AMD's Radeon RX 9000 series launched with the FidelityFX Super Resolution 4, AMD's upscaling method that leverages an AI-powered algorithm to boost image quality. Before the RDNA 4 architecture made its official debut, early tests hinted at significant visual improvements on the new GPUs. Officially, FSR 4 only works with the Radeon RX 9000 series, but theoretically, the Radeon RX 7000 series can also use it.

Sick of waiting for an official announcement from AMD, some users have been trying to mod FSR 4 (with success) using Optiscaler. One such user was Virtual-Cobbler-9930 (via Wccftech), who shared some performance and image quality results.

Image credit: Reddit (Virtual-Cobbler-9930)

To get FSR 4 working on RDNA 3 graphics, you need to activate it with the command: WMMA_RDNA3_WORKAROUND. While RDNA 3 GPUs support WMMA (Wave Matrix Multiply Accumulate) for FP16 data, RDNA 4 further enhanced these instructions to natively accommodate formats like FP16, BF16, and INT8, which are crucial for the AI-powered upscaling. It appears someone has found a way to emulate these functionalities on RDNA 3.

The results from Cyberpunk 2077 indicate a clear improvement in graphic quality, with less smearing on elements like grass and bushes. However, this visual fidelity comes with a performance cost. Running the game's built-in benchmark with FSR Quality settings saw frame rates drop from 85.06 FPS to 56.28 FPS. Similar findings were observed in titles like Oblivion Remastered, where the visual artifacts were reduced. The performance hit ranged from 20% to 30%. The visual improvements in games like Oblivion and Marvel Rivals were also noticeable, but in Cyberpunk 2077, both cases had a performance hit compared to FSR 3.1.

This FSR 4 workaround offers a glimpse into enhanced visuals for RDNA 3 owners, showing that it could be worth considering for games beyond the most demanding AAA titles. However, one must be aware of the significant performance impact that it brings. On the other hand, this unofficial implementation sheds some light on why AMD opted not to offer the capability to older GPU series. Even with workarounds, the raw processing power needed for the AI upscaling appears to heavily tax the older hardware, consuming resources that would otherwise be dedicated to rendering the scene. Whether AMD will eventually find a more optimised official path remains to be seen.

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KitGuru says: Do you have a Radeon RX 7000 series GPU? Will you be trying Optiscaler to enable FSR 4?

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