Samsung Announces First Ultra HD Blu-ray Disc Player

September 4, 2015

Samsung is the first company to announce an Ultra HD Blu-ray Disc player, taking the lead in 4K and HDR video. The announcement was made at IFA 2015. The Samsung player, expected early next year, will push super-high-resolution movies (four times the resolution of Blu-ray, and 64 times as many colors) on discs. Not much detail is available on the new player, although it is expected to cost less than the $1,000. Joining the tech company on its IFA 2015 stage were Twentieth Century Fox executives, with President Mike Dunn proclaiming the studio is committed to releasing its slate of upcoming movies in Ultra HD with HDR day-and-date with the Blu-ray and Digital HD releases. That includes Fantastic Four, Maze Runner, Kingsman: The Secret Service and more.

Samsung's Ultra HD Blu-ray player is curved and will include a number of UHD streaming services. The other news at IFA is that Samsung's TVs will be the first ones getting a software update to support HDMI 2.0a, necessary to receive HDR data from the new Blu-ray Disc players.