First UHD Blu-Ray Drive for PC to be Put on Sale From Next Month - But There's a Catch...

[Misanthrope]

I count more than 1 though. 

[PocketNerd]

Welp... this thing is DOA.

I feel sorry for the joe consumer who buys this and doesn't know about the DRM.

[Bcat00]

1 hour ago, dalekphalm said:

Nope. In fact, there's a very strong optical disc presence in the home theatre enthusiast community. When you can get equal quality to Blu-Ray streams on Netflix or other streaming service, then discs can and will die.

Well enthusiasts alone won't keep this alive, unless they are willing to pay 1k a pop.

 

heck, most people would be done with it by buying a xbox for their player. 

[You_are_a_cunt]

I'm not entirely sure it's all about DRM.

It's mostly the way UHD is encoded and decoded

[FloRolf]

Here is why I bought an Xbox One S (which I actually hate a lot #pcmr) for 'only'  319€ including 3 games and a 4k Bluray. 

It also doesn't come with a kaby lake cpu so dafuq is this shit? 

[Zodiark1593]

21 minutes ago, revsilverspine said:

I'm not entirely sure it's all about DRM.

It's mostly the way UHD is encoded and decoded

Well, the GTX 960 and onward (pascal/polaris) had hardware decode capabilites that allows HEVC, 4K 60P video to be played. The technical capability had been there for a couple years at least. And then there's cpu decode for those with the monsters to do so.

 

Given the above, I call the Kaby Lake requirement 100% artificial. 

[imreloadin]

48 minutes ago, FloRolf said:

Here is why I bought an Xbox One S (which I actually hate a lot #pcmr) for 'only'  319€ including 3 games and a 4k Bluray. 

It also doesn't come with a kaby lake cpu so dafuq is this shit? 

You've hit the proverbial nail on its head there. Why does this drive REQUIRE a Kaby Lake CPU while the Xbox One S doesn't have one and still supports it? Honestly the only thing I can think is DRM as you can't rip the blu ray with your Xbox but would be able to on a PC.

[Notional]

What exactly makes the drives UHD supportive? Is it the extra layer(s) on the discs, or just the speed, due to higher bandwidth needs? My old Blu ray drive is 4x read, so it should be fine. Most of the issues lies in the software and drm.

[dalekphalm]

5 minutes ago, Notional said:

What exactly makes the drives UHD supportive? Is it the extra layer(s) on the discs, or just the speed, due to higher bandwidth needs? My old Blu ray drive is 4x read, so it should be fine. Most of the issues lies in the software and drm.

There may be hardware differences. A BDXL drive can apparently detect some UHD Discs, but since UHD supports layers that BDXL does not, there may be hardware issues.

 

These issues can probably be solved by a firmware update, but good luck getting the manufacturers to update their older drives.

[jaggysnake57]

and they wonder why people pirate films

[LAwLz]

THIS HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH ENCODER/DECODER CAPABILITIES

 

It is entirely artificial limitations imposed by Microsoft. I have been playing HEVC and VP9 files on my sandy bridge and Radeon 7850 for years already. The problem is ReadyPlay 3.0 (a DRM developed by Microsoft).

 

Microsoft have said that Intel, Nvidia, AMD and Qualcomm are all working on implementing it in their products. I can't find anything about the RX480 supporting it, but Pascal cards does (but for some reason still can't play any content). In order to support this new cancerous-DRM, you need hardware that supports it. So out with your old motherboard, CPU and monitor, and in with the brand new DRM-compliant hardware.

Zen won't support it but that shouldn't matter since it's a GPU feature and Zen won't ship with GPUs until later. Then again, it should work on Pascal but apparently doesn't... So while it is a GPU feature, the only GPUs that supports it right now are those built into Intel's CPUs. That will (hopefully) change in the future though.

 

This most likely won't come to other OSes either, because it is made by Microsoft. GNU/Linux never got support for any previous version of ReadyPlay, so I don't see why this will be any different. Microsoft are 100% in control of which OSes gets support, and which does not.

 

So you will really need:

1) To use Windows 10

2) Have a Kaby Lake system (or in the future, an Nvidia Pascal or later, or some AMD card that supports ReadyPlay 3.0)

3) A monitor with HDCP 2.2 (should work with DisplayPort 1.4 as well as HDMI 2.0a or later)

 

There is no way around it until someone breaks ReadyPlay 3.0., and that day can't come soon enough.

 

 

 

B-b-but it doesn't make sense! Why would they intentionally limit their audience?

Well, the DRM is developed by Microsoft and of course they want to push people to Windows and other Microsoft products (no coincident that the only browser that supports it is Edge). Hardware manufacturers seems OK with it because it gives them another selling point (plus you actually need to physically support this DRM since it is hardware based. You can't firmware update to support it even if you wanted to).

And the studios are so extremely paranoid about piracy, despite the vast amount of evidence that piracy doesn't hurt sales, and that they make more money now than ever, that they are not thinking rationally. They just want to limit piracy at all costs, even the cost of making less money.

[lettuce head]

6 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

Well shit...this means that an Xbox One S is still the best value 4K Blueray player around. Because I can guarantee, few people will ever get Kabylake with Skylake still around and in some cases, cheaper. And then there are the people still on Sandybridge right through Broadwell who also really don't need to replace their current platform.

this actually could be very much on purpose. think about it, Microsoft gains profit from new pc builds obviously (New OS keys sold), and obviously gains profit from console/games sales. some people who are into 4k Blu-ray's may have built in the last 2 years and aren't willing or able to justify a brand new z270 mobo and 7700k/7600k. a cheaper route (and one that earns Microsoft more cash) is to simply buy an xbox1S...

[Mooshi]

Yeah, hell no. I'm not dropping 300+ for a cpu that's only 2% more performance over my 6700k. I'd rather get an xbox one S. 

[AlTech]

In other news: Microsoft sells a hell of a lot more Xbox One S consoles than they expected.

 

/joke

[MrDynamicMan]

8 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Well to be fair, you can probably buy the i3 Kaby CPU. Still... I wonder if Ryzen CPU's will be compatible?

I doubt anyone is gonna buy this, given that it rewuires a full platform upgrade. Unless theres someone who wasnt already upgrading or really wants 4k blu-ray...

 

actually, that new pentium is poweful, isnt it? $550 kaby lake/ 1050 htpc.

[Daiyus]

Sometimes I'm really glad I stay a generation or so behind the resolution game. I still haven't fully adopted 1080p as my PC has been hooked up to a 720p TV in my living room for HTPC/gaming duties for years; the TV still works so why waste money replacing it? It's only now that I've decided I need separate HTPC and gaming/workstation systems that I'm going to buy a 1080p+ monitor (I'm thinking 2560x1080 for the workstation/gaming rig, oh, and RyZen/Vega because we need the competition).

 

By the time my 720p TV dies UHD TV's should be pretty cheap and hopefully this UHD DRM nonsense will have been sorted out so I can do a relatively cheap upgrade to the HTPC to allow using it.

[Doobeedoo]

Unnecessary additional DRM added is what will make people ignore it mainly. And then companies wonder why there's piracy after?

Personally I'm interested in this because myself I tend to watch stuff locally and don't stream it.

[SpaceGhostC2C]

10 hours ago, Alexp10v2 said:

 

Much like with Netflix 4K - to be able to watch UHD Blu-ray, you MUST have the following:

A Windows 10 based Machine

HDMI 2.0a connection that's HDCP 2.2 capable

AND - A 7th Generation Intel KabyLake processor...

DOA. KabyLake is barely starting, too soon to make it a requirement for anything. Like the market for optical drives wasn't shrinking enough... 

10 hours ago, M.Yurizaki said:

UHD Blu-Rays require some DRM that Microsoft was forced to implement care of those production studios. From https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2016/11/netflix-4k-streaming-pc-kaby-lake-cpu-windows-10-edge-browser/

 

 

I'm still going to blame the studios for this.

Ah, that great anti-piracy strategy consisting in making everything harder/worse for paying customers than for pirates... 

[Dabombinable]

Piracy: D.O I.T

 

[Sauron]

Screw DRM.

9 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

You know what? Buy the disc, download a 4K rip off the internet, the studio gets their money and you can play the movie. You are allowed 1 copy afterall....

Honestly this all the way

[Space Reptile]

12 hours ago, Alexp10v2 said:

AND - A 7th Generation Intel KabyLake processor...

called it

[TidaLWaveZ]

Someone may have already covered this but I haven't found a definitive answer yet as to why these drives and netflix 4k are only available via Kaby Lake. Is it truly because of HDCP 2.2/DRM?

 

If so that's a huge smack in the face of the tech community, we spend hundreds more to have higher end components clearly capable of achieving the level of performance necessary for 4k and they just deny us in the name of DRM? The size of a UHD video file alone is enough to combat piracy.

 

 

[suicidalfranco]

what's more convenient: this or just combining popcorn time with chromecast?

Micro$shaft and holywood have their heads so up their arses the've given birth to a new specie of ouroboros 

[That Norwegian Guy]

And here's another example of why, if you do not consider optical drives obsolete, you might be the one who's obsolete

[Coaxialgamer]

Fuck.  It's probably cheaper just to  get an xbox one s than getying a kaby lake pc... 

 

But wasn't planning on buying one anyway.