Welcome back friends of the channel, I’m excited because FidelityFX Super Resolution 2.0
is FINALLY here. It’s been teased all year, but I've now gotten some time to
test it. Today I’m going to go through and explain how FidelityFX Super Resolution 2.0,
or FSR 2.0, works and how it’s different from FSR 1.0. I'll also discuss graphics
card compatibility and why it’s not quite as simple of a discussion as with FSR 1.0.
Then I’m going to take a look at how well it works using the game Deathloop as a point of reference.
And for the finale, I'm going to find out if and how well FSR 2.0 works on Valve's Steam Deck!
Well now that you know what’s coming, let’s jump right into it.
So to understand why FSR 2.0 is a drastic improvement over FSR 1.0 I’ll need to do
a bit of a recap on the original. You see, FSR 1.0, as good as it is, is just a spatial
upscaler. What that means is that it takes a lower than native resolution (so a 4K image
would actually be rendering 1440p) and uses an advanced upscaling and sharpening technique
to attempt to make the image appear as close to native true 4K as possible. Another component
that makes FSR 1.0 great is that its processing is done in the middle of the render pipeline. So the
post-processing effects and heads-up display elements remain at full crisp resolution.
But spatial upscaling can only be so good as it works off a single image and tries to clean it up.
That’s where FSR 2.0 comes in and steps up the game in a big way. lt still takes place in the
middle of the render pipeline, but this time it’s using a ‘temporal’ upsampler - much like
Nvidias Deep Learner Super Sampling, or DLSS. Okay, cool, what does that mean?
Well, there’s a lot more going on here and ACTUAL temporal reconstruction is taking place.
So basically what that means is the game still renders at a sub-native internal resolution,
but uses multiple frames and motion vectors to
‘rebuild’ the onscreen image to as close to native. What’s really cool
about FSR 2.0 is that, just like FSR 1.0, it is compatible with a wide range of graphics cards
due to it not relying on machined learning or dedicated hardware for this procedure.
Just like FSR 1.0 and other upscaling and reconstruction techniques like DLSS,
FSR 2.0 follows a general table of scale factors. Quality mode aims for a 67% internal resolution,
Balanced runs a slightly reduced 59% scale, and Performance is 50% scale. So quick numbers
for a 4K render target, it would have an internal resolution for Quality at 1440p,
Balanced at 1270p, and Performance at 1080p.
With the added compute cost of processing multiple frames and motion vectors, there will be a
performance penalty when compared to the older FSR 1.0 - and that’s to be expected. Because of
this AMD actually recommends particular cards for various target resolutions, something that wasn’t
really done with FSR 1.0. For example; at 4K AMD recommends a Radeon RX 6700 XT or RX 5700 and
above. On the GeForce side (because yes, FSR 2.0 is vendor-agnostic) the RTX 2070 or 3070 and above
are recommended for 4K. At the 1080p level, the RX 6500XT or GTX 1070 and above are recommended.
In just a moment we’re going to see how much of a performance differential there is
for running FSR 2.0 vs FSR 1.0 with a Radeon RX 6700XT at 4K.
But before we talk performance on desktop graphics cards we need to talk about visuals,
because if it doesn’t look good then it doesn’t matter how much faster you’re running.
AMD provided a code for Deathloop so I could get a good look at FSR 2.0 in action,
and that’s what I’m using today. Unfortunately right now it’s the only game that supports it,
but I will be testing future games so be sure to subscribe here on PCWorld to catch those videos.
Kicking things off with a Native to FSR 1.0 look we can see a very clear degradation of the image,
even at Quality mode. The power lines and the balls that are suspended from them
are much softer with a shimmer now, the rooftop railing has become quite fuzzy,
and the sign above the door has degraded quite a bit. But what about when you switch to FSR 2.0?
Well, Admittedly this is a temporal solution, and standing still like this will generate a
slightly better image than when in motion, but for example sake this will do just fine. You can see
here a CLEAR improvement over the older FSR 1.0 with the power lines being solid, and the
lines connecting the handing balls are clear and defined. The railing on the rooftop is very sharp,
and the sign above the door is no longer flickering. Massive improvement to say the least.
So then what about performance? To get an idea of performance scaling I used my X570 Test bench
with a Ryzen 7 5800X, 32GB of DDR4 3600, and a Radeon RX 6700XT. Testing was done at 4K Ultra
settings but no Ray Tracing. Obviously Native gives us the worst performance of the bunch,
at only 43 FPS. Basically every setting, whether it’s FSR 1.0 or 2.0, allows us to break that 60
FPS mark which is great. BUT, remember how I said FSR 2.0 is more intensive than FSR 1.0?
Well the 10 FPS difference in performance from FSR 1.0 to 2.0 on quality mode is pretty stout.
It is still a drastic improvement over Native though, and not to mention the fact
that FSR 2.0 looks so much better, I’d say the performance differential is worth it.
These upscaling technologies always shine brightest on a big 4K panel with tons of pixels
to work with. But what about something like the Steam Deck? I mean, FSR 2.0 is IN the game and not
the hardware so why shouldn’t Valve’s handheld be a good fit for performance-enhancing drugs? Well,
I decided to test it! After booting up the game I noticed the option is in there so I couldn’t
resist giving it a go. Now one thing to remember with FSR of any variety is that it’s going
to render that lower resolution and work with that. The Steam Deck is already a low 1280x800
so I wasn’t expecting miracles and even wiith Quality mode we’re talking an
internal render resolution of just a hair under 540p . On top of that, scaling up the footage
to fit in this 4k presentation doesn't look fantastic, but I promise it's not bad in person.
So how did it go? Honestly, at first look, it didn’t seem like it moved the needle a whole lot,
as performance didn’t improve much. It did ‘smooth’ out the framerate, so it makes a
difference you can feel, but the most impressive part was how it smooths out the jaggies.
I wouldn’t recommend running below the Quality setting here as you’re not going to get
enough of a performance jump. I’m talking literal single digits worth of improvement,
which is hard to actually measure, so go for visual fidelity. When you’re looking at scenes
where there was severe aliasing at native you’ll find that FSR 2.0 Quality smooths it out nicely!
So, what are my thoughts on FSR 2.0? Simple: it’s great. It’s a very good
update to the FidelityFX suite. At 4K it’s simply incredible in Deathloop
and even more impressive with what it can do on the Steam Deck. But, this is just one title and
one that’s been being worked on for a while with FSR 2.0. We’ll need to see more games,
including ones that are developer initiated, to really see how FSR 2.0 holds up in the wild.
But what about you? What do you think about FSR 2.0? Are you excited? What games do you hope get
this feature integrated? Let us know your thoughts down in the comment section and make sure to hit
the like button and get subscribed here at PCWorld for even more PC hardware and software goodness.