ASRock's High-End Vision 3D 252B HTPC Review 6

HQV 2.0 BENCHMARKING

HTPC enthusiasts are often concerned about the quality of pictures output by the system.  While this is a very subjective metric, we have decided to take as much of an objective approach as possible. Starting with the Core 100 review in 2010, we have been using the HQV 2.0 benchmark for this purpose.

The HQV 2.0 test suite consists of 39 different streams divided into 4 different classes. The playback device is assigned scores for each, depending on how well it plays the stream.  Each test was repeated multiple times to ensure that the correct score was assigned. The scoring details are available in the testing guide on the HQV website.

In the table below, we indicate the maximum score possible for each test, and how much the ASRock Vision 3D 252B was able to get. As mentioned in the previous section, we used NVIDIA Graphics Driver v301.24 for the benchmarking.

HQV 2.0 Benchmark - ASRock Vision 3D 252B
Test Class	Chapter	Tests	Max. Score	ASRock Vision 3D 252B (NVIDIA GT 540M)
Video Conversion	Video Resolution	Dial	5	5
		Dial with Static Pattern	5	5
		Gray Bars	5	5
		Violin	5	5
	Film Resolution	Stadium 2:2	5	5
		Stadium 3:2	5	5
	Overlay On Film	Horizontal Text Scroll	5	3
		Vertical Text Scroll	5	3
	Cadence Response Time	Transition to 3:2 Lock	5	5
		Transition to 2:2 Lock	5	5
	Multi-Cadence	2:2:2:4 24 FPS DVCam Video	5	5
		2:3:3:2 24 FPS DVCam Video	5	5
		3:2:3:2:2 24 FPS Vari-Speed	5	5
		5:5 12 FPS Animation	5	5
		6:4 12 FPS Animation	5	5
		8:7 8 FPS Animation	5	5
	Color Upsampling Errors	Interlace Chroma Problem (ICP)	5	5
		Chroma Upsampling Error (CUE)	5	5
Noise and Artifact Reduction	Random Noise	SailBoat	5	5
		Flower	5	5
		Sunrise	5	5
		Harbour Night	5	5
	Compression Artifacts	Scrolling Text	5	5
		Roller Coaster	5	5
		Ferris Wheel	5	5
		Bridge Traffic	5	5
	Upscaled Compression Artifacts	Text Pattern	5	3
		Roller Coaster	5	3
		Ferris Wheel	5	3
		Bridge Traffic	5	3
Image Scaling and Enhancements	Scaling and Filtering	Luminance Frequency Bands	5	5
		Chrominance Frequency Bands	5	5
		Vanishing Text	5	5
	Resolution Enhancement	Brook, Mountain, Flower, Hair, Wood	15	15
Video Conversion	Contrast Enhancement	Theme Park	5	2
		Driftwood	5	2
		Beach at Dusk	5	2
		White and Black Cats	5	2
	Skin Tone Correction	Skin Tones	10	0
		Total Score	210	176

When compared with the other SFF HTPCs, the score doesn't look out-of-place.

However, we have seen NVIDIA GPUs scoring higher in earlier reviews. This is just an indicator of how new driver releases tend to break existing features. As we will see in the next section, there are a number of knobs in the driver which just don't work at all.

credit :  http://www.anandtech.com