Streaming UHD 4K Video

Overview

As long as you have enough bandwidth (ie your line is fast enough), we'd expect our customers to be able to stream Ultra High Definition (UDH) 4K video, even at peak time.

More Information

About UHD 4K video streaming

Many people enjoy watching movies and shows through online streaming services such as Netflix, YouTube, Amazon, Vimeo, BBC iPlayer, iTunes etc. There are lots of services to choose from and most charge a monthly subscription, usually offering their Ultra High Definition quality versions for a slightly higher fee.

Typically, 4K UHD video has a resolution of 3840x2160, you'll need a compatible Television/player.

Different content providers will have their own requirements as to what hardware and software are required, as well as minimum speed requirements of your Internet connection.

Typically, UHD 4K video will require a minimum of 25Mb/s, however, some providers are encoding their video streams in different ways (eg using Variable bit rate as apposed to constant bit rate) meaning that lower speeds are required - perhaps around 17Mb/s.

Congestion

Our aim is not to be the bottleneck, that means that the various interconnects we have between our DSL providers (eg BT, TalkTalk etc) and the many interconnects to various parts of the internet and content providers are not run at, or anywhere near, full capacity.

This means, that when our customers need to download at the full speed of their line that we would expect that to be possible even at the busiest time of the day or week.

Congestion == Low quality streaming

What to do if you have problems

Check your TV hardware:

• Can your TV actually play UDH 4K content?
• eg, try playing UDH from a different streaming service such as Netflix, Youtube, Vimeo, iTunes, Amazon etc
• If you can play UHD 4K then there is probably not a problem with your TV hardware
• If you can't then check the
  • HDMI cable (some cheaper cables may not be so great)
  • HDMI input (not all HDMI inputs on a 4K TV will accept UDH 4K video)
  • Use a wired ethernet connection instead of WiFi
  • Try a different player - eg if you use a device such as an 4K Apple TV, try your Smart TVs built in Apps.

Check your internet connection:

Check the speed of your line:

• Look on the Control Pages for the 'Rate' of your line:
  • 

    Rate is the download speed of your line
  • You're needed the Rate to be around 25M or more (some UHD may only need around 17M or so)
• Check our CQM graphs on the control pages:
  • Your graph should look nice a clean - no red packet loss, not blue or green latency spikes. Whilst streaming you'll see the download shown. For example:
  • 

    Streaming 4k shown on the CQM graphs

Use a wired connection rather than WiFI

• Try speed test sites to check your connection, you'll be wanting to see about 25Mb/s or more
  • http://speedtest2.aa.net.uk (the A&A tester)
  • http://fast.com (Netflix's speed test)
  • http://speedtest.net

Still having problems?

• If you're sure your TV is working ok, and your wired internet connection is giving good speeds and your CQM graph looks clean, but you're still unable to stream at 4k UHD, then do ask our support team to review the line and you may need to contact the streaming provider for further help.