DLSS, FSR & XeSS, WTF Does All This Mean for Gamers?

Final Thoughts

Interestingly, the performance results I got here were not what I expected, I thought I would see a bigger shift between them all, but I am just testing a single GPU here, so it’s hard to get a broad picture of performance. I use DLSS in Death Stranding, Cyber Punk 2077, Forza Horizon 5 and a few others, and it works great, delivering a noticeable performance improvement. At the very least, I expected to see more performance variation from one format of upscaling to the other. However, for the most part, AMD, Nvidia and Intel’s technologies are all different takes on the same dish.

Quality

What did make a difference is the visual quality. It can be drastically different at some resolutions, and near indistinguishable from native resolution at others. The higher the resolution and the higher the quality setting, the closer you are going to get to native performance, that much is easy. However, interestingly, I find that DLSS looks smoother, perhaps even a little softer in terms of image quality and requires some sharpening to be applied. Intel’s upscaling seems to be very sharp and rough around the edge, but at the same time, it really does pull up the resolution and retain a lot of detail in the scene. AMD seems to flick from one end of the spectrum to the other. That’s interesting, as they are all trying to do the same thing, but they’re clearly all doing something unique.

The Future

With Nvidia now working on DLSS 3.0, and AMD SFR having seen a few updates too, I fully expect to see Intel develop their code further too. The simple fact is, while these technologies are making great leaps and advancements, they’re just getting started. One big example is DLSS 3.0, which actually uses AI to generate entire frames, rather than just upscaling existing ones. This could have a pretty drastic impact on performance if you’re GPU only has to render half the frames, it could theoretically double the performance, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Other Technologies

There’s also DLAA, which uses the upscaling technology to upscale your native resolution to something even higher, giving you a new anti-aliasing method. Sure, Nvidia may have more of these upscaling technologies, but hey, they have been at it for a couple of years now. I’m sure AMD and Intel will follow up with their own suite of similar technologies and updates.

What’s Next?

What’s going to be interesting is how games integrate not one, not two, but all three technologies to appeal to the wider gaming market. While it won’t be a magic bullet for performance for all gamers, it’s great to see developers and GPU makers finding unique ways to increase game performance, improve efficiency, and innovate.

Do you use any upscaling technology? Let us know in the comments. And who knows, perhaps those of you on the fence or who don’t like any of the downsides of upscaling will be converted in the coming months and years as the technology develops even further!