We Solved Our TV Upscaling Test (TV Test Bench 1.11)

We’ve designed a new test as part of our TV test bench, one that allows us to assess upscaling and sharpness image processing in a much more helpful way than originally. Instead of every TV getting a score of 8.0 for upscaling a 480p image, like a lot of you pointed out over the years, we now have scores for upscaling that actually reflect the image quality and performance. At the moment, we've updated 24 TVs, but we have another 49 planned.

In this video, we will walk you through this new test, how we created it, and look at our results so far and see which model and brands are better than the others. You can also compare the results yourself and make your own judgement by looking at the photos we took on our website!

Chapters:
0:00 - Intro
0:58 - Why We're Changing Our Test
1:54 - How Does This Test Help You?
3:01 - How The Test Works
5:05 - Results
10:39 - Other Important Testbench Changes
11:32 - Conclusion

[alifmohammadmagdy]

She's an excellent presenter. That burn-in video and this really changed the channel

[gatsnguts]

It's awesome you guys listen to feedback and to see you adapt and evolve!

[SenorSchnitz]

Also: the 2019 Nvidia shield TV was THE top dog with it's AI Upscaling. You should test this box as a reference - so we know if we still should use it or if TVs are better at upscaling now.

[wraithwrecker_]

Great stuff, keep up the incredible work! Abby is a very skilled presenter too!

[joeynessily]

Nice. It would be interesting to benchmark the TVs on the upscaling against an Apple TV, nvidia shield or PC/hardware scaler… you’d hope they are better?

[BloopsnBleeps]

I bought the Sony A80J years ago and a big reason was for the upscaling. I own a lot of DVDs still and they look fantastic on the TV

[kamesna]

Thanks for this updated upscaling process. Currently browsing for a TV and Upscaling is high on my list.

[diegofontes]

This is the BEST video on the internet about upscaling performance. Thank you so much!

[Pib]

Glad to see Spears and Munsil being used. They have a new disc with some good stuff on there. Also, this video feels very similar to a Dygma Labs video. Sam is looking fresh too.

[DankePlace]

I think a good combination of media player and TV make great upscaling partners.
I have an nVidia shiled with an LG CS OLED and i was shocked how good DVD looked.
I recently got some old movies that are only available on DVD, was blown away with PQ, so I have decided to acquire my other collectables on DVD, not dismissing the format due to the upscaling capabilities I have now.
It is a blessing in disguise when understood properly.

[DonaldHendleyBklynvexRecords]

This made me feel comfort in my recent purchase of an upper-class Sony TV thank you.

[camarykaren]

I love this new way of doing things and the "new" presenter . I hope to see more of her cause she comes across excellent. Good job and great channel.

[Gamingwithgleez]

This is great. I actually was watching DVDs on my CRT that I use for retro gaming and decided on a whim to throw one on my Sony x900h. I was shocked at how well it upscaled the image. In some ways it looks better than some streamed 1080 content. Less banding, less pixelation on movement and just smoother overall. Where it is hurt is text and with shots that are further away or background images. Overall it is very watchable though. I am glad you are covering this in more detail. Very informative.

[s.r.]

Thats really cool, maybe it would be interesting if you mention your settings for the upscaling capabilities in your test, so we could copy them or have a direction which settings would be the best 🤔

[am_ma]

Thank you for your great explanations and thank to Rtings team for responding to creat upscaling scores and new methodology to do it.

[madcrabber]

Best tv review channel there is, wish more did this type of thing.

[SenorSchnitz]

You should provide different scores for 480p, 720p and 1080p. I for instance don't care about 480p - but want the best TV for upscaling my 1080p streaming content. A DVD collector would be mostly interested in 480p performance. And so on.

Or are all TV equally good / bad with all resolutions?

[Aquadon]

Thanks RTings!
I'd like to see ratings involving these Televison Panel Metrics added to your reviews
1) ability to change aspect ratio during playback of 1) dvd 2) blu ray 3) 4K BluRay 4) streaming content 5) OTA TV
2) Posturization/Color Banding in varying levels of content 1) 480p 2) 720p 3) 1080p 4) 4K 5) low bit rate (such as Netflix /Hulu)
and the ability to minimize it.
3) Name Initial Firmware # ... & Retest and name Firmware # if major changes are made good or bad =
( Samsung gimping S95B after initial reviews were stellar )
4) QUALITY OF CUSTOMER SERVICE WHEN PROBLEMS DO ARISE!
YOU MIGHT NEED TO START A FORUM/QUESTION-ANSWER SECTION IN YOUR REVIEWS FOR THIS
Thanks for all you do!!

[WickedRibbon]

Great job on the new testing method, and on your explanation. It was clear and engaging throughout!

[MadViking]

Thank you for the great content as always!

Shadow detail, black crush tests would be great, because blooming test may omit some of the shadow details. ABL test would also be great for OLEDs, and it should reflect the score. Burn-in as well should have a larger impact on the score, especially if there's no warranty from the maker.

Some sort of "Creator's intent" custom test against reference monitors and checking how well TVs replicate BVM-HX3110 image would be awesome. Lot of enthusiasts (people who check TV reviews!!) want to go for a natural image, and the best way to test this on a TV would be to put a reference monitor next to it and compare IQ. Vincent at HDTV Test does this, and that is why I buy TVs based on his reviews, and always been very happy with what I've gotten.

Rtings is a 2ndary site for me, used to be number one, but still provides good info generally. I very much like the burn-in test content, that is extremely valuable and made me not go for A95K and instead to X95K (for which you upgraded the review as well, albeit it should still score higher than C2 for example as the aggressive ABL and burn-in are at the very least as bad deficit as blooming is on X95K.)