For almost three years, Nvidia’s DLSS (its acronym for “Deep Learning Super Sampling”) has been a pioneer in back-end techniques for conjuring faster PC-game frame rates out of what seems like thin air. Driven by what Nvidia calls its “Tensor” cores (found in every graphics card bearing the GeForce RTX badge), DLSS can dramatically improve the frame rate in games that are specially trained to use it. In a nutshell, DLSS uses information from higher-resolution renders of a supported game and applies that info to actually render the game at a lower resolution on the hardware.
Thanks to that innovation, in games that support DLSS (and with GeForce cards that can do the job), gamers can see faster frames without a loss of visual fidelity. In essence, DLSS boosts frame rates for the same amount of power, turning what we thought we knew about PC and console gaming performance ever-so-slightly on its head.
Now, AMD is entering the fray with its own supersampling option, FidelityFX Super Resolution (FSR). Launching today as a part of AMD’s growing FidelityFX suite of graphics-tweaking tools, FSR will be made available for dozens of current graphics cards already on shelves—no Tensor cores required.
Key Distinctions: FSR vs. DLSS
What makes FSR different? For starters, not only will FSR work on AMD-branded Radeon video cards—stretching down from the now-lowly Radeon RX 460 all the way up to the latest fire-breathing Radeon RX 6000 Series—but Nvidia cards will also be compatible, from the GeForce GTX 10 and 16 Series on up.
The slide below shows the full range of compatibility with existing graphics cards. Especially notable is the inclusion of the CPU-integrated Radeon Graphics of some late-model AMD processors…
This much broader compatibility is possible because unlike DLSS, which is proprietary to Nvidia back-to-front, FSR uses an algorithm similar to Contrast Adaptive Sharpening (CAS) that works at the shader level, making it universally applicable to almost any 3D title out there. It integrates right into the shader pipeline of any game engine that adopts it, so dozens of Nvidia cards that were previously locked out of supersampling due to the Tensor core requirement will now have a potential supersampling option of their own.
Still, games have to be adapted to FSR to use the technology. And like DLSS when it first launched, AMD’s list of compatible games available when FSR goes live may not impress most gamers. As of this writing at FSR’s launch (on June 22), FSR will be compatible with the following titles:
- Godfall
- The RiftBreaker
- 22nd Century Racing Series
- Anno 1800
- Evil Genius 2: World Domination
- Kingshunt
- Terminator Resistance
These are not exactly the kind of “gets” that Nvidia can claim with monster games like Call of Duty: Warzone. AMD says, however, that bigger titles such as Resident Evil: Village and the upcoming Far Cry 6 will be compatible with FSR “soon.” (And we mustn’t forget the most anticipated game of the year: Farming Simulator 22.)
With the aim of tactically expanding FSR access, the company has also opened up a survey page on which you can request which games you would like to see gain FSR support as soon as possible. If AMD sees enough requests for a particular title, it could get moved up the queue sooner than the rest.
So far, it looks as if FSR’s biggest advantage over Nvidia’s DLSS will be its compatibility, both with a broader set of hardware options as well as its upcoming integration with GPUOpen. AMD says FSR will be released into the open-source community sometime in mid-July, which will make it far easier for developers to patch FSR into both new and existing titles based on the DirectX 11, DirectX 12, or Vulkan APIs.
This is almost the opposite of Nvidia’s approach to supersampling, which requires every game that adopts DLSS to be trained on Nvidia’s own artificial intelligence neural network, followed by a GameReady driver update for cards that are compatible with DLSS. This is both time- and energy-intensive, two things the game industry isn’t exactly known for having an abundance of. If FSR integrates more easily and quickly into games, we could see it surpass the current DLSS roster of 55 supported games in just a few months.
But What About FSR’s Eye Appeal?
While FSR’s compatibility is all well and good, the biggest question on everyone’s mind still looms heavy for AMD: Will it be as pretty to look at as DLSS?
When running in the “Quality” preset (as opposed to alternatives like “Performance” or “Balanced” modes, which provide faster frames at the cost of visuals), there are times when DLSS not only increases performance, but can even enhance the quality of a game’s image beyond that of a native render. These types of innovations are what have led many (including this writer) to call whatever’s happening inside those Tensor cores “magic,” at least in an Arthur C. Clarke sort of way.
As for whether or not FSR’s own Quality mode, without Tensor cores or a neural network training course, can stand up to DLSS? Only time (and a whole lot of testing over here at PC Labs) will tell. So stay tuned in the coming days as we dive into all the FSR-ready games on offer to see which supersampling tech ultimately reigns supreme.
