VESA Announces DP8K, HBR-Supporting Cables and Work on Next-Gen DP

The Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) today announced that DP8K Certified DisplayPort cables-native DisplayPort cables that are guaranteed to support DisplayPort High Bit Rate 3 (HBR3)-are now available in the marketplace. HBR3 is the highest bit rate (8.1 Gigabits per second (Gbps) per lane) supported by DisplayPort standard version 1.4, and provides the speed required to drive 8K video resolution at 60 frames per second (fps) using a single cable, as well as multiple 4K displays. Key applications supported by HBR3 include high-performance gaming, augmented/virtual reality (AR/VR) and television broadcasting. With HBR3 already available in a wide array of consumer products, including GPUs and monitors, the availability of cables that have been certified by VESA to support HBR3 provides a crucial final link to the ecosystem.

VESA is also currently engaged with its members in the development of the next DisplayPort standard generation, with plans to increase the data rate enabled by DisplayPort by two-fold and beyond. VESA plans to publish this update within the next 18 months. Further developments in display interfaces are needed to address future performance requirements of traditional displays, such as beyond 8K resolutions, as well as greater enhancement of the user experience with AR/VR displays, including 4K-and-beyond VR resolutions.

"As display resolution, refresh rate and color space continue to grow, we see strong adoption of HBR3 on displays, discrete graphics card and mobile PC platforms. HBR3 certified cables facilitate a seamless connectivity experience to end users," said Syed Athar Hussain, VESA board vice chairman and AMD Senior Display Domain Fellow. "DisplayPort HBR3 has enabled support for 8K and novel wide-aspect resolutions, such as 3840×1080, at refresh rates of 144Hz and beyond for High Dynamic Range (HDR) gaming."

According to James Choate, compliance program manager for VESA, "Since we first launched our HBR3 Certification Program nearly a year ago, more than 20 DisplayPort devices have undergone HBR3 certification, including sources, sinks, docks, and now, cables. With DP8K Certified DisplayPort cables, a single-port solution for 8K displays is finally attainable. DP8K Certified cables provide added assurance of smooth operation and full compliance at the higher HBR3 link rate."

With DP8K Certified cables, devices with native DisplayPort connectors can reliably support 5K or 8K monitors, as well as high-performance 4K monitors. For USB Type-C (USB-C) to USB-C connections, this same level of performance is available with "SuperSpeed USB 10 Gbps" cables, which support the HBR3 data rate for DisplayPort Alt Mode.

Cable vendors offering DP8K Certified DisplayPort cables include ELKA International, Hotron Precision Electronic Industrial, Dezhou HongJu Communication Technology, Ji-Haw Industrial, and Ningbo Prime Electronic. HBR3 cable testing is now available at DisplayPort Authorized Test Centers (ATCs), including Allion Labs and Granite River Labs (GRL). A complete list of DisplayPort ATCs can be found at https://www.vesa.org/displayport-developer/compliance/.

Several high-performance gaming systems showcasing the ability to drive 4K resolution at 120 fps using DisplayPort HBR3 will be demonstrated at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), January 9-12, 2018, at the Las Vegas Convention Center South Hall, DisplayPort booth #21066.

Even Higher Data Rates on the Horizon

With the wide field of view offered by AR/VR displays combined with motion, the virtual world is putting more demands on resolution, refresh rate and color depth. In addition, two displays are needed for AR/VR applications, one for each eye, which doubles the data rate demand. Higher data rates will also be needed to support increases in HDR performance and resolutions beyond 8K for traditional displays. VESA is continuing to work on DisplayPort to increase data-rates by two-fold and beyond to enable the higher performance requirements demanded by these applications.

In addition to pure display interfaces, VESA is also working to address the future needs of the mixed data-plus-video world of DisplayPort Alt Mode on the USB-C connector. USB-C now allows a single connector for USB data, video data and power, but for simultaneous support of SuperSpeed USB data (now running at 5 or 10 Gbps) and video, the USB-C signals need to be shared, which cuts the DisplayPort bit rate in half. Today, USB-C can support 4K at 60Hz performance utilizing the two lanes of USB-C in this configuration, or 4K HDR or 8K at 30Hz by adding compression. Increasing the DisplayPort data rates in the future will also expand video display capability of a single USB-C connector.

"VESA published DisplayPort v1.4 in early 2016 to address the needs of 8K monitors, which are beginning to arrive in the market today," stated Bill Lempesis, executive director at VESA. "Through the contributions of its more than 260 company members, VESA is continuously focused on the future needs of the display industry. As such, it is now working on the next updates to DisplayPort and related video standards to address even higher resolutions and refresh rates, as well as new use cases."