Testing:

Testing for this card will take a different tack than normal.  For the gaming tests, I ramped the E8600 to 4GHz in order to eliminate any chance of CPU bottleneck.  However, for the High Definition playback tests, I underclocked the E8600 to 2GHz, to see how well the 4550 offloaded the work from the CPU. 

First up, we are going to test BluRay playback capabilities.  BluRay movies typically are encoded in one of two codecs; VC-1 and MPEG-4, also known as H.264.  Because of this, we are going to test one movie encoded with each codec, both at 1080p.  For the VC-1 test, we are going to use one of my personal favorites: V for Vendetta.  For the MPEG-4 test, we will use the movie Jumper.  To determine performance, we will look at CPU usage during playback, and watch for any dropped frames. 

VC-1:

The important thing to look at here is the CPU usage graphs. Even at a paltry 2GHz, the CPU load barely budges.  This is a very good thing if you have a hot CPU crammed in a tiny HTPC case; the last thing you want to hear is a fan kicking on due to the heat load.  The other good thing about this is the fact that just about any cheap low power CPU will handle the job, which helps tremendously when budgeting a build.

MPEG-4 (H.264):

While the CPU usage in Jumper was moderately higher, it is still very good, and in fact, much better than I have seen with integrated video solutions.  Playback of both movies was completely stutter free, resulting in a very satisfying experience.