[Buyer’s Guide] Kaleidescape Quality Compared to Blu-ray & other Digital Sources

[Dj7675]

I guess, but I never tried that since my AVR can defeat dialnorm... The problem with that approach is that every movie has a different value. For example, Ballerina has an insane -15db dialnorm, Black phone 2 is at -4db, Smashing Machine is at -2db.


I don't know. I'm not really an expert audio-wise, and never really compared DDP and TrueHD for frequency and dynamic differences. Other people might be able to answer that one.


It depends. If color accuracy is important to you, KS often messes that up. But purely in terms of video compression, KS is better than Apple TV 99.9% of the time. Movies Anywhere, on the other hand, has much better compression with no DNR and can outperform some KS encodes.

HDR alone will be the same everywhere unless someone makes a mistake or deliver a trim pass from the master

I have a Deon A1H (still in the box) and my understanding is it can defeat dialnorm on DD+. Appreciate your efforts to find/report issues as well as K working on improving things. I have a lot of movies on Movies Anywhere and some on Apple. If I go the streaming only route, will be sure to do MA.

 

[MikeKobb]

Hi folks,

I wanted to give you some updates on our progress in addressing issues that have been reported here.

Before I dive into the weeds, I want to start with a reminder. We’re starting the rollout of a new kOS software release this week: version 10.23. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, at the time that we discovered the issues tied to the Strato V & E scaler (more on this below), this release was already too far into the testing process to stop the train and introduce further changes. So, fixes for the scaler-related issues are not in this release. They are scheduled for the next release (10.24), which is planned for early spring.

Let me move on to updating the status of various issues reported here.

Issue	Current status
Cropping of letterboxed titles	Confirmed; fixes in progress. I previously said that we expected to fix this issue with a kOS update. It turns out this will actually be a 2-part fix, partly in the store and our backend tools, and partly on the players. The store/backend fix is scheduled for early in the new year, and this will adjust the movie guide metadata for these titles so that the player does not clip beyond the letterboxed area and into the image. A side effect of this change is that the black letterbox area may have slightly elevated blacks near the image, because the clipping will be held back away from the active image area. Because the player side fix depends on the updated guide metadata, it is scheduled for that same early spring release as the scaler work. That change will clip to the exact image area, eliminating any small areas of elevated black while preserving all of the image lines. As previously stated, no part of this fix requires changes to the files themselves. One bit of good news here is that the work to address these issues is also going to improve how we handle aspect ratios generally, with better display and handling of ratios that have become more popular recently, like 2.0 and 2.2.
Incorrect HDR metadata on some titles	Confirmed; many fixes released already; others in progress. Note that this issue affects certain displays, while others completely ignore this metadata. These were rooted in incorrect data provided as part of the metadata package that accompanies the mezzanine file, and we did not catch those errors. We're working to fix the ones that are incorrect, and we have added additional process steps to make sure that we catch errors like this in the future. Some of these titles were already scheduled for updates (e.g. to add Dolby Vision versions), and so the metadata will be corrected in the course of those updates. Others are receiving updates specifically to fix this issue, prioritized by popularity.
Incorrect colorspace on Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning	Fixed. Similar in some ways to the above, in that there was incorrect colorspace information in the metadata package.
Red/green "push" on certain older titles	Confirmed; some fixes released already; others in progress. We fully understand the cause of the red/green shift in older titles, and we have begun releasing updates that correct it. We have made process adjustments to avoid what caused the issue, and we have deployed a new tool into our content workflow that will flag issues of this type should something creep in that would cause them again. (This is in addition to our manual review process.)
Red “push” on certain recent titles	Under investigation. This is not the same cause as the red/green push mentioned above, and while it does look similar to the Mission Impossible colorspace issue, it is not the same. We have identified common factors in affected titles, so we're closing in on an answer to this one.
Poor picture quality on certain older titles (e.g. "Pixels")	Confirmed; some fixes released already; others in progress. Some older releases don't match the quality of our more recent titles. Re-encoding with our current process produces significant improvement. We've released some updated titles already and as with the color issue above, others are either being addressed in the course of planned updates, or with targeted updates specifically for this issue, prioritized by popularity.
Encoding-related issues on recent titles (detail, macroblock artifacts, grain structure, etc.)	Confirmed. This is a combination of encoder “recipe” and the scaler issues mentioned above. More on this below.
Decoding of bitstream audio to PCM	TrueHD confirmed; DTS-HD works as designed. We can confirm that when decoding TrueHD 7.1 to PCM, the 2 rear channels are silent. This is under investigation. When decoding DTS-HD 5.1 to PCM, the output is 7.1. While you might expect that there should be a direct mapping from DTS-HD 5.1 to 5.1 PCM, this is actually functioning according to the DTS specifications and certification standards.

Okay, I said that I would expand on the issues related to the combination of encoding and player scaling.

As a reminder, when I refer to the Strato V & E scaling issue, I'm actually referring to image processing in the new chip that Strato V and E are built upon. That processing is intended to be applied when the player is scaling up content (e.g., from HD to 4K), but the chip is also enabling this processing when we didn't expect it to -- when we are outputting 4K content as 4K, but with some clipping applied to ensure that the letterbox area of the image is pure black. That clipping turns out to be a feature of the scaler, and so it inadvertently triggered the processing that would normally be applied in the up-scaling case. When this image processing is applied when it's not needed, it creates artifacts.

We can disable the added image processing in these cases, but there are a lot of permutations to address here (with different content aspect ratios and output settings), and that takes time to implement and then carefully test. This is why this work had to be scheduled into the next kOS release.

Meanwhile, on the encoding side, we are now regularly using our updated encoding "recipe" that produces significantly better results for many titles. This improvement is noticeable on all players, even ones that are affected by the scaler-related image processing.

While we think the new recipe is very good, we will continue to refine it, and we are also making some refinements to some of the special-purpose recipes that are tailored for content like animation or content that is deliberately produced with a very high film grain.

This is time consuming work. Each recipe has to be tested across an array of different titles, because a change that may make one movie look dramatically better may cause issues in others. And all of that testing has to be done within a secure compute environment that protects the original source files. This adds substantial additional friction to the process, especially when trying to compare the encoded result to the original files. All this to say that you can expect continuous improvement in encoding quality.

 

[HiFiHippie]

Hi folks,

I wanted to give you some updates on our progress in addressing issues that have been reported here.

Before I dive into the weeds, I want to start with a reminder. We’re starting the rollout of a new kOS software release this week: version 10.23. As I mentioned earlier in the thread, at the time that we discovered the issues tied to the Strato V & E scaler (more on this below), this release was already too far into the testing process to stop the train and introduce further changes. So, fixes for the scaler-related issues are not in this release. They are scheduled for the next release (10.24), which is planned for early spring.

Let me move on to updating the status of various issues reported here.

Issue	Current status
Cropping of letterboxed titles	Confirmed; fixes in progress. I previously said that we expected to fix this issue with a kOS update. It turns out this will actually be a 2-part fix, partly in the store and our backend tools, and partly on the players. The store/backend fix is scheduled for early in the new year, and this will adjust the movie guide metadata for these titles so that the player does not clip beyond the letterboxed area and into the image. A side effect of this change is that the black letterbox area may have slightly elevated blacks near the image, because the clipping will be held back away from the active image area. Because the player side fix depends on the updated guide metadata, it is scheduled for that same early spring release as the scaler work. That change will clip to the exact image area, eliminating any small areas of elevated black while preserving all of the image lines. As previously stated, no part of this fix requires changes to the files themselves. One bit of good news here is that the work to address these issues is also going to improve how we handle aspect ratios generally, with better display and handling of ratios that have become more popular recently, like 2.0 and 2.2.
Incorrect HDR metadata on some titles	Confirmed; many fixes released already; others in progress. Note that this issue affects certain displays, while others completely ignore this metadata. These were rooted in incorrect data provided as part of the metadata package that accompanies the mezzanine file, and we did not catch those errors. We're working to fix the ones that are incorrect, and we have added additional process steps to make sure that we catch errors like this in the future. Some of these titles were already scheduled for updates (e.g. to add Dolby Vision versions), and so the metadata will be corrected in the course of those updates. Others are receiving updates specifically to fix this issue, prioritized by popularity.
Incorrect colorspace on Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning	Fixed. Similar in some ways to the above, in that there was incorrect colorspace information in the metadata package.
Red/green "push" on certain older titles	Confirmed; some fixes released already; others in progress. We fully understand the cause of the red/green shift in older titles, and we have begun releasing updates that correct it. We have made process adjustments to avoid what caused the issue, and we have deployed a new tool into our content workflow that will flag issues of this type should something creep in that would cause them again. (This is in addition to our manual review process.)
Red “push” on certain recent titles	Under investigation. This is not the same cause as the red/green push mentioned above, and while it does look similar to the Mission Impossible colorspace issue, it is not the same. We have identified common factors in affected titles, so we're closing in on an answer to this one.
Poor picture quality on certain older titles (e.g. "Pixels")	Confirmed; some fixes released already; others in progress. Some older releases don't match the quality of our more recent titles. Re-encoding with our current process produces significant improvement. We've released some updated titles already and as with the color issue above, others are either being addressed in the course of planned updates, or with targeted updates specifically for this issue, prioritized by popularity.
Encoding-related issues on recent titles (detail, macroblock artifacts, grain structure, etc.)	Confirmed. This is a combination of encoder “recipe” and the scaler issues mentioned above. More on this below.
Decoding of bitstream audio to PCM	TrueHD confirmed; DTS-HD works as designed. We can confirm that when decoding TrueHD 7.1 to PCM, the 2 rear channels are silent. This is under investigation. When decoding DTS-HD 5.1 to PCM, the output is 7.1. While you might expect that there should be a direct mapping from DTS-HD 5.1 to 5.1 PCM, this is actually functioning according to the DTS specifications and certification standards.

Okay, I said that I would expand on the issues related to the combination of encoding and player scaling.

As a reminder, when I refer to the Strato V & E scaling issue, I'm actually referring to image processing in the new chip that Strato V and E are built upon. That processing is intended to be applied when the player is scaling up content (e.g., from HD to 4K), but the chip is also enabling this processing when we didn't expect it to -- when we are outputting 4K content as 4K, but with some clipping applied to ensure that the letterbox area of the image is pure black. That clipping turns out to be a feature of the scaler, and so it inadvertently triggered the processing that would normally be applied in the up-scaling case. When this image processing is applied when it's not needed, it creates artifacts.

We can disable the added image processing in these cases, but there are a lot of permutations to address here (with different content aspect ratios and output settings), and that takes time to implement and then carefully test. This is why this work had to be scheduled into the next kOS release.

Meanwhile, on the encoding side, we are now regularly using our updated encoding "recipe" that produces significantly better results for many titles. This improvement is noticeable on all players, even ones that are affected by the scaler-related image processing.

While we think the new recipe is very good, we will continue to refine it, and we are also making some refinements to some of the special-purpose recipes that are tailored for content like animation or content that is deliberately produced with a very high film grain.

This is time consuming work. Each recipe has to be tested across an array of different titles, because a change that may make one movie look dramatically better may cause issues in others. And all of that testing has to be done within a secure compute environment that protects the original source files. This adds substantial additional friction to the process, especially when trying to compare the encoded result to the original files. All this to say that you can expect continuous improvement in encoding quality.

Is this update just for Strato V and E, or will it also be for Strato C. Thanks in advance for making the improvements to the Kscape system

 

[KDeering]

I'm really concerned about the raised blacks being used on titles for aspect stuff. This will cause a lot of issues most likely with video processors like MadVR and Lumagen with their auto aspect features, which a lot of K users have in their setups. If the blacks are not at black, the video processor will think there is active video there in most cases (players look at active frames, not metadata). I think people would notice this issue way more than the minor image clipping being done right now.

 

[MikeKobb]

Is this update just for Strato V and E, or will it also be for Strato C. Thanks in advance for making the improvements to the Kscape system

Both 10.23 and 10.24 will have elements that apply to Strato C as well. We’ll have a post soon to lay out some of the changes in 10.23.

I'm really concerned about the raised blacks being used on titles for aspect stuff. This will cause a lot of issues most likely with video processors like MadVR and Lumagen with their auto aspect features, which a lot of K users have in their setups. If the blacks are not at black, the video processor will think there is active video there in most cases (players look at active frames, not metadata). I think people would notice this issue way more than the minor image clipping being done right now.

Kris, this is a fair concern. I will discuss with the team. As a headend change, we have some flexibility on when that change is deployed. If testing shows that it’s problematic with video processors, then I expect we would delay deploying the updated guide data to customers until the player-side change has rolled out.

 

[Rmarci]

Thanks for the update Mike...
So it ended up being a matter of months, not weeks...

Letterbox:
So this player can’t display absolute black pixels as true black? Why would it need a letterbox mask to show them correctly if the source letterbox bars are truly black? Wouldn't that mean that any absolute black pixels in the active area are lifted??

Block artifacts:
I tried watching the new movie Good Fortune recently, and it just looked terrible with all the block artifacts...
Guess I’ll see you in spring, then...

 

[macfan2k24]

“Winter is coming”

 

[Rmarci]

Indeed, and three more months to wait before my 5K CAD device finally works properly…
P.S. There’s already a foot of snow here in northern Canada, lol.

 

[Nathan28]

This means my strato V is defective. Are dealers going to offer refunds?

 

[Jin-X]

Both 10.23 and 10.24 will have elements that apply to Strato C as well. We’ll have a post soon to lay out some of the changes in 10.23.


Kris, this is a fair concern. I will discuss with the team. As a headend change, we have some flexibility on when that change is deployed. If testing shows that it’s problematic with video processors, then I expect we would delay deploying the updated guide data to customers until the player-side change has rolled out.

If I read your original post correctly, the elevated black levels on a small area of the letterbox bars would be a temp issue until the player side fix deployed on the Q1/April kOS update? At which point everything will be in it’s correct aspect ratio without any elevated black bars?

If that’s the case I think it would just be better to wait and fix it all at once instead of causing issues for those with image processors and/or OLED tvs where it might be noticeable.

 

[MikeKobb]

Letterbox:
So this player can’t display absolute black pixels as true black? Why would it need a letterbox mask to show them correctly if the source letterbox bars are truly black? Wouldn't that mean that any absolute black pixels in the active area are lifted??

No, it certainly can display black as black. If the pixels in the video are actually black, then that's what the player will output. The clipping/masking that we apply is a belt & suspenders sort of thing for cases where the source material doesn't have a perfect black in the letterbox area.

 

[Rmarci]

Then there won’t be any issue, and I wouldn’t have even mentioned it (not to alarm people). I think I’ve seen one or two movies or TV shows with raised letterboxes from Blu-ray or streaming , one example being the recently released Blu-ray of Lights Out (2016) but that's a studio encoding mistake.

 

[Rmarci]

**** Unless one uses the player’s built-in DV-to-HDR10 conversion function, but that’s a player bug.
By the way, will this issue be addressed as well?

 

[MikeKobb]

I should have included that issue in my chart, sorry. That one is still under investigation.

 

[thrawn997]

I saw the update that was released and while hdmi-cec is nice I really wish this release had been delayed to incorporate these fixes. Spring 2026 for a fix here is really bad.

 

[thrawn997]

And what torture, One Battle After Another is out

 

[Rmarci]

The Conjuring Last Rites 2025

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-Ignoring the block artifacts, pretty good compression and noticeably better than the Blu-ray.

 

[thrawn997]

And what torture, One Battle After Another is out

Barry Lyndon now also

 

[Rmarci]

At least there’s a UHD-BD release for this movie available right now…

Battle After Another won’t get a BD release for more than two months. If it weren’t priced so high, I’d already buy it, and I still might cave anyway, since it’ll probably have strong replay value.

Spoiler: spoiler

 

[Rmarci]

Star Trek Beyond 2016

- Green push

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Oblivion 2013

- Incorrect 10 000 MDL
Glad to see it's the same 4000nits master as iTunes though... Bluray disc is 1000nits only..
Compression could be improved; it looks a bit soft compared to the already soft BD...

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