SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Talk about overclocking displays at a higher refresh rate. This includes homebrew, 165Hz, QNIX, Catleap, Overlord Tempest, SEIKI displays, certain HDTVs, and other overclockable displays.
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SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 04 Jan 2014, 22:25

Good news regarding the SEIKI 39" 4K HDTV from AVSFORUM and HardForum.
p0ser wrote:For those interested, member @chuckfagan
 has discovered that flashing the 50" firmware on the 39" solves the frames kipping @ 120hz.  I can independently confirm that it works as well (1920x1080 res)

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leeleatherwood wrote:I just flashed the 50" firmware on my 39", it works.

EDIT: Sharpness setting in the menu doesn't function, you can change the setting but it doesn't change the sharpness at all. (correction, it seems to work over HDMI but not DVI, wierd)

I was using the sharpness setting as a form of pseudo anti-aliasing at 1080p to make text look better, but I cant do that anymore. 4k reso is fine obviously.

EDIT: Mouse lag at 4k is MUCH improved with the 50" firmware. With the 39" firmware it was pretty unbearable to me and I found myself using 1080p constantly. Now I have no problems running 4k.
leeleatherwood wrote:My 39" @ 1080p 120hz, no frame skipping with the 50" firmware.

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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Q83Ia7ta » 04 Jan 2014, 22:34

Wanna 160-180-200-200hz @1080p firmwares for modern 144hz monitors

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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Ahigh » 05 Jan 2014, 01:01

Hey this is great news! I'm very hopeful with this development that Seiki will release a firmware that fixes the remaining issues so we can have a fully functioning display.

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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 05 Jan 2014, 02:13

It's really interesting that the 50" firmware works on the 39". I guess the panels are similar enough for this to work.

Aaron, as you have a connection with SEIKI, perhaps you can coax them to make minor modifications of the 50" firmware to allow it to work on the 39".

The SEIKI 39" 4K HDTV is available for only $499 on Amazon currently -- that's cheaper than many high end computer monitors. If you need tons of pixels (4K) for productivity while also having good game response (1080p @ 120Hz), it's now a much more viable display option than it was yesterday. I'm now tempted to buy one of these myself, for my main desktop, next to my strobe backlight displays -- since occasionally I need something bigger for web development, Eclipse & Visual Studio. That's 3840x2160 of goodness for only $499.
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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 05 Jan 2014, 02:24

Instructions, posted by Excessionoz on HardForum:
Excessionoz wrote:http://www.seiki.com/support/downloads.php <--- download location.

Downloaded the 50" TV ROM
unzipped it onto a FAT32-formatted USB key
Plug USB Key into TV
Menu on Seiki remote
Press 0 four times (0000) to activate factory settings
Navigate to Software Update -- choose YES.
Power indicator flashes orange and blue for about a minute
Then you get the Seiki indicator and the Initial Settings menu (choose language etc)

I had to set my brightness down to about 17 (down from 50).

Worked just fine.

Now to test that 120Hz at 1920 * 1080 actually works, instead of skipping.

I'll use my HueyPro colorometer to fix up the settings later.

Thanks Internet!
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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by shadman » 05 Jan 2014, 03:11

Awesome! I'll have to really push my friend to get this TV now

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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Ahigh » 05 Jan 2014, 04:36

Chief Blur Buster wrote:It's really interesting that the 50" firmware works on the 39". I guess the panels are similar enough for this to work.

Aaron, as you have a connection with SEIKI, perhaps you can coax them to make minor modifications of the 50" firmware to allow it to work on the 39".

The SEIKI 39" 4K HDTV is available for only $499 on Amazon currently -- that's cheaper than many high end computer monitors. If you need tons of pixels (4K) for productivity while also having good game response (1080p @ 120Hz), it's now a much more viable display option than it was yesterday. I'm now tempted to buy one of these myself, for my main desktop, next to my strobe backlight displays -- since occasionally I need something bigger for web development, Eclipse & Visual Studio. That's 3840x2160 of goodness for only $499.
I have no idea where it will end up going, but I am doing my very best to communicate with Seiki. As far as my connection, you and Cirthix have the same connections that I have with Seiki. Hopefully this latest discovery will lead to something positive in response from Seiki. Although nobody is going to complain about it, I'm pretty sure that Seiki did not intend for 50" firmware to be loaded on 39" sets. I would expect that future firmware releases will only work on the sets that they were intended to be placed on.

I once had an issue burning firmware to a Samsung set and bricked the Samsung. That set was under a Best Buy extended warranty, and Best Buy service guys had to come to my house and spend hours on the set before swapping out another working set while they did warranty service. Total cost to them was very likely more than the cost of the display because of a firmware upgrade gone bad. I didn't tell them I was trying to do a firmware upgrade; just told them that the display would not turn on any longer. I could have done something wrong, but I'm not going to admit it when I have a bricked four-figure-display that I want replaced.

This, I think, will be the big motivator for having improved firmware. And I would expect newer firmwares are not going to work on the wrong TV. It sounds as if burned out backlights could be one of the first snafu's of wrong firmware being applied on the 39".

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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by trey31 » 06 Jan 2014, 16:12

I'm so happy to hear that its at least capable of the 50" big brother's specs though.

I recently read that Sony is flashing a firmware fix for their 4K TVs to enable HDMI 2.0. No hardware changes needed, HDMI 1.4 connector & cable friendly.

Anyone know if this is going to be possible with the 39"/50"/65" Seiki panels? I spoke to one of their reps about their plans for 4K displayport or hdmi 2.0 early last year and got the cold shoulder. I chalked it up to the 2.0 standard not yet being agreed upon at the time and left it alone. Early opinion was HDMI 2.0 was going to be a hardware change, quite surprising that its not. Which makes you wonder why they (HDMI standards) wouldn't untap 18Gbps & 32 uncompressed audio channels right from the start of the HDMI standard, or at the very least at the same time as the 1.4 spec update? http://www.hdmi.org/manufacturer/hdmi_2_0/index.aspx
  • "HDMI 2.0 does not define new cables or new connectors. Current High Speed cables (Category 2 cables) are capable of carrying the increased bandwidth."
Either way I'm actually hoping this takes off http://www.hdbaset.org/technology, I like the idea of the whole "One cable to rule them all" approach.

Anyway if/when this HDMI 2.0 firmware fix gets confirmed for Seiki, we're considering going with three 39"s (rather than a single 50") for a desktop play/work station setup later this year. I mean, how breath taking would 11520x2160@60hz+ be for RTS and non-fps dependent games? Not to mention 5760x1080@120hz or possibly 7680x1440@100hz for all the action oriented games?

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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by Chief Blur Buster » 06 Jan 2014, 17:09

I am pretty sure that HDMI 2.0 isn't possible via a firmware upgrade on the SEIKI.

SONY was able to firmware upgrade, because they prepared for that inevitability, and made sure that their chips were HDMI 2.0 compatible. At the price league of the SONY 4K HDTV, they were able to afford to do so. For SEIKI, it would have been a money loser to do so -- but I would imagine that once widespread chip availability occurs, SEIKI would probably come out with all-new models at some point in the future.

I could be wrong though, but I would lean on the side of no HDMI 2.0 firmware without at least a hardware board upgrade first (maybe offer SEIKI money for that -- there are some people who would order a run of these boards).
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Re: SEIKI 4K 39" HDTV now capable of true 120Hz 1920x1080

Post by trey31 » 06 Jan 2014, 19:23

Chief Blur Buster wrote:I am pretty sure that HDMI 2.0 isn't possible via a firmware upgrade on the SEIKI.

SONY was able to firmware upgrade, because they prepared for that inevitability, and made sure that their chips were HDMI 2.0 compatible. At the price league of the SONY 4K HDTV, they were able to afford to do so. For SEIKI, it would have been a money loser to do so -- but I would imagine that once widespread chip availability occurs, SEIKI would probably come out with all-new models at some point in the future.

I could be wrong though, but I would lean on the side of no HDMI 2.0 firmware without at least a hardware board upgrade first (maybe offer SEIKI money for that -- there are some people who would order a run of these boards).
Hopefully we'll see affordable 4K with 120hz 1080p and the HDMI 2.0 new standard sooner rather than later from Seiki.

And honestly I'd pay another $100+ or so for an HDMI 2.0 board from Seiki. But I'd rather have displayport like the 4K Panasonic honestly.

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