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[DocSeuss]

1) QB already has somethin similar
2) it doesn't look as good as the real thing; it makes the image soft (in most implementations I've seen), which is why the PS4 isn't really getting my jimmies rustled. Native excites me. Checkerboard isn't as good as the real thing.
3) 4K doesn't matter, like, at all

So the simplest answer would be "there's no real point to it; the PC can do native 4K, which is better. Why take half measures?"

 

[dogen]

1) QB already has somethin similar

Except different enough that you can't presume it will look similar.

 

[blankempathy]

1) QB already has somethin similar
2) it doesn't look as good as the real thing; it makes the image soft (in most implementations I've seen), which is why the PS4 isn't really getting my jimmies rustled. Native excites me. Checkerboard isn't as good as the real thing.
3) 4K doesn't matter, like, at all

So the simplest answer would be "there's no real point to it; the PC can do native 4K, which is better. Why take half measures?"

Especially when theres 1440p already between 1080p and 4k. Seems like a lot of trouble to make something similar for pc users when you can easily reach 1440p with the stuff out now. Even 4k highest settings is within reach on new games.

 

[lowhighkang_LHK]

Especially when theres 1440p already between 1080p and 4k. Seems like a lot of trouble to make something similar for pc users when you can easily reach 1440p with the stuff out now. Even 4k highest settings is within reach on new games.

DF said that they noticed PS4 Pro doing over 1800p native, and then checkerboard upscaling to 2160p (4k)

I've never seen this 'higher' than 1800p resolution used before.

 

[Turin Turambar]

I'm reading lots of silly replies in this thread. 'We don't need it, we have REAL 4K!!" 'Just buy a better gpu next year!" etc.

Is SMAA or TXAA or any solution like that as good as supersampling or MSAAx8? No. They are efficient software-based solutions for a problem in which the root cause is low resolution. If we would have 8k resolutions we wouldn't need antialiasing techniques. But said software solutions are way more efficient, for what they do.

This is the same.

 

[gofreak]

1) QB already has somethin similar
2) it doesn't look as good as the real thing; it makes the image soft (in most implementations I've seen), which is why the PS4 isn't really getting my jimmies rustled. Native excites me. Checkerboard isn't as good as the real thing.
3) 4K doesn't matter, like, at all

So the simplest answer would be "there's no real point to it; the PC can do native 4K, which is better. Why take half measures?"

I guess if you live in a world where every PC can do native 4K in every game...

If checkerboard 4K (or other techniques) offers a better picture for some PC gamers in some or other variety of PC games (e.g. vs 1440p), it makes all the sense in the world to support the option where possible. I'd hazard to guess most PC gamers aren't in a position to brute force to a full native 4K yet.

It's like asking why a game should offer post-process AA options or even MSAA options given that we could theoretically just brute force SSAA with the best PCs. Options! Not every PC is the same.

 

[Head.spawn]

Doesn't Rainbow Six Siege already use this technique?

 

[jim-jam bongs]

Hah, I love that Durante is at God level when it comes to graphics discussion here these days. Totally deserved, good to see knowledge and hard work being revered over hype and bullshots.

Anyway, I'd be okay with this. It's a nice option for people who want it. I don't have a 4k display yet, so it doesn't affect me, but if someone who has one wants to run max settings with an internal upscaling renderer improving their IQ that's something they should be able to do. PC gaming is about putting control in the hands of the player, let the people decide what's best for them.

 

[elelunicy]

2) it doesn't look as good as the real thing; it makes the image soft (in most implementations I've seen), which is why the PS4 isn't really getting my jimmies rustled. Native excites me. Checkerboard isn't as good as the real thing.

What's next, you're going to tell people that native 1080p doesn't look as good as native 4k?

In Quantum Break, people already found upscaled 4k to be better looking than native 1440p, and in that game, upscaled 4k is rendered exactly at 1440p natively. The two basically use the same processing power but upscaled 4k looks better.

Especially when theres 1440p already between 1080p and 4k. Seems like a lot of trouble to make something similar for pc users when you can easily reach 1440p with the stuff out now. Even 4k highest settings is within reach on new games.

1440p is a joke compared to 4k. In terms of pixel count it's about a quarter way from 1080p to 4k. Even 1440p ultrawide (3440x1440) is still closer to 1080p than it is to 4k.

Even 4k highest settings is within reach on new games.

4k isn't an end-all resolution. I played Quantum Break at 5k with its upscaling/reconstruction tech on. It looked better than native 4k to me (or at least as good) while being easier to run.

 

[Durante]

I still don't understand the way the discussion in this thread is going.

There are already multiple shipped games which offer (optional) reconstruction techniques on PC. There will be more in the future. Having that option is a good thing. The whole idea that these techniques aren't possible or (optionally) useful on PC is ridiculous.

That's it.

 

[Schlomo]

Having the option in certain games is nice, but something on the driver level would be much better. If that's feasible or will happen soon is the real question.

 

[UltimateIke]

3) 4K doesn't matter, like, at all

Steam is also stupid and reports 4K as 2560x1440 if you are using display scaling.

 

[wildfire]

Fucking really? Patenting an algorithm?

First off they aren't patenting only an algorithm. There is hardware mentioned in that link.

Secondly you are totally off base thinking code shouldn't be patent-able. It takes a lot of skill and knowledge to make really efficient algorithms. Might as well be against making patents for chemical formulas.

 

[SaberEdge]

I'm reading lots of silly replies in this thread. 'We don't need it, we have REAL 4K!!" 'Just buy a better gpu next year!" etc.

Is SMAA or TXAA or any solution like that as good as supersampling or MSAAx8? No. They are efficient software-based solutions for a problem in which the root cause is low resolution. If we would have 8k resolutions we wouldn't need antialiasing techniques. But said software solutions are way more efficient, for what they do.

This is the same.

Exactly. Even though I'm doing 4k on my gsync monitor driven by a single GTX 1070 and getting decent framerates (mostly in the 40s and 50s) in essentially every game at max or close to max settings, I would definitely welcome any techniques that give more visual bang for their performance buck.

 

[dr_rus]

DF said that they noticed PS4 Pro doing over 1800p native, and then checkerboard upscaling to 2160p (4k)

I've never seen this 'higher' than 1800p resolution used before.

How do you "checkerboard upscale" from 1080p to 4K? That's 4 times more pixels, you can't build a checkboard in this case.

This is normal rendering, all pixels are shaded:

This is what is assumed for PS4Pro's checkboarding right now, each next quad is omitted from shading and reconstructed later from those which have been shaded:

This would be how rendering in 1080p and reconstructing to 4K would look like, for each shaded pixel you'd have three pixels reconstructed:

The latter option would be pretty bad in both the final image quality and h/w utilization (as h/w operates on pixel quads and this is essentially what makes checkerboard pattern the most obvious option).

 

[lowhighkang_LHK]

How do you "checkerboard upscale" from 1080p to 4K? That's 4 times more pixels, you can't build a checkboard in this case.

This is normal rendering, all pixels are shaded:

This is what is assumed for PS4Pro's checkboarding right now, each next quad is omitted from shading and reconstructed later from those which have been shaded:

This would be how rendering in 1080p and reconstructing to 4K would look like, for each shaded pixel you'd have three pixels reconstructed:

The latter option would be pretty bad in both the final image quality and h/w utilization (as h/w operates on pixel quads and this is essentially what makes checkerboard pattern the most obvious option).

No I said 1800p not 1080p.

In the DF video Richard said the PS4 Pro seems to be rendering at around 1800p and upscaling to 2160p (4k). Giving a result that's far better than 1440p upscaled to 2160p. I'm just asking, his words.

 

[oneils]

Yeah. There is no point in doing this on a platform that offers hardware choice and graphics options.

Yeah. If only 5% of PC gamers have the power to do native 4K and 100% of ps4 pro users have ability to have an approximation of it, which platform has the best iq? This is all getting pretty fun.

I still don't understand the way the discussion in this thread is going.

There are already multiple shipped games which offer (optional) reconstruction techniques on PC. There will be more in the future. Having that option is a good thing. The whole idea that these techniques aren't possible or (optionally) useful on PC is ridiculous.

That's it.

Well, that's no fun!

 

[pastrami]

I still don't understand the way the discussion in this thread is going.

There are already multiple shipped games which offer (optional) reconstruction techniques on PC. There will be more in the future. Having that option is a good thing. The whole idea that these techniques aren't possible or (optionally) useful on PC is ridiculous.

That's it.

It's baffling. All AA techniques other than super-sampling should be banned from PC gaming. There are new GPUs every year! We don't need no stinking half-assed measures like MSAA.

 

[dr_rus]

No I said 1800p not 1080p.

In the DF video Richard said the PS4 Pro seems to be rendering at around 1800p and upscaling to 2160p (4k). Giving a result that's far better than 1440p upscaled to 2160p. I'm just asking, his words.

This isn't correct either as with a checkerboard pattern you're rendering into a 4K frame buffer but you only shade each even/odd quad. The "upscaling" (not sure if that's the correct word here) is happening inside the image, the image dimensions do not change in this process.

That being said it's completely possible that some games will actually just render in 1800p and upscale to 4K in the same way as PS4 would upscale from 900p to 1080p. We shouldn't expect that all games will reach 4K output on PS4Pro in the same way.

 

[Durante]

In the DF video Richard said the PS4 Pro seems to be rendering at around 1800p and upscaling to 2160p (4k). Giving a result that's far better than 1440p upscaled to 2160p. I'm just asking, his words.

I think he has very little idea of how any of this actually works in depth if he said that.

 

[FLAguy954]

Who says it won't?

There are already games which use reconstruction techniques on PC.

Of course, something like that should be optional, given that not everyone is comfortable with the IQ tradeoff it enforces.

Doesn't The Division use some sort of reconstruction with its super-sampling option? That shit is one of the best AA implementations I have ever seen and the performance hit isn't too bad.

EDIT: Nevermind, it's just a form of temporal AA. Looks like Quantum Break is the only game on PC that uses the technique at the moment. Hopefully AMD and Nvidia can figure out a way to implement this at the driver level.

 

[Renekton]

Just so we are all on the same wavelength, Ultra nowadays is more like the "Very High" of yesteryear many new games have presets above Ultra.

 

[Durante]

EDIT: Nevermind, it's just a form of temporal AA. Looks like Quantum Break is the only game on PC that uses the technique at the moment.

No, there's also Rainbow Six: Siege.

Start at slide 44.

 

[oneils]

I think he has very little idea of how any of this actually works in depth if he said that.

I didn't take that literally. I thought he was just trying to explain what it looked like, not what was actually happening.

And this is what he wrote :

And with Microsoft releasing press materials boasting about next year's Project Scorpio offering "true" 4K gaming, the question of upscaling must be addressed. In truth, the quality varies from one title to the next. Activision took to the stage talking of 4K and 60fps for Call of Duty: Infinite Warfare, then showed a section of gameplay that while impressive, was clearly neither. Stair-step edges are also evident in the new Mass Effect running on PS4 Pro, though the low contrast aesthetic of the level we saw hid most of the artefacts and the base resolution itself is still a big, big upgrade over standard 1080p.

However, a trio of the Sony first party efforts looked seriously impressive: Horizon Zero Dawn, Days Gone and Infamous First Light. All use the same cutting-edge upscaling technique. Previously we've talked about the 4x4 checkerboard process, where a 2x2 pixel block is extrapolated out into a 4x4 equivalent - next-gen upscaling, if you like. It allows developers to construct a 2160p 4K framebuffer from half the pixels - a much closer fit for the Pro's GPU prowess.

So it looks like not everyone is using the new checkerboard process yet?

 

[FLAguy954]

No, there's also Rainbow Six: Siege.

Start at slide 44.

That was a very informative read, thanks! I might grab the game just to check out the implementation.

 

[jmga]

No, there's also Rainbow Six: Siege.

Start at slide 44.

Doesn't this technique have an impact in performance?

What kind of dedicated hardware can PS4 Pro have to do it? Or maybe there are GPU resources not accessible to developers and reserved for this?

 

[aeolist]

First off they aren't patenting only an algorithm. There is hardware mentioned in that link.

Secondly you are totally off base thinking code shouldn't be patent-able. It takes a lot of skill and knowledge to make really efficient algorithms. Might as well be against making patents for chemical formulas.

software should absolutely not be patentable. the fact that it is currently causes huge issues in our legal system and we'd all be better off without it.

 

[dr_rus]

Doesn't this technique have an impact in performance?

Compared to what?

What kind of dedicated hardware can PS4 Pro have to do it? Or maybe there are GPU resources not accessible to developers and reserved for this?

This is still a puzzling question as in my opinion there cannot be any kind of dedicated h/w for resolution reconstruction, only for straight image rescaling on video out. Whatever can be used in these techniques aren't "dedicated" as this is just regular MSAA, shader ALUs, LDS/L1/L2 caches, etc. So I still can't think of any dedicated h/w which may help here.

 

[pa22word]

Compared to what?



This is still a puzzling question as in my opinion there cannot be any kind of dedicated h/w for resolution reconstruction, only for straight image rescaling on video out. Whatever can be used in these techniques aren't "dedicated" as this is just regular MSAA, shader ALUs, LDS/L1/L2 caches, etc. So I still can't think of any dedicated h/w which may help here.

There can't?

I mean it seems to me pretty obvious Sony can just mandate you have to have the overhead for reconstruction built in or the game won't pass cert.

edit: erm, dedicated hardware, yes I see what you mean now. I too think it's pretty unlikely there's anything under the hood in there specifically onboard purely for reconstruction.

 

[dr_rus]

There can't?

I mean it seems to me pretty obvious Sony can just mandate you have to have the overhead for reconstruction built in or the game won't pass cert.

edit: erm, dedicated hardware, yes I see what you mean now. I too think it's pretty unlikely there's anything under the hood in there specifically onboard purely for reconstruction.

Well, the only type of dedicated h/w I can think of is something which would perform temporal accumulation outside of the frame rendering pipeline. But such accumulation without access to motion vectors and depth buffers will likely produce awful results in practice so I don't think that it's applicable here.

Hopefully they'll shed some light on what they meant by dedicated h/w for checkerboard rendering b/c for now it seems just as pointless of a statement as the original PS4 ACEs expansion pegged as a big help with graphics and compute.

 

[cheesekao]

So the simplest answer would be "there's no real point to it; the PC can do native 4K, which is better. Why take half measures?"

Because some people have weak hardware and not all PC's can do 4k?

 

[MR ARCADE FOREVER]

1) QB already has somethin similar
2) it doesn't look as good as the real thing; it makes the image soft (in most implementations I've seen), which is why the PS4 isn't really getting my jimmies rustled. Native excites me. Checkerboard isn't as good as the real thing.
3) 4K doesn't matter, like, at all

So the simplest answer would be "there's no real point to it; the PC can do native 4K, which is better. Why take half measures?"

Any pc can do native 4k? Think about that

 

[Pepboy]

..upscaled.

If you display at a lower than max resolution, isnt it technically already upscaled? The number of pixels hasnt changed...

 

[Caayn]

3) 4K doesn't matter, like, at all

Steam hardware survey isn't the most reliable source.

UltimateIke already mentioned one of the problems. My own problem with it is that it registers my primary monitor (2560*1080) while I game on my secondary monitor (3840*2160).

 

[Shai-Tan]

I reckon more people will have 4k tv than 4k monitor in the near term too. It doesn't make sense for me to have a 4k monitor yet because rendering games to it wasn't sufficient until this current batch of Nvidia cards which I don't have yet;

whereas I have a 4k TV because I needed a new tv and it made sense to get 4k since there's actually content for it already between Netflix and Youtube. Having PS4 Pro which can have some 4k upscaling is just gravy there.

 

[LordRaptor]

Any pc can do native 4k? Think about that

Well.... yeah, pretty much.

The qualifiers start in what they're displaying at 4K.

 

[johnnydrama]

Fucking really? Patenting an algorithm?



And what people who can't or won't upgrade?

Expecting 4K to run on 2013 hardware is foolish to begin with. Even Sony users have to upgrade to get 4K.

 

[belmonkey]

Any comparisons been done on whether a sub-4k resolution can match the clarity of checkerboarding?

 

[ethomaz]

Because you can brute force high resolutions.

 

[Neo_Geo]

It's probably more noticeable up-close on a PC monitor.

Oh yeah! How silly of everyone to forget that you can't play PC games unless you are huddled in on your monitor. Thanks for enlightening us!

 

[belmonkey]

Because you can brute force high resolutions.

When doing tech comparisons, it wouldn't seem quite fair if one side was rendering a more demanding / cleaner image (native 4k) than the other.

 

[dogen]

Any comparisons been done on whether a sub-4k resolution can match the clarity of checkerboarding?

I want to see a comparison between it and 1527p(double 1080p according to nvidia dsr) just scaled up.

 

[data]

I want to see a comparison between it and 1527p(double 1080p according to nvidia dsr) just scaled up.

1527 is double 1080p? what? isn't 4k double 1080p?

 

[Mystic_Wanderer]

Because it's a poor cousin to the real thing? My 980ti can do 4K30fps+ easily. Last gen games are an easy 4K60fps+, without the need for 'remasters'. No one's going to pay premium price for 'approximation'.

Your $1000 graphics card (or $700 or whatever) can do it? Wow, you must represent .5% of PC owners.

 

[dogen]

1527 is double 1080p? what? isn't 4k double 1080p?

4k is 4x 1080p

 

[x3sphere]

Your $1000 graphics card (or $700 or whatever) can do it? Wow, you must represent .5% of PC owners.

It used to be $650-700 for that level of performance, not anymore. 1070 is faster than the 980 Ti and can be found under $400, or a little above that if you want one of the more fancier models.

Used 980 Tis go for mid $300s now...

 

[RenderJosh]

1527 is double 1080p? what? isn't 4k double 1080p?

4k is 4x 1080p

People are confusing vertical resolution and pixel count here.
4K (implying a resolution of 3840x2160) is equal to four times the pixel count of 1920x1080. That is what the Nvidia tool is about when you are tweaking DSR and its 1.25/1.5/2/... options, that is a multiple of the pixel count you are currently displaying on your screen, not a multiple of your vertical resolution.

 

[Metfanant]

Why fake it if you got the hardware?

Because 99% of people don't have the hardware?...

There is literally ZERO reason these types of options would be BAD for PC gamers lol

 

[Soltype]

Any comparisons been done on whether a sub-4k resolution can match the clarity of checkerboarding?

This is what I want to see, there has to be some visual difference between just upscaling and this checkerboard method.

 

[10k]

Go native or go home.