NVIDIA's GeForce GT 430: The Next HTPC King?
by Ryan Smith & Ganesh T S on October 11, 2010 9:00 AM ESTGT 430 For the HTPC: HQV 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 our HTPC reviews, 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. In our HTPC(s), we use Cyberlink PowerDVD build 2113 with TrueTheater disabled and hardware acceleration enabled for playing back the HQV streams. 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 from HQV.
Given the price point and the power consumption profile of the GT 430, it is evident that it is going to compete with the Radeon HD 5570. In the table below, we indicate the maximum score possible for each test, and how much the GT 430 (with driver version 260.77) and the Radeon HD 5570 (with Catalyst 10.9) were able to get.
| GT 430 vs. HD 5570 : HQV 2.0 Benchmark | |||||
| Test Class | Chapter | Tests | Max. Score | GT 430 | HD 5570 |
| Video Conversion | Video Resolution | Dial | 5 | 4 | 5 |
| Dial with Static Pattern | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Gray Bars | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Violin | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Film Resolution | Stadium 2:2 | 5 | 0 | 5 | |
| Stadium 3:2 | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Overlay On Film | Horizontal Text Scroll | 5 | 5 | 5 | |
| Vertical Text Scroll | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Cadence Response Time | Transition to 3:2 Lock | 5 | 5 | 5 | |
| Transition to 2:2 Lock | 5 | 0 | 5 | ||
| Multi-Cadence | 2:2:2:4 24 FPS DVCam Video | 5 | 0 | 5 | |
| 2:3:3:2 24 FPS DVCam Video | 5 | 0 | 5 | ||
| 3:2:3:2:2 24 FPS Vari-Speed | 5 | 0 | 5 | ||
| 5:5 12 FPS Animation | 5 | 0 | 5 | ||
| 6:4 12 FPS Animation | 5 | 0 | 5 | ||
| 8:7 8 FPS Animation | 5 | 0 | 5 | ||
| Color Upsampling Errors | Interlace Chroma Problem (ICP) | 5 | 5 | 5 | |
| Chroma Upsampling Error (CUE) | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Noise and Artifact Reduction | Random Noise | SailBoat | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| Flower | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Sunrise | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Harbour Night | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Compression Artifacts | Scrolling Text | 5 | 3 | 3 | |
| Roller Coaster | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Ferris Wheel | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Bridge Traffic | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Upscaled Compression Artifacts | Text Pattern | 5 | 3 | 3 | |
| Roller Coaster | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Ferris Wheel | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Bridge Traffic | 5 | 3 | 3 | ||
| Image Scaling and Enhancements | Scaling and Filtering | Luminance Frequency Bands | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| Chrominance Frequency Bands | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Vanishing Text | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Resolution Enhancement | Brook, Mountain, Flower, Hair, Wood | 15 | 15 | 15 | |
| Video Conversion | Contrast Enhancement | Theme Park | 5 | 5 | 5 |
| Driftwood | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Beach at Dusk | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| White and Black Cats | 5 | 5 | 5 | ||
| Skin Tone Correction | Skin Tones | 10 | 7 | 7 | |
| Total Score | 210 | 148 | 189 | ||
We find that the GT 430 scores the same as the GT 425M in the ASRock Vision 3D. It is also better than the Intel HD Graphics (which scored 133) with respect to this metric, but comes up short against the HD 5570.
A look at the above table reveals that there is not much to differentiate between the GT 430 and HD 5570 except for the bulk of the cadence detection tests. The all-important 3:2 pulldown is performed correctly. However, none of the other cadence detection tests passed. Getting those cadence detection features implemented in the drivers has the potential to increase the HQV score by 35 points, bringing it much closer to the 5570's score. Till then, it is hard for us to recommend the GT 430 with respect to picture quality for the average user.
Power users can always get past the cadence issues by setting up custom resolutions and refresh rates depending on the video being played back, but this not a solution for the average consumer. More concerning is the fact that many digital camcorders record at 30 fps, making it necessary to have proper cadence detection set up for 2:2 pulldown. nVidia says that this issue is being looked into, but not as a top priority feature to implement. Eventually, we should see scores similar to the 5570 a couple of driver releases down the line. For now, the Radeon HD 5570 is a clear winner from the picture quality standpoint.
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Mumrik - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
From the Final Words:"We opened up this article talking about how NVIDIA is FORGING performance in the name of (...)"
Surely you don't mean "forging"...
knutjb - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
I can see this and similar under performing cards showing up in consumer HTPCs further turning the general public off computer based products giving yet another reprieve to blue ray set top boxes.It seems every time the PC comes closer to taking a key role in the entertainment center a company releases a pos product like this.
manno - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
I can not agree with your conclusions and I'm an ATI/AMD fan. I will not touch fermi with a 10' pole, but to say from your benchmarks that the 430 is not competitive with the 5570 is just plain wrong. Let's do the numbersBenchmark : AMD 5570 | Nvidia 430
Image Quality : +1 | 0
Crysis : +1 | 0
BattleForge : +1 | 0
HAWX : 0 | +1
Left 4 Dead : 0 | +1
Battlefield: BC2 : +1 | 0
STALKER : 0 | +1
DiRT 2 : +1 | 0
Mass Effect 2 : 0 | +1
Wolfenstein : +1 | 0
On power consumption: I personally feel that a lower idle power consumption is more important than load as my system would sit idle way more frequently that it would be under load, but that depends on the user: Draw or +1 Nvidia
Noise : 0 | +1
Totals:
AMD: 5 | Nvidia: 5
Looks dead even to me both cards would make great HPC cards. I find a lot of image quality dbenchmarks are highly subjective and fail under a double blind test. It's like asking an audiophile for advice on weather you should use MP3's or FLAC's very few people can tell the difference between the two and unless you're highly tuned to it it's not noticable. Not to mention I haven't even gotten to the fact that it's an AMD made denchmark, I wouldn't put any weight in an Nvidia benchmark for an ATI card. I've made 0 purchases based on 3D Mark Vantage scores that handicap Nvidia a rediculous amount due to the GPU compute portion of the benchmark, otherwise I'd own no AMD cards.
PLEASE DEFEND YOUR POSITION.
Full disclosure:
10% of my portfolio is AMD
0.0% of my portfolio is Nvidia
cknobman - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
Please read the article correctly. It clearly states that it is on par with 5570 but fails every time against the 5670.Given the pricing of this card it is not out of the question to compare it against the 5670 in gaming tests.
This card at its current price point is a huge failure for Nvidia.
The companies banking on 3D tech are going to find hard time in the near future because consumers arent buying in on it. Heck Ive already read about GIGANTIC price cuts in the LCD market coming in the next month because supply is through the roof and no one is buying.
manno - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
http://www.techeye.net/chips/nvidia-launches-gt-43...http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Sub...
looks like their priced evenly...
manno - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
"GT 430 simply isn’t competitive with AMD’s 5570 and 5670 in gaming performance"Does not read as "on par"
Stuka87 - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
Well, that would be true if those points were all equal. However they are not. Especially in regards to image quality where the nVidia lost horribly in a test for the market that this card is specifically aimed at.As for gaming, you can pick up 5670's for the same price as the 430, and the 5570 for less. So the 5670 is really the card that nVidia is up against. Which easily beat it in every single performance test.
The lower idle power/temps of the 430 are nice to have, but not if it means significantly worse performance in other areas.
manno - Tuesday, October 12, 2010 - link
You're correct, and I want to nake this clear, my issue isn't with your post it's with this articles conclusion which states:"GT 430 simply isn’t competitive with AMD’s 5570 and 5670 in gaming performance"
in which it states that Nvidia is in an unenviable position HTPC wise because the 5570 is superior to the 430. Which is not true based on their own benchmarks. Of course the 5670 is better but that's not the card this Nvidia is positioning against it that will be the GT 440 or maybe 435's job.
The 5770 and 430 are the exact same card benchmark and price wise:
http://www.techeye.net/chips/nvidia-launches-gt-43...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Sub...
As for AMD's Image Quality test, that is not the best test/benchmark they had at their disposal. A double blind comparison where you play two clips one after the other to random people and give them an similar, better, worse question is the best test for something as subjective as image quality. Using an AMD test to judge any card is inherently biased in AMD's favor. Their conclusion is wrong.
esc923 - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
Lol. You seem to think highly of yourselves asking others to defend their position when you can't even defend your own.You've thrown a lot of opinions (e.g. "I personally feel..." or "I find..."). All I can say is let's ignore your personal feelings as they're irelevant, ok?
That just leaves your basic reasoning, and you've failed even more miserably here. Weighing the performance of something like "Battlefield 2" equally to that of video "image quality" to get your conclusion (i.e. "looks dead even to me") is just plain idiotic considering we're talking about the HTPC market where image quality is more imporant than video game frame rates. Which is pretty frigging obvious.... Note that I'm not calling you idiotic, just your reasoning.
You see a lot of crap on the internet that you ignore, but the thing is, your memo was written in such a serious way that even includes a disclaimer as well as a DEMAND in caps that you've just got to laugh because the end result comes across as someone trying too hard to look smart, and failing.
manno - Monday, October 11, 2010 - link
From my previous post:http://www.techeye.net/chips/nvidia-launches-gt-43...
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Sub...
The 5570 and the 430 are priced exactly the same their performance for all intents and purposes is exactly the same. ATI and Nvidia are both taking the same position in this category, why is ATI's position superior? Because an Nvidia card doesn't perform as well as an ATI card on an ATI created benchmark. That is a poor reason to state one card is superior to another.
As I stated previously a metric like image quality is purely subjective unlike a FPS score which is objective. What looks like garbage to one person looks great to another.
Regarding my intelligence, my argument is correct regardless of how smart I am. Furthermore I could care less how smart anyone here thinks I am, for all I care your can hold a mental image of me squatting in mud smiling as I shove berries up my nose.