YouTube to showcase 4K streaming using VP9 codec at CES

[Shawn Knight]

YouTube will be on hand during next week’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas to showcase 4K video streaming. But instead of using the traditional H.265 video codec to get the job done, the Google-owned company will rely on a new royalty-free codec developed in-house known as VP9.

Whether or not Google will be able to drum up interest in the codec, however, remains to be seen. The search giant launched the VP8 video codec back in 2010 which many believed would become the go-to option for real-time communications and plugin-free video streaming.

A lack of hardware support and opposition from those looking to make money from a commercial video format, however, prevented VP8 from becoming a mainstream success.

For VP9, Google is getting its duck in a row ahead of the fact. YouTube recently released a list of 19 hardware partners that have vowed to support the new codec including ARM, Broadcom, Intel and Marvel. And at CES, YouTube will be demonstrating 4K streaming at the booths of LG, Panasonic and Sony.

You’d think that with such a strong focus on VP9, YouTube would be putting every resource possible behind the codec. But that isn’t the case according to Francisco Varela, global director of platform partnerships at YouTube. In a recent interview with Gigaom, the executive said this certainly isn’t a war of the video codecs and left open the possibility that YouTube might add H.265 support at some point.

Permalink to story.

https://www.techspot.com/news/55192-youtube-to-showcase-4k-streaming-using-vp9-codec-at-ces.html

 

[HurpityDurp111]

tra·di·tion·al
trəˈdiSHənl/Submit
adjective
1.
existing in or as part of a tradition; long-established.
"the traditional festivities of the church year"
synonyms: long-established, customary, time-honored, established, classic, accustomed, standard, regular, normal, conventional, usual, orthodox, habitual, set, fixed, routine, ritual; More


4K and HEVC aren't even remotely close to being mainstream. There isn't any traditional codec for 4K. What you meant to say is HEVC is highly anticipated to be everyone's favorite codec for 4K.

Which pretty much means that this entire article hinges on a completely faulty headline. No doubt, click bait.

"the executive said this certainly isn’t a war of the video codecs and left open the possibility that YouTube might add H.265 support at some point."

Bull. ****. Google was rushing fast adoption of their codecs. For what reason? Google has Google Chrome, and most phones and tablets are using Android. Google is already dominating a significant number of platforms for which it can deploy VP9 or WebM or WebP. If Google wasn't worried, they wouldn't bother encouraging anyone to adopt their formats quickly. They would let developers adopt at their own leisure.

Plus there was some **** about H.264 going free. To what extent, I can't remember. Point is, a war is brewing. lol HEVC will likely be a dominant codec for use with next gen video disc formats, as well as streaming companies like Netflix. Google wants to avoid supporting HEVC so that they can force VP9 support in all major browsers and devices.

Microsoft doesn't give a **** about VP9, nor does Mozilla.

 

[VitalyT]

But instead of using the traditional H.265 video codec to get the job done

Since when H.265 is considered traditional? It is anything but, H.264 is the traditional video codec as of yet.

 

[tonylukac]

And the browser now needs at least 3 gigs of memory to work. In the mainframe days we had 200 users on 5 meg of memory in the entire computer and it ran background (batch) jobs also.

 

[NTAPRO]

I might find it hilarious if the video they attempt to use gets taken down for copyright infringement

 

[kissx]

With my internet speed, I'm lucky if I can stream in 480p.