AMD launches Radeon Super Resolution (RSR) technology; teases Fidelity FX Super Resolution 2.0
AMD confirmed that Fidelity FX Super Resolution (FSR) 2.0 is coming to games in the second quarter of the year. Here is everything gamers with AMD GPUs need to know about the updates to the AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition software suite.
Technology giant AMD has just announced several new graphics technologies as part of its AMD Adrenalin Edition software suite update. These technologies include the Radeon Super Resolution (RSR), updated AMD Link, and Radeon Image Sharpening (RIS). However, the highlight of the announcements is the confirmation about Fidelity FX Super Resolution (FSR) 2.0. The company teased the arrival of FSR 2.0 in the second half of the year. In addition, it also shared some information on how the upcoming version will be different than the current version. Here is everything gamers with AMD GPUs need to know about the updates to the AMD Software: Adrenalin Edition.
Adrenalin Edition brings Radeon Super Resolution, updated AMD Link, and more; details
Before we talk about FSR 2.0, let’s focus on other announcements including RSR, updated AMD Link Play, and RIS. RSR is a spatial upscaling technology that is similar to the current FSR 1.0 works. AMD confirmed that RSR is “built on the same algorithm as AMD FSR” offering “near-native resolution” upscaling. However, the way RSR is applied to the games is drastically different from FSR. Game developers need to specifically add support for FSR in their games while RSR works on all games without any special implementation.
To make things easier to understand, FSR is game-based while RSR is driver-based and can work on any game out there. While FSR is placed in the game rendering pipeline, RSR is placed at the end of the game rendering pipeline. This means that FSR can offer better quality because it can work on graphics without post-processing depending on its placement. RSR may not be able to offer equal results because it works with post-processed images. It is worth noting that RSR only works on AMD RDNA 1 and RDNA 2-based graphics.
The updated AMD Link Play allows AMD Radeon-powered PC owners to connect to their systems and "play local multiplayer games". Owners can use their Android or Windows-based phones, tablets, TVs, or smartphones to connect to their systems. RIS is a sharpening feature that will bring back the "clarity" and "crispness" back to upscaled images. For some context, upscaling tends to soften up images. AMD also stated that users can use RIS to sharpen and improve the quality of visuals in productivity apps and video playback with just a "single click". Gamers can access all these technologies by updating their AMD Radeon software now.
AMD Fidelity FX Super Resolution (FSR) 2.0 coming in Q2 2022
The company also shared a teaser for FSR 2.0 while sharing some technical details about the upcoming technology. Going over the details, it seems that like Nvidia DLSS 2.0, AMD FSR 2.0 will also use temporal data to upscale game graphics. In addition to the temporal data from the game scene, the technology will also use "optimized anti-aliasing" to offer better framerates "in supported games". AMD claims that the technology will provide gamers "similar or better image quality". However, we will need to test these claims when FSR 2.0 launches. One interesting thing to highlight here is that AMD claims that FSR 2.0 will not need any "dedicated machine learning hardware" to offer this level of upscale quality. It also added that the technology will work on both AMD as well as "competitor GPUs".