Sky Q will be available without a satellite dish from 2018

[adm]

They will most likely stream using the High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC), H.265. There system will be built for this codec.
There is a massive reduction in the amount of bitrate needed to stream video in H.265.

A 1080p video can be streamed without issue on 3 Mbps.
Companies like Nvidia, Intel, Apple, GoPro and most others now have this codec incorporated into their systems/equipment.

Currently recommendations of bitrate needed for H.264
480p, recommended bitrate = 3 Mbps
720p, recommended bitrate = 5 Mbps
1080p, recommended bitrate = 8 Mbps
3840 x 2160 — 4K, recommended bitrate = 25 Mbps

To give you an idea of the reduction compared to H.264
The average bit rate reduction for HEVC was:
52% for 480p - recommended bitrate H.265 = 1.44 Mbps
56% for 720p - recommended bitrate H.265 = 2.2 Mbps
62% for 1080p - recommended bitrate H.265 = 3.04 Mbps
64% for 4K UHD - recommended bitrate H.265 = 9 Mbps

You can read more details about the tests that was conducted by the BBC and the University of the West of Scotland to prove these results on the High Efficiency Video Coding wiki page. People who have (what they see as) a crappy 5/6 Mbps internet speed should have no issues streaming 1080p with the H.265 codec.

Are the progressive figures for 25Hz or 50Hz transmission?

What rate is required for the other 40% of the transmission? I assume that the figure of 64% for 4K means that for 64% of content a 9Mbs data rate is adequate but what rate is required for a a scene with a lot of change of movement such as a football match where the camera pans over the watching crowd.

The result will be that 4K will have the same quality as SD analogue TV of yesteryear. These lossy coding methods are not designed for picture quality bit to squeeze as much crap into as little of bandwidth as possible. Once information has been lost at the broadcast end of the process with lossy encoding there is nothing that can be done at the consumer end of the decoding process to restore the quality of the original information captured in the camera.

In the UK you just have to watch some of the lesser channel to see the effects of over compression of the transmitted video where the displayed picture appears "soft" and out of focus. Even on HD watch something with a lot of movement in a scene such as the start of a marathon or on entertainment shows where they use a silver paper cannon and the picture turns to mush.

 

[ccs]

Doesn't 64% refer to the amount 25Mbps is reduced to give 9Mbps?

 

[thisntaht]

@ccs - Correct.

 

[thisntaht]

Are the progressive figures for 25Hz or 50Hz transmission?

What rate is required for the other 40% of the transmission? I assume that the figure of 64% for 4K means that for 64% of content a 9Mbs data rate is adequate but what rate is required for a a scene with a lot of change of movement such as a football match where the camera pans over the watching crowd.

The result will be that 4K will have the same quality as SD analogue TV of yesteryear. These lossy coding methods are not designed for picture quality bit to squeeze as much crap into as little of bandwidth as possible. Once information has been lost at the broadcast end of the process with lossy encoding there is nothing that can be done at the consumer end of the decoding process to restore the quality of the original information captured in the camera.

In the UK you just have to watch some of the lesser channel to see the effects of over compression of the transmitted video where the displayed picture appears "soft" and out of focus. Even on HD watch something with a lot of movement in a scene such as the start of a marathon or on entertainment shows where they use a silver paper cannon and the picture turns to mush.

I think you have misunderstood that explanation (I don't mean that to some patronising)
The link below should help clarify. Scroll down to the Coding efficiency section

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Efficiency_Video_Coding

 

[thisntaht]

The result will be that 4K will have the same quality as SD analogue TV of yesteryear. These lossy coding methods are not designed for picture quality bit to squeeze as much crap into as little of bandwidth as possible. Once information has been lost at the broadcast end of the process with lossy encoding there is nothing that can be done at the consumer end of the decoding process to restore the quality of the original information captured in the camera.
.

That is completely false and non factual information.
In August, 2016, Netflix published the results of a large-scale study comparing the leading open-source HEVC encoder, x265, with the leading open-source AVC encoder, x264 and the reference VP9 encoder, libvpx. Using their advanced Video Multimethod Assessment Fusion (VMAF) video quality measurement tool, Netflix found that x265 delivered identical quality at bit rates ranging from 35.4% to 53.3% lower than x264.

Source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Efficiency_Video_Coding

 

[twol]

That is completely false and non factual information.
In August, 2016, Netflix published the results of a large-scale study comparing the leading open-source HEVC encoder, x265, with the leading open-source AVC encoder, x264 and the reference VP9 encoder, libvpx. Using their advanced Video Multimethod Assessment Fusion (VMAF) video quality measurement tool, Netflix found that x265 delivered identical quality at bit rates ranging from 35.4% to 53.3% lower than x264.

Source

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Efficiency_Video_Coding

Although one has to read some of the external commentaries on the Netflix blog post to realise that as usual its a good piece of marketing - and that results may not be as good as they indicate
As usual "they would say that wouldn't they"!!