In an interview with Sony Electronics President and COO, Phil Molyneux, The Verge managed to get a confirmation, of sorts, that a 4K video download service would be supported by the Sony PlayStation 4.
Sony held an event in New York yesterday showing off its 4K TV product line and related AV equipment head-to-head against competitor products. The Verge sent a reporter to interview Sony Electronics President and COO, Phil Molyneux at the event. Interviewer Nilay Patel asked about how these new 4K TVs and AV equipment will work together with the PlayStation 4 and Xperia Z products that have just been shown at other events.
Took a while to get to the point
Molyneux talked at some length about using your Xperia Z tablet in conjunction with your TV to bring a richer experience; controlling the TV and interacting with social media concerning your viewing and so on. Further on in the interview the COO talked about the 4K content home server, which will be feeding lucky wealthy folks’ 4K TVs with UltraHD content.
You won’t be disappointed
The Verge interviewer then took advantage, while on this topic, to ask about whether the download service for 4K movies, using Sony’s 4K Home Server, is going to work for people using the PS4 instead. Molyneux replied; “We will give you more details in due course but I promise you that you won’t be disappointed.” Molyneux definitely placed emphasis on that promise. (Video at 10m20s)
100GB plus
Discussing the 4K movie content, it was estimated that an average UltraHD movie would weigh in at “100GB plus”. Molyneux considered that a challenge but said that Sony had some “very good ideas” to make 4K media downloads more comfortable. Possible new compression methods were hinted at. As far as buying 4K content on some kind of distributable physical media the Sony COO said that “the whole world is moving more and more to download”. Sony’s download service will kick off this summer.
At the moment with my “rural broadband” I have a download limit of 120GB a month so it would be appreciated if the Sony techs get working on that compression technology soon. Perhaps Sony will use the H.265 High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC)?
