which was only in the 95th percentile. I was very much confused by what's causing the poor score
We have noticed over the years that the cost of the video card and monitor have almost no relationship to their 2D performance. So generally speaking you don't need to buy high end parts to get good 2D. (though a fast single threaded CPU can help)
As you noticed the 2D tests run in a fairly small window (compared to 4K resolution anyway). This was done deliberately to keep the number of pixels displayed equal on all displays. So if everything else is equal, the 2D score should be about the same, regardless of the resolution. But everything might not be equal. For example Windows might be changing the font scaling as you drop the resolution or the behaviour in the driver might not be the same.
In our testing here we saw a 7% difference in the overall 3D mark going from 4K resolution to 720p. So not very much of a difference. But enough to move the percentile score a few points. Hardly flawed.
We spend a bit more time today to confirm it isn't our code causing the difference. In the end however it is a job of the benchmark to measure the performance of the system. If the system is slightly faster as a lower resolution, then it is important we report this (not hide it as you are proposing).
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