Verizon says the company is conducting trials of 4K content delivery with a satellite company by the name of SES. A company press release gives little to no detail on when the trials will begin, but the company says the trial will involve test delivery of nine smaller channels to begin: NASA TV, 4K Universe, C4K60, Fashion One 4K, Insight, Nature Relaxation, Travelxp 4K, UHD1 and an SES demonstration channel.
The release proclaims that SES's managed Ultra HD platform is delivered over dedicated satellite bandwidth, which provides a "much higher quality viewer experience compared to current Internet-delivered 4K offerings," which can be susceptible to bottlenecks, buffering and network congestion.
That's a swipe at companies like Netflix and Amazon, which have beaten most cable providers to the punch when it comes to delivering 4K and HDR content to the home.
"Verizon’s network is uniquely positioned to bring its customers the most innovative content solutions, including 4K/UHD.” said Erin McPherson, VP of Programming & Content Strategy. “We look forward to driving the technology and delivering premier video experiences through our collaboration with SES."
Again there's no real timeline for when FiOS customers will actually see 4K content, but the launch of 4K will likely fall in line with a looming and total
overhaul of Verizon's FiOS TV platform. That overhaul will not only include completely new ONT and home gateway hardware, but an all-IPTV delivery system that will replace the company's existing FiOS TV services.
My system is on the list of the current testing providers. The above is correct, we receive these on a 3.7 Meter Dish and do not have any issues with heavy rain. Each channel takes up about 18Mbps of transport which means you can stack 2 per QAM (6Mhz) or hand out over IP. I will have to say the channels are mighty vibrant with color.
