What is HD Native?

Native HD can mean two different things.

First, it may refer to the resolution. Native HD resolution is either 1080 line or 720 line, depending on the format chosen for the production. Many televisions have a different line count in their displays so the image needs to be re-sized to fit the resolution of the screen. The image is no longer in its native resolution.

Second, it might refer to the signal bandwidth. Production HD uses an uncompressed signal with a data rate of 1.483 Gb/s (that's 1,483,000,000 bits every second). That is the native data rate. By the time the signal is delivered to homes, it has been compressed to as little and 5Mb per second (5,000,000 bits per second).

The data rates refer to 720p and 1080i signals. 1080p signals have a native data rate of 2.966Gb/s