DLSS is Dead: New Nvidia Freestyle Sharpening Tested

[Julio Franco]

Nvidia's latest major driver update brought with it several new features including performance enhancements, GPU integer scaling for retro games, a new ultra-low latency mode and perhaps the biggest addition: a new Freestyle Sharpening Filter to rival Radeon's RIS. Is Nvidia's new Freestyle better, and does it make DLSS completely obsolete?

Read the full article here.

https://www.techspot.com/review/1903-dlss-vs-freestyle-vs-ris/

 

[VitalyT]

We have 30-bit color support

Please,...it's 10-bit color, and has always been. Let's at least pretend we know what we are talking about, and not follow some marketing person who doesn't, because those are the same guys selling us that 1Kb = 1000 bytes, and it's not cool.

The number of bits with reference to colors has always meant single spectrum depth, never the sum of all.

 

[Nobina]

There are performance enhancements for games like Apex Legends and Forza Horizon 4, promising up to 23% faster performance compared to driver 431.60 with some RTX GPUs. We verified this already when testing the RTX 2070 Super against the Radeon RX 5700 XT, these two games in particular received hefty performance gains.

On a side note. I love how Nvidia pulled 20% more performance out of their ***. This always makes me wonder how much performance can be squeezed from just having good, optimized drivers and games. We wouldn't need to spend a small fortune to play games maxed out.

 

[kira setsu]

So which cards get all this new stuff? as I run a 980ti and knowing nvidia loves focusing on the new, will it benefit or can I stick with my old drivers.

 

[corrosive23]

So which cards get all this new stuff? as I run a 980ti and knowing nvidia loves focusing on the new, will it benefit or can I stick with my old drivers.

It's in the review. It works with all Nvidia GPUs.

 

[Lew Zealand]

There are performance enhancements for games like Apex Legends and Forza Horizon 4, promising up to 23% faster performance compared to driver 431.60 with some RTX GPUs. We verified this already when testing the RTX 2070 Super against the Radeon RX 5700 XT, these two games in particular received hefty performance gains.

On a side note. I love how Nvidia pulled 20% more performance out of their ***. This always makes me wonder how much performance can be squeezed from just having good, optimized drivers and games. We wouldn't need to spend a small fortune to play games maxed out.

This was fixing a driver problem, not unlocking more performance.

Those games performed unusually poorly on Nvidia/well on AMD the last time they were tested and while I did notice the disparity in Forza (it was huge), I missed it in Apex. It was clear to me at the time that there was a problem with the Nvidia drivers in Forza and that Nvidia would probably correct it, which they did here.

 

[Evernessince]

So which cards get all this new stuff? as I run a 980ti and knowing nvidia loves focusing on the new, will it benefit or can I stick with my old drivers.

If you want integer scaling you need to get turing. If you want the performance improvements from their latest drivers you need turing.

Othewrwise this FreeStyle feature should work on your card. It was opened source to begin with so it makes sense that it would work on all Nvidia cards.

 

[Nandiman]

I don't understand why we are comparing Freestyle sharpening to DLSS. It's like trying to compare an apple and windscreen wiper. The two technologies have nothing to do with one another. DLSS improves performance by upscaling a lower resolution and than trying to sharpen the image through some voodoo AI magic. Freestyle sharpening is what reshape has been doing for ages. Just sharpens the image. It doesn't improve performance or change anything with the resolution. In fact you want to use both to improve the DLSS inage quality further. Basically Freestyle sharpening fixes the shortcomings of DLSS. It's not a replacement for DLSS.

 

[BigBoomBoom]

I don't understand why we are comparing Freestyle sharpening to DLSS. It's like trying to compare an apple and windscreen wiper. The two technologies have nothing to do with one another. DLSS improves performance by upscaling a lower resolution and than trying to sharpen the image through some voodoo AI magic. Freestyle sharpening is what reshape has been doing for ages. Just sharpens the image. It doesn't improve performance or change anything with the resolution. In fact you want to use both to improve the DLSS inage quality further. Basically Freestyle sharpening fixes the shortcomings of DLSS. It's not a replacement for DLSS.

Because the whole point of higher resolution is sharper image... DLSS is dead because it isn't better than normal upscale. If DLSS 4K (1800p equivalent) looks less sharp compared to Freestyle 1440p and cost more performance (1800p vs 1440p), why do you need it.

 

[toooooot]

"This always makes me wonder how much performance can be squeezed from just having good, optimized drivers and games"

Optimization gain could be endless. But so would it take the same amount of time to optimize it.
There is a reason every app maker pushes updates without much testing ruining user experience often
We live in a world of early access, beta and everybody is a free tester.
It is cheap. It is practical. And it prosper software businesses.
And the best of them are those that at least try to spend time removing crucial bugs and
problems.

 

[m3tavision]

All I can say is that Nvidia has turned into a joke of a Company.
Their products and hardware are 100% not for gaming, and use so much marketing to get people to buy their broken chips that don't work for Servers.

Jensen, why haven't you been seen in public since RDNA launched? Feel a little guilty about Turding?

 

[m3tavision]

I don't understand why we are comparing Freestyle sharpening to DLSS. It's like trying to compare an apple and windscreen wiper. The two technologies have nothing to do with one another. DLSS improves performance by upscaling a lower resolution and than trying to sharpen the image through some voodoo AI magic. Freestyle sharpening is what reshape has been doing for ages. Just sharpens the image. It doesn't improve performance or change anything with the resolution. In fact you want to use both to improve the DLSS inage quality further. Basically Freestyle sharpening fixes the shortcomings of DLSS. It's not a replacement for DLSS.

DLSS does nothing.
Jensen tried to make up some nifty name for unused hardware on his chips and DLSS sprung out of the marketing meeting. It doesn't do anything for gamers, it is another gimmick like RTX. And stooopid people bought into his gimmick.

 

[scavengerspc]

I don't understand why we are comparing Freestyle sharpening to DLSS. It's like trying to compare an apple and windscreen wiper. The two technologies have nothing to do with one another. DLSS improves performance by upscaling a lower resolution and than trying to sharpen the image through some voodoo AI magic. Freestyle sharpening is what reshape has been doing for ages. Just sharpens the image. It doesn't improve performance or change anything with the resolution. In fact you want to use both to improve the DLSS inage quality further. Basically Freestyle sharpening fixes the shortcomings of DLSS. It's not a replacement for DLSS.

DLSS does nothing.
Jensen tried to make up some nifty name for unused hardware on his chips and DLSS sprung out of the marketing meeting. It doesn't do anything for gamers, it is another gimmick like RTX. And stooopid people bought into his gimmick.

Honestly I wouldn't say RTX is a gimmick, It's just way over hyped and under performing.

 

[ArjunKL]

It'd be more accurate to say that DLSS is dead in the first couple of games that implemented it. Granted BFV and pre-patch Metro Exodus had terrible image quality with DLSS enabled. But I just finished a playthrough of Control on an RTX 2070 Super here. A proper DLSS implementation, as seen in Control has a MASSIVE impact on image quality. At 1440p with DLSS enabled, Control's presentation is very similar to native and a definite step up from either 1080p upscaled or 1080p upscaled with Reshade CAS. regular upscaling and a sharpening filter don't add high frequency detail that no longer exists. DLSS actually does. Certain surfaces like walls and textures with lettering on them clearly have additional detail added in. Low-res signboards and text textures are one my pet peeves when upscaling and DLSS handles these beautifully. Plus it cleans up the jaggies sharpening invariably introduces. DLSS is obviously not perfect but I really think we need to move on from BFV and Metro Exodus as reference points: they're no longer a good indicator of what DLSS looks like in modern titles.

 

[Lindstroem4]

Great article! What method do you use for the gpu scaling on Nvidia?

 

[Astroreflux]

I don't understand why we are comparing Freestyle sharpening to DLSS. It's like trying to compare an apple and windscreen wiper. The two technologies have nothing to do with one another. DLSS improves performance by upscaling a lower resolution and than trying to sharpen the image through some voodoo AI magic. Freestyle sharpening is what reshape has been doing for ages. Just sharpens the image. It doesn't improve performance or change anything with the resolution. In fact you want to use both to improve the DLSS inage quality further. Basically Freestyle sharpening fixes the shortcomings of DLSS. It's not a replacement for DLSS.

Because the whole point of higher resolution is sharper image... DLSS is dead because it isn't better than normal upscale. If DLSS 4K (1800p equivalent) looks less sharp compared to Freestyle 1440p and cost more performance (1800p vs 1440p), why do you need it.

No. Sharpness isnt everything. What you achieve using standard upscaling and sharpening is a heavily aliased image. That is the point of dlss, similar to taa. Dlss is very effective in this regard. 2 very different featured for different purposes. The comparison is silly. If anything sharpening should be used on top of dlss like you would with taa. If you dont care about aliasing ur probably 12 or have bad eyes.

 

[mountains]

So I have a GeForce GTX 1060 (Pascal, not Turing).

1) Am I right in assuming most of this new stuff with this driver won't help me? Maybe Freestyle?

2) I use NVCleanstall (and sometimes first Display Driver Uninstaller (DDU)) to install Nvidia drivers to avoid the extra junk and telemetry that gets installed. It lets you pick only what you want to include in the install. It has worked pretty well. I avoid GeForce Experience this way. Would I need GeForce Experience to use any of this new stuff? What parts of the driver download should I select to get the benefit but not the junk?

 

[PurpleYoda]

Do we know when nVidia is planning to move to smaller die technology? What was it 10 or 7nm, can't remember.. Only then will I be interested in upgrading...

 

[m3tavision]

Do we know when nVidia is planning to move to smaller die technology? What was it 10 or 7nm, can't remember.. Only then will I be interested in upgrading...

Yes, it will be about October 2020 (next Year) when Nvidia releases their new 7nm Samsung based GPUs. Problem is, Nvidia's 7nm GPU will be extremely costly, because it will be harder for them to move to 7nm, than AMD.

AMD will be out with their 3rd 7nm GPU in just a few months. (That will cost half as much as a 2080ti)

 

[MMWWMM]

NVIDIA just throw big pile of bull**it at Pascal users and here is why I think that:
1. Most of games with internal scaling at some point use integer scaling (otherwise called nearest pixel scalig) and its not a new technique
2. When they launched Maxwell architecture, they allow usage of DSR for Kepler users, and that technology at 4.00x scaling from 1080p without gaussian blur is just the integer scaling with 4 pixels per pixel of the monitor (other way around would be 1 pixel per 4 pixels of the monitor)
3. The Turing cards bellow RTX 2060 have that technology enabled even without RT cores

 

[hahahanoobs]

AMD sucks at software. They are a component company. Nothing more.