UHD TV regardless of the Brand?? from a flash discount sales, I ran Youtube and checked the STATS for NERDS on video?? i was trying to watch a 4K transmission from youtube, i set appropriate technical settings targeting 4K i.e 2160p in Youtube Universe!

But amazingly or in fact shockingly the viewport is showing 1920 X 1080 as the value that is pure FULL HD contrary to the expected actual 3840 X 2160 resolution, but the real resolution from Youtube is 4K but the 4K tv is displaying it in FULL HD? Now i am confused have i really bought a 4K TV Or a FULL HD tv in the disguise of 4K TV just over the box cover!! Any inputs from experienced brothers/sisters are welcome!!

Beware try STATS FOR NERDS on youtube 4K video beforehand by watching it in your 4K TV, analyse and then post your feed back! Thanks in Advance.
 
eTernity2021 said:
Hi, I have recently bought a 4K UHD TV regardless of the Brand?? from a flash discount sales, I ran Youtube and checked the STATS for NERDS on video?? i was trying to watch a 4K transmission from youtube, i set appropriate technical settings targeting 4K i.e 2160p in Youtube Universe!

But amazingly or in fact shockingly the viewport is showing 1920 X 1080 as the value that is pure FULL HD contrary to the expected actual 3840 X 2160 resolution, but the real resolution from Youtube is 4K but the 4K tv is displaying it in FULL HD? Now i am confused have i really bought a 4K TV Or a FULL HD tv in the disguise of 4K TV just over the box cover!! Any inputs from experienced brothers/sisters are welcome!!

Beware try STATS FOR NERDS on youtube 4K video beforehand by watching it in your 4K TV, analyse and then post your feed back! Thanks in Advance.
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can you post the details of the device and how you are accessing youtube
 
eTernity2021 said:
Hi, I have recently bought a 4K UHD TV regardless of the Brand?? from a flash discount sales, I ran Youtube and checked the STATS for NERDS on video?? i was trying to watch a 4K transmission from youtube, i set appropriate technical settings targeting 4K i.e 2160p in Youtube Universe!

But amazingly or in fact shockingly the viewport is showing 1920 X 1080 as the value that is pure FULL HD contrary to the expected actual 3840 X 2160 resolution, but the real resolution from Youtube is 4K but the 4K tv is displaying it in FULL HD? Now i am confused have i really bought a 4K TV Or a FULL HD tv in the disguise of 4K TV just over the box cover!! Any inputs from experienced brothers/sisters are welcome!!

Beware try STATS FOR NERDS on youtube 4K video beforehand by watching it in your 4K TV, analyse and then post your feed back! Thanks in Advance.
Click to expand...
My TV isnt 4k but I think last few times I checked it was showing m 4k resolution.
May be the video isnt 4k but YT upscaled it or something. Try original 4k videos instead.
 
Oopsy, i was late to see all the responses, OK first things first, People have been showing less importance to VIEW PORT, that is the actual resolution supported by the device, if at all its a PC Monitor, you will have free-hand in resizing the video, hence, the viewport resolution changes invariably for the size you play with,,

But in the case of a TV, You are not gonna play around with sizes IMHO, for example, TVs come in 4 Flavours these days, that is HD Ready (only 720P), FULL HD (1080p), QuadHD (2K), UltraHD (4K) and 8K as of now.. So anybody who has bought one of these flavours will strictly have only that much resolution ViewPorts, and the playback gets adjusted to that resolution support...by lowscaling higher resolution videos or upscaling the low resolution videos where necessary. Moving on to the issue area....

So Now come to the present advanced world, World is now excelling at only Particular Flavour that is everywhere, its none other than 4K Tvs that is Ultra HD tvs, thats available at a considerable price equivalent to the price of FULL HD tvs 5 years back... Now i am wondering are we gimmicked that we have ascended to 4K FALSELY only on package covers, but in reality we still stand at only FULL HD..

To realize that falsehood, one should understand the difference between VIEW PORTS and ACTUAL RESOLUTION OF THE STREAM over internet, which takes a Page to explain, But can be easily understood in the FOLLOWING VIDEO, Viewport - Explored!!

Once the understanding of the STATS for NERDS on YT video illuminates the Brain, check any 4K Video in the 4K tvs if you have or in a show-room regardless of the Brands by playing a 4K YT Video via NET, ;) i feel the panel in every 4k TV is FULL HD still but plays 4K stream by lowscaling it to FULL-HD, and they call such a technological revolution in simple terms the 4K TV... so its up to someone to correct me if i am wrong!!!
 
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I have a Samsung Crystal 4K 43" (2021) and I'm currently running it's inbuilt YouTube app. The "Stats for nerds" show viewport as 1920x1080*2.00 Do you mean to say that it is actually a 1080p panel with only 1920 pixel x1080 pixels, that is approx 2 million physical pixels on the screen?
 
john1911 said:
I have a Samsung Crystal 4K 43" (2021) and I'm currently running it's inbuilt YouTube app. The "Stats for nerds" show viewport as 1920x1080*2.00 Do you mean to say that it is actually a 1080p panel with only 1920 pixel x1080 pixels, that is approx 2 million physical pixels on the screen?
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There You go, another Illuminated Soul entering into reality!! or Perhaps the inbuilt Youtube APP can exercise only a Full HD resolution, i am not sure about it though?? coz one can't have options to change the rendering screen resolution beyond FULL-HD, as of now!!

Still please correct me!!

Having said that, the logical reasoning is both the VIEWPORT and CURRENT/OPTIMAL RES, must display 3840 x 2160, ..... a great expectation is actually tattered into pieces in reality!!!
 
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So why doesn't it just show 1920X1080, why is it showing 1920x1080*2.00 ?

BTW I'm pretty sure that the panel has approx 8 million total physical pixels (3840x2160).

I just counted 21 pixels in 0.5cm (measured by a ruler) across width of the screen. The It has a total width of 94.5cms so based on my not so accurate counting, I have 21*189 = 3969 pixels across the width, which is close to 3860.
 
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john1911 said:
So why doesn't it just show 1920X1080, why is it showing 1920x1080*2.00 ?

BTW I'm pretty sure that the panel has approx 8 million total physical pixels (3840x2160)
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Lol, my inference is that, actual stream is 4K, that is supply is 4K, its gets lowscaled to FULL-HD, and then again processed by DSP that is (Upscaling FULL-HD * 2) :p The reason could be in reality, A 4K Panel is EXPENSIVE!! which can't be brought to mainstream audience at this timeline!!
 
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john1911 said:
Nope.

https://twitter.com/i/web/status/930277424323088384
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Isnt it easier to display 3840 x 2160 than 1920 x1080 * 2,, ?? Reality Bites!! its not same, the processing is different right, hence they show the difference in the Stats..

otherwise , YT app onboard the TV is incapable of displaying 4K!! I need more convincing methods,

the easiest way is 4K on viewport as well the current/optimal res can only bring satisfaction, any other ways are still buggy!!
 
eTernity2021 said:
Isnt it easier to display 3840 x 2160 than 1920 x1080 * 2,, ?? Reality Bites!!
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Because they mean different, TV YouTube Apps are basically a toned down HTML5 web-browser. When high density displays started coming in market, they started implementing resolution scaling (*2.00) so that lower resolution web objects don't look too small on the screen. It isn't actually downscaling anything, it is showing it in full 4K resolution.

I'm not sure what are you trying to imply, do most of the midrange 4K have only 1920x1080 physical pixels or is the YouTube app downgrading 4K to 1080p and then it is being upscaled by the television engine?
 
eTernity2021 said:
Isnt it easier to display 3840 x 2160 than 1920 x1080 * 2,, ?? Reality Bites!! its not same, the processing is different right, hence they show the difference in the Stats..

otherwise , YT app onboard the TV is incapable of displaying 4K!! I need more convincing methods,

the easiest way is 4K on viewport as well the current/optimal res can only bring satisfaction, any other ways are still buggy!!
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Instead of wasting time on youtube just connect your PC via HDMI and see if a 4K res is available on the screen natively. That way you can be sure if it's a 4K panel.
Another way is to check using netflix video test but that's only going to work if the TV has been certified for netflix otherwise you'll only see 720p.
 
enthusiast29 said:
Instead of wasting time on youtube just connect your PC via HDMI and see if a 4K res is available on the screen natively. That way you can be sure if it's a 4K panel.
Another way is to check using netflix video test but that's only going to work if the TV has been certified for netflix otherwise you'll only see 720p.
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will do!! and update later!!
john1911 said:
Because they mean different, TV YouTube Apps are basically a toned down HTML5 web-browser. When high density displays started coming in market, they started implementing resolution scaling (*2.00) so that lower resolution web objects don't look too small on the screen. It isn't actually downscaling anything, it is showing it in full 4K resolution.

I'm not sure what are you trying to imply, do most of the midrange 4K have only 1920x1080 physical pixels or is the YouTube app downgrading 4K to 1080p and then it is being upscaled by the television engine?
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as u already know, the straightforward method is to show correct display resolution as advertised and promised by the Manufacturer on the stats, if there is discrepancy there, we see wrong data on the Stats!! as simple as that, but thanks for your information, though!
 
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I did some testing on my laptop and arrived at the conclusion that 1920*1080*2 is 4K, but with the added information about how the UI is being scaled. In Windows on a 1080p display, for example, if you have your display scaling set to "150%" or "125%" (as it is by default on most machines with a resolution greater than HD), the YouTube viewport will show up as "1280x720*1.5" and "1536x864*1.25" respectively; note that in both cases, the video is still rendering at 1920x1080; the viewport stat is just indicating - if I understand correctly - that the OS is using a scaling factor for anything that is at a lower resolution, which the video is not.

Coming back to the TVs, I did a quick search, and it seems that Android TV prior to Android 12, the UI has always been rendered at 1080p and upscaled where necessary, which is why the viewport says what it does. If anyone has a media box or TV that is running it, the viewport should display as "3840x2160". Alternatively, as @enthusiast29 suggested, connect a PC to it via HDMI and set your resolution and scaling to 4K and 100% respectively.
 
dude just count the number of pixels in 0.5 or 1cm and multiply it by the screen width, it isn't that hard, took me like 1-2 mins, and nothing is more foolproof than counting the physical pixels by eyes.

enthusiast29 said:
Instead of wasting time on youtube just connect your PC via HDMI and see if a 4K res is available on the screen natively. That way you can be sure if it's a 4K panel.
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Although this would give correct results most of the times, it still can give false reports. I once had a Sony HD Ready TV with only 1280x720 actual hardware pixels but it still showed 1080p as native resolution in Windows and even the TV showed "1080p input signal" when pressing the ' i ' button on the remote control.
 
john1911 said:
dude just count the number of pixels in 0.5 or 1cm and multiply it by the screen width, it isn't that hard, took me like 1-2 mins, and nothing is more foolproof than counting the physical pixels by eyes.


Although this would give correct results most of the times, it still can give false reports. I once had a Sony HD Ready TV with only 1280x720 actual hardware pixels but it still showed 1080p as native resolution in Windows and even the TV showed "1080p input signal" when pressing the ' i ' button on the remote control.
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ouch!! i am out of ideas now!!

a brainstorming discussion that happened an Year ago !
 
john1911 said:
Although this would give correct results most of the times, it still can give false reports. I once had a Sony HD Ready TV with only 1280x720 actual hardware pixels but it still showed 1080p as native resolution in Windows and even the TV showed "1080p input signal" when pressing the ' i ' button on the remote control.
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Yeah I have one sony bravia TV which is 768p only and allows selecting higher res as well but when selecting those higher res the picture is noticeably blurry or not in the actual viewport. The image if native and supported must be crisp which happened only on the supported 1366x768 res.
 
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