There's rumours that the BBC will be broadcasting tomorrow evenings Planet Earth II episode 1 in 4k UHD; afaik this will be the first time it does this. 
Although I don't know if this will happen. 
And I don't know whether it will just be the live broadcast or whether the iPlayer will give the option to view it in 4k UHD.

Does anyone know by any chance? 

Also, will get_iplayer be able to "see" and thus grab this content?

Thanks

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I know that this high quality content is only applicable with a 4K UHD TV and that is something I don't currently own, but suspect at some stage in the future I will own one.

Ok, so maybe this can't happen with the live stream as my understanding is that a dedicated 4k / UHD channel would be needed (like the BBC HD channel). So potentially this is just going to be made available as UHD on the iPlayer... or they'll not do that and only make it available in UHD from the Blu Ray retail version.

Just to clarify: Planet Earth II has been filmed in 4k / UHD.

Hi there

I'm not sure if get_iplayer will be able to manage 4K TV in the foreseeable future -- the main problem is not the file per-se but for 4K content the HDMI cable needs HDMI version 2.0 or above --there's all sorts of DRM and other stuff in there.

I use SKY Q a lot also - I can save in Real time via an HDMI splitter from a SKY Q minibox  into a hardware capture device-- the splitter passes thru the HD pictures OK. If I try this on the main SKY Q box even though the capture device will handle 4K pictures there's no way currently to get this to work. It will do HD without problems --same as the Sky Q Minibox.

I mention this because I like others would love 4K content to work via get_iplayer -- but I think this will be a tall order to get it to work.

Cheers

^^ maybe I'm missing something here and being stupid lol, but get_iplayer grabs the source of your choosing. Therefore, if 4K content is available from the BBC and get_iplayer has it has an option to grab, then surely it would right??

What has the HDMI cable got to do with anything with regards to get_iplayer? Surely that only affects the end-users viewing of the 4K content on their hardware, e.g. if the HDMI cable is not v2.0 and above and of course if the TV / monitor etc is not 4K ready/enabled.

As far as I know, iPlayer is not making any 4K content available at the moment, so the discussion is kind of moot (though it wasn't when the topic was started I think due to the rumours over Planet Earth).

However, the first thing to clear up is there is no such thing as a HDMI 2.0 cable. They don't exist, it's not a thing and is a conflation of the cable category that the HDMI 1.3 specification stipulated.

So, you can get different speeds of HDMI cable, specifically category one (rated up to 74.5MHz) and category 2 (rated to 340MHz). Category 2 can handle 4K 30fps output from the new HDMI 2.0 source.

HDMI 1.3 was superseded by HDMI 1.4, which stipulates 'Standard', 'Automotive' and 'High Speed' with the addition of Ethernet on the Standard and High Speed cables as an option. Standard does up to 1080i/720p. High speed does 1080p, 4K (up to 60fps), 3D and deep colour (which I guess is HDR).

To confuse matters, Wikipedia tells us:

Quote:On October 5, 2015 - HDMI Licensing, LLC announced[81] the Premium HDMI Cable Certification for HDMI 2.0. This is an enhanced cable testing, authentication and verification program to ensure they support the full 18 Gbit/s bandwidth from the HDMI 2.0b specification plus an EMI test to ensure cables minimize interference with wireless signals. This ensures that HDMI cables support 4K/UHD products that may include features such as 4K UHD 60fps, BT.2020 and HDR. These certified High Speed HDMI Cables are marked as:[82]

• Premium High Speed HDMI Cable
  Premium High Speed HDMI Cables with Ethernet
  

The upshot being (as @jaybeee pointed out), cables have nothing to do with getting the source media from iPlayer so we don't need to talk about them any further.

If/when iPlayer does release 4K content it would depend on the technical details of how it's delivered as to whether get_iplayer could capture it or would need to be altered to do so. That's a conversation best left until it happens.