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BD Color Bit?

post #1 of 15
9/9/12 at 12:53pm
Thread Starter 
Just a curious question....
What color bit are BD's created in? What color bit does a BD player output? What color bit is broadcast TV(i.e. Satellite/Cable/Fiber Optic, etc)?
And I'm all in for ALL HDMI cables are the same, because the science backs it and I've seen it for myself, but why would a company so prolific as say, Monster, advertise right on one of their 700-1000 Series HDMI cables that those cables can carry anywhere from 8-16 Color Bit??

Thanks for the answers all!
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post #2 of 15
9/9/12 at 1:20pm
Blu-rays are 8-bit per channel. Factoring in chroma subsampling, that comes out to 12bits/pixel. If the video signal is decoded into RGB without chroma subsampling, that's 24bits/pixel.
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post #3 of 15
9/9/12 at 1:23pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by hoozthatat View Post

And I'm all in for ALL HDMI cables are the same, because the science backs it and I've seen it for myself, but why would a company so prolific as say, Monster, advertise right on one of their 700-1000 Series HDMI cables that those cables can carry anywhere from 8-16 Color Bit??
Thanks for the answers all!

Monster is not in the business of targeting audiophiles or videophiles. They target the mainstream consumer, one who has little or no understanding of A/V technology (and they shouldn't be expected to really, is isn't their hobby), and barrage them with clever marketing and misleading pseudo-technical jargon so they can charge a super-premium price for a standard product. Bose does the exact same thing with their absurdly priced low-quality speakers. That is precisely why those companies are so prolific... because the "mainstream consumer" demographic is so large (and often so gullible) they're able to produce and move a tremendous volume of product. When they take one of their "premium" 100 dollar HDMI cables and claim it can pass anywhere from 8-16 bit color that's not technically false... What they don't tell you is a 4 dollar HDMI cable from Monoprice will do the exact same thing.
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post #4 of 15
9/9/12 at 1:32pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by hoozthatat View Post

Just a curious question....
What color bit are BD's created in? What color bit does a BD player output? What color bit is broadcast TV(i.e. Satellite/Cable/Fiber Optic, etc)?
And I'm all in for ALL HDMI cables are the same, because the science backs it and I've seen it for myself, but why would a company so prolific as say, Monster, advertise right on one of their 700-1000 Series HDMI cables that those cables can carry anywhere from 8-16 Color Bit??
Thanks for the answers all!
Marketing. It's just like calling a TV "LED" or "Full HD". It sounds cool.

Having said that, not all HDMI cables are the same. While it's true that price doesn't determine quality, some companies do suck at making them. Generally, stuff from places like Monoprice or Blue Jeans is good. Monster is usally good, too, but highly overpriced. Some of those cables from RCA or Philips are sketchy, though.
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post #5 of 15
9/9/12 at 3:14pm
Thread Starter 
I guess I should have phrased my, "All HDMI cables are the same" line. I meant to say roughly all high speed hdmi cables from less then substandard manufacturers are the same. IMO some cables are absolutely built better and can last longer, but as far a pure performance goes, I personally have done a side by side test of a 10$ cable and a $90 cable and they both performed identically. I am also aware that monster does not try and appeal to the videophile or audiophile, I was simply asking why would they put information like that on the packaging if currently no equipment takes advantage of a spec like that? And again I say this only because the average consumer is never going to care, nor understand what something like that means even if it's put on the front of the product. Case and point, look at what Samsung has done this year with their EH Series of TV's. They market them just as an other "LED" TV and people have no clue there is an actual difference between the EH and ES series other then say Smart TV.

Regardless I feel like this may be getting off topic. What color bit is broadcast TV or non film being displayed at?
And maybe a better question, what's the native display capabilities in terms of color bits for front projection? PDP? LCD? DLP? etc..? Or am I missing the point some where?
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post #6 of 15
9/9/12 at 8:48pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by hoozthatat View Post

I guess I should have phrased my, "All HDMI cables are the same" line. I meant to say roughly all high speed hdmi cables from less then substandard manufacturers are the same. IMO some cables are absolutely built better and can last longer, but as far a pure performance goes, I personally have done a side by side test of a 10$ cable and a $90 cable and they both performed identically. I am also aware that monster does not try and appeal to the videophile or audiophile, I was simply asking why would they put information like that on the packaging if currently no equipment takes advantage of a spec like that? And again I say this only because the average consumer is never going to care, nor understand what something like that means even if it's put on the front of the product. Case and point, look at what Samsung has done this year with their EH Series of TV's. They market them just as an other "LED" TV and people have no clue there is an actual difference between the EH and ES series other then say Smart TV.
Regardless I feel like this may be getting off topic. What color bit is broadcast TV or non film being displayed at?
And maybe a better question, what's the native display capabilities in terms of color bits for front projection? PDP? LCD? DLP? etc..? Or am I missing the point some where?

ALL consumer HD content has a color depth of 8bits per color( 24bits total) and a Chroma Subsample rate of 4:2:0.

Years ago they were talking about extending the color depth to 10bit (30bit total) or even 12bit (36bit total) under the moniker of Deep Color. As of yet, this has failed to materialize.

Professional video starts at 10bit and goes out to 16bit (48bit total) with a max Chroma Subsampling rate of 4:4:4. Here is something that will help you to underatnd CS:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chroma_subsampling

Just as HDTV displays upscale SD content, many displays will upscale the color depth to higher levels than 8bit. And just like video upscaling, there is guesswork as to how that upscaling is accomplished

One of the biggest benefits of higher than 8bit color depth is the extended Gray Scale - how many steps between black and white. 8bit is around 255. Just extending the color depth to 10bit extends the Gray Sacle to 1024.
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post #7 of 15
9/10/12 at 2:42am
Quote:
Originally Posted by hoozthatat View Post

...but why would a company so prolific as say, Monster, advertise right on one of their 700-1000 Series HDMI cables that those cables can carry anywhere from 8-16 Color Bit??
Quote:
Originally Posted by hoozthatat View Post

...but as far a pure performance goes, I personally have done a side by side test of a 10$ cable and a $90 cable and they both performed identically. I am also aware that monster does not try and appeal to the videophile or audiophile, I was simply asking why would they put information like that on the packaging if currently no equipment takes advantage of a spec like that?

My 2 year old BDP can output 48-bit upsampled Deep Color (16-bit per channel) and my 3 year old plasma can accept 36-bit. If you want to know which displays can do 48-bit try the display forum.

So:
If Monster cable can be proven to transmit that it isn't falsely advertising. Whether you have capable equipment or a need is another matter. They haven't said they are the only cables that can do that. You are over-reacting a bit.

A lot of performance issues seem to concern long runs and most cheap non-high speed cables probably do fine on short runs. So testing 1m or 2m isn't going to reveal anything.
Edited by Kilian.ca - 9/10/12 at 2:56am
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post #8 of 15
9/10/12 at 10:23am
Thread Starter 
@Kilian.ca I didn't mean to over react I was just simply pointing out the spec listed on the front of the Monster Cables, and I didn't mean to call out Monster specifically because a lot of cable mfcts. call out that spec. I was simply using them because I was under the impression almost all of consumer content is only 8 bit, and then upscaled by the display source, but not the cable.
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post #9 of 15
9/11/12 at 12:08pm
Even though Blu-ray is 8 bit, the black bars are at 16,16,16 instead of RGB(0,0,0). I think white is supposed to be about 235 instead of 255. So you're really getting a lot less colours/brightness ranges (assuming the TV is calibrated so that the black bars are black and 235 is the brightest) than you would for full 8 bit (0-255 for R,G & B).
Quote:
I was under the impression almost all of consumer content is only 8 bit
You're right, it is. Some Blu-ray players can upscale to higher bit-depths (ie. guess), and I think there are some consumer camcorders that can record & output higher bit-depths or deep colour.
Edited by Joe Bloggs - 9/11/12 at 12:15pm
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post #10 of 15
9/12/12 at 2:33pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by hoozthatat View Post

...why would...Monster...advertise...their...cables...can carry anywhere from 8-16 Color Bit?
To get people who don't know better to buy their cables. The simple fact is that any HDMI cable is capable of carrying up to 16 bits per channel as long as the total bit rate, which is a function of color depth, resolution and refresh rate, is within its capacity.

FWIW higher depth color sounds sexy. But for a number of reasons, in most cases, it does little if anything to improve the experience.
Edited by Colm - 9/12/12 at 2:41pm
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post #11 of 15
9/12/12 at 3:12pm
Thread Starter 
@Colm, I know what you're saying, and maybe what I was saying was misinterpreted, and maybe was misleading by me to phrase it the way I did. I mean the average consumer has no idea what that means, nor any of the other specs they list on the cable, so why waste the print? A typical consumer is never going pick up one of the cables and say "Well, this Monster can pass up to 16 bits per channel! I've gotta have it!" biggrin.gif
I was looking more for a technical answer of what possible sources can display color bits higher than 8 and did receive very good answer(s) which are/is much appreciated biggrin.gif
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post #12 of 15
9/13/12 at 6:20am
Today, the only consumer source that I am aware of that can capture and pass a higher then 8bit color depth are a few HD Camcorders that use the x.v.Color extended color gamut. (also known as x.v.YCC). It provides a 1.8 times wider color gamut (color depth) than 8bit.
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post #13 of 15
9/13/12 at 10:24am
Seems to be a little bit of misunderstanding here;

Consumer video is 8bit ; ( calling it 24bit because its 8bits per channel misses the point about what the 8 bit represents)

Usually its encoded as component (YCbCr) and chroma downsamples to 4:2:0 , that means the Cb and the Cr records are half the resolution in both the x and y axis of the luma (Y).

RGB is not chroma downsampled (its RGB after all) so descriding it as 4:4:4 is redundant and innacurate.

Professional level imagery is usually carried about as 10bit log , 16bit or 32bit linear (float in the case of CGI or HDR imagery like film negative although film is usually carried about as 10bit log)

processing is usually carried out in 32bit float workspaces.

Some things to bear in mind ;

Most people cannot differentaite between 8 and 10bit video.

4:2:0 vs 4:2:2 vs 4:4:4 is most visible on test patterns rather than real world imagery.

The only real benefit in upping the bit depth would come if there was a commensurate improvement in dynamic range ; closer to DCi or print type dynamic range.
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post #14 of 15
9/13/12 at 8:38pm
Hi Mr D smile.gif

What parameters determine the dynamic range?
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post #15 of 15
9/13/12 at 9:13pm
Thread Starter 
@ Lee Stewart.. Please, elaborate on this thought biggrin.gif
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