Panasonic has announced another product for AV enthusiasts and fans of high definition media. The DMR-UBZ1 is the company's first Ultra HD Blu-ray player / recorder. Available from November 13 in Japan, the DMR-UBZ1 supports playback of Ultra HD Blu-ray content such as Netflix / Youtube 4K streams as well as the content 4K stored in upcoming UHD Blu-ray discs. The new format has been designed to accomodate 4K content (3,840x2,160 pixels) at 60 frames per second. The player supports HDR (High Dynamic Range) when connected to an HDR compatible television, it is equuipped with a HEVC (High Efficiency Video Coding) decoder aka H.265, and the maximum allowable gamut of Rec.2020. Support for connectivity via DLNA and NAS for media streaming are also part of the player?s characteristics.

Of course, The reproduction of the UHD BD content requires an HDMI cable HDMI 2.0 and an HDCP 2.2 compliant 4K TV / projector.

Equipped with a 3TB hard disk drive, users the recorder can save 4K / 60p video (MP4) to the internal. Supported formats are MPEG-4 AVC / H.264 High Profile 5.2 or less, and a bit rate of up to 100Mbps. Output of 4K video and photos is also supported.

The world's first UHD Blu-ray player / recorder will be priced at about $3,330.

Specifications