Digital Foundry Article Technical Discussion [2023]

[Shifty Geezer]

In theory, and then again is everyone happy in practice? Surely if compression is minimal no worries, and we are watching some youtube video. But I doubt everyone who want to have the movie experience, would want to watch a compressed video of Avatar 2 on their 4k TV.

Everyone does. Even the cinemas stream compressed footage (JPEG 2000). As you move out to BRD and streamed content, the compression escalates to something significant that everyone's still happy with. It's all about the 'in practice', where and how downgrades occur as to how noticeable they are.

 

[davis.anthony]

This is a old Doom Eternal comparison:

With a 400% zoom in, show the image without the zoom and you can't see it.

 

[mr magoo]

With a 400% zoom in, show the image without the zoom and you can't see it.

I don’t like the narrative as only cod developers put any research into the subject. We can clearly see that all teams that worked on vrs implementation did great deal of research. ID for example went with combination of tier 1 and tier 2. As tier 2 vrs didn’t work great on animated surfaces of terminals.

 

[mr magoo]

Keeping the native high frequency details is also important. With VRS you degrade the original assets and you get those blocky textures everywhere

After so many comments on vrs you should know better. This is not how vrs works. This is not true at all. And your example from doom as an evidence is also simply flawed. With vrs you will be able to find regions that differ but this not apply to the whole screen. And since whole screen is rendered at higher resolution so important regions will look better in higher res. As not every region of screen is touched with vrs.

https://developer.nvidia.com/sites/default/files/akamai/VRWorks/images/vrs_grids_car_002.png

You talk about scientific measurements but you completely ignore work that iroboto did on spectrum analyze when comparing doom eternal on both platforms. Not to mention any other vids and presentations that were posted before on subject of vrs.

 

[iroboto]

And I'd disagree about the spectrum analysis as it detects only one part of the problem. Keeping the native high frequency details is also important. With VRS you degrade the original assets and you get those blocky textures everywhere (you also get some ugly artifacts on reflections in Doom Eternal BTW).

I think at the heart of the debate perhaps, but as you can see with different upscaling algorithms using a different base resolution it’s able to separate the blockier from the finer.

Essentially, a quick method to determine if an image has more detail or less detail is to count the number of unique pixel colour values it has. And I’m theory if every colour value is different you aren’t really getting this colour blocking.

Spectrum is sort of similar, except it does it by frequency, what are the frequencies that need to be added together to form the image. The more finer the detail the more frequencies that need to be added. And then we look at the total frequency and see which ones have the most.

So in some ways it accounts for blocks, but in other ways it does not because it’s a summation of the total image and not a particular spot you’re looking at.

As per why to me it makes sense to degrade detail, it just comes down to persistence of motion, which is why we can see animation in the first place.

Those small details during motion are going to be gone for several reasons, most of which is where your eyes are actually focused on the screen, and secondly when things are moving your eyes can’t possibly see that level of detail the faster things move.

So I guess in my preference the areas that are going to be in focus or visible should be sharper, because that would actually be more in line how we see things, we aren’t able to actually stop our vision and look at all the blurry stuff that was out of focus.

I don’t see a problem with VRS when done correctly especially as we move to foveated rendering, we do have an evaluation problem around VRS.

 

[Cyan]

It runs fine ?

I played through it at 40hz

nothing wrong with Steam Deck, it's just that I wonder how a handheld PC can play a game like Elden Ring where even more powerful GPUs at 1080p can go from 60fps to 57fps for no apparent reason and decreasing the resolution -from 1080p to 720p, or from 1440p to 1080p doesnt change that-.

 

[cwjs]

Uhhh, pretty sure that doom shot is not showing VRS — the texture is lower res for sure, probably a difference in streaming or filtering. Or maybe the texture uses a lossier form of compression on xbox than on ps5?

But Vrs is applied in screen space, not on individual textures, and the blurriness looks pretty clearly to be in texture space to my eye.

More tellingly, there's a sharp geometric edge which is not down-resed at all -- circled the area where the edge is present, it's a vertical cut downwards into the surface we're zoomed into, where you can see the side of the cavity as a noticable texture change. VRS can't avoid chewing up geometry edges like this -- you'd expect to see either: aliasing on the edge from VRS downscaling, or a (screenspace) pattern of vrs turning off around the edge, which would be visible as the whole red circled area looking exactly like the non-vrs ps5 image.


Here's a screenshot I took of glob's earlier post showing VRS in dead space, the aliasing on the geometry is very visible:

 

[eastmen]

nothing wrong with Steam Deck, it's just that I wonder how a handheld PC can play a game like Elden Ring where even more powerful GPUs at 1080p can go from 60fps to 57fps for no apparent reason and decreasing the resolution -from 1080p to 720p, or from 1440p to 1080p doesnt change that-.

I mean I've played it on the deck an there are some drops but its perfectly fine on the system. The deck is at least as powerful as the ps4 with a much better cpu and a newer generation gpu + twice the ram

 

[davis.anthony]

The deck is at least as powerful as the ps4

It really isn't, the Deck has no where near the memory bandwidth to compete with PS4.

 

[eastmen]

It really isn't, the Deck has no where near the memory bandwidth to compete with PS4.

perhaps but it makes up for it in other areas.

Steam deck renders at 720p vs ps4 trying for 1080p . Steam deck has a more powerful cpu its a quad core zen 2 clocked @ 2.4 to 3.5ghz vs the 8 core jaguar at 1.6ghz. It also has a modern rdna 2 gpu vs ps4's gcn circa 2013. Then add in double the ram. The only advantage the ps4 has is more bandwidth and that the developers tried optimizing for it .

There are plenty of videos out there doing comparisons between the deck and ps4 running this game

and don't worry the 6800u systems are coming and after them the 7x00u systems. And remember this is a pretty bad pc port that is them emulated on the deck vs an optimized version for ps4's hardware

 

[davis.anthony]

Steam deck renders at 720p vs ps4 trying for 1080p . Steam deck has a more powerful cpu its a quad core zen 2 clocked @ 2.4 to 3.5ghz vs the 8 core jaguar at 1.6ghz. It also has a modern rdna 2 gpu vs ps4's gcn circa 2013. Then add in double the ram. The only advantage the ps4 has is more bandwidth and that the developers tried optimizing for it.

Paper specs mean nothing.

The Deck requires FSR in a lot cases to get stable stable performance and FSR at 720p is horrendous and if it was as powerful as the PS4 it wouldn't need the resolution dropping to match it would it.

Effects and graphics are always typically better on PS4.

So making the blanket statement of "The deck is at least as powerful as the ps4" is utterly wrong to say.

and don't worry the 6800u systems are coming and after them the 7x00u systems. And remember this is a pretty bad pc port that is them emulated on the deck vs an optimized version for ps4's hardware

And who's worrying? Next gen Deck hardware will be competing with current *next* gen consoles so it'll still be behind.

 

[yamaci17]

Yeah, steam deck is nowhere near close to PS4. God of War W literally has ps4 equivalent graphics options and Steam Deck renders 800p 0-35 fps with it, whereas PS4 gets 1080p/30 locked (most likely runs above 40+ fps but locked to 30 for stability reasons. The fact that it never drops a single frame on that old machine proves that it most likely runs at an 35+ fps average uncapped. PS4 Pro's 30 FPS capped mode runs 40+ FPS uncapped too.).

Probably that puny 88 gb/s bandwidth is a huge limitation + console optimization stuff.

This thing barely gets 37-40 fps average at 800p, a resolution where even bandwidth requirements should be lower. Now imagine it trying native 1080p like PS4 does.

Yeah, not good;

%50 slower than PS4 (more, when you think PS4 could run 35+ FPS uncapped). And that is the lighest section of game with no effects and enemy NPCs. Most likely it will drop to 15 FPS with 10 FPS %1 lows.

 

[Dictator]

Yeah, steam deck is nowhere near close to PS4. God of War W literally has ps4 equivalent graphics options and Steam Deck renders 800p 0-35 fps with it, whereas PS4 gets 1080p/30 locked

Base PS4 actually drops below 30 in fights in the game! The very first fight in fact!

 

[Cynicalking]

Yeah, steam deck is nowhere near close to PS4. God of War W literally has ps4 equivalent graphics options and Steam Deck renders 800p 0-35 fps with it, whereas PS4 gets 1080p/30 locked (most likely runs above 40+ fps but locked to 30 for stability reasons. The fact that it never drops a single frame on that old machine proves that it most likely runs at an 35+ fps average uncapped. PS4 Pro's 30 FPS capped mode runs 40+ FPS uncapped too.).

Probably that puny 88 gb/s bandwidth is a huge limitation + console optimization stuff.

This thing barely gets 37-40 fps average at 800p, a resolution where even bandwidth requirements should be lower. Now imagine it trying native 1080p like PS4 does.

Yeah, not good;

%50 slower than PS4 (more, when you think PS4 could run 35+ FPS uncapped). And that is the lighest section of game with no effects and enemy NPCs. Most likely it will drop to 15 FPS with 10 FPS %1 lows.

You're thinking of the PS4 pro when talking about uncapped frames on console, not base PS4.

 

[yamaci17]

Base PS4 actually drops below 30 in fights in the game! The very first fight in fact!

Hmm... I mean I platinumed the game on base PS4. Later sections seemed locked 30 FPS to me. However even if it drops... it couldn't be worse than <27 most likely, and it is still at native 1080p which is a far cry from what I'm seeing there at 15-20 FPS with Steam deck at native 1080p. :/

@Reynaldo I know, but overall game was very stable at 30 FPS throughout the whole game which I think would need at least 35+ FPS average for it to be that good. However maybe my perception is skewed, who knows. I remember more frame drops in RDR2 but not so much on base PS4.

Ragnarok definitely had frame drops to 25 with A LOT of particle effects in screen however. That I can surely say. Steam Deck has a huge advantage over PS4 with its CPU tho. It can somewhat run a plague tale requiem. I think that game would be impossible to run at >15 FPS on Jaguar cores. So there are some merits to Steam Deck.

 

[Inuhanyou]

If switch 2 is anywhere close to steamdeck in terms of performance, I think Nintendo fans should be foaming at the mouth for what Nintendo will be able to do with that kind of hw power

 

[davis.anthony]

I think Nintendo fans should be foaming at the mouth for what Nintendo will be able to do with that kind of hw power

Implementing anti-aliasing would be a good start.

 

[techuse]

210$....People need to stop whaling off. This level of corporate greed is getting ridiculous.

 

[Inuhanyou]

210$....People need to stop whaling off. This level of corporate greed is getting ridiculous.

B b but what about the best shiny new thing possible?!?

Sony should leave this kind of thing to third party sellers who will put in all the work. It's not like they need to invest in these types of things themselves only to not to 100 percent

 

[Shifty Geezer]

210$....People need to stop whaling off. This level of corporate greed is getting ridiculous.

Don't particularly disagree, but its pricing is comparable to other solutions on the market. If Scuf can charge $200+ for a controller, why can't Sony et al?

Sony should leave this kind of thing to third party sellers who will put in all the work.

There are already existing 3rd party options. Sony are offering a different option with a different balance of advantages and disadvantages, particularly replacing thumbsticks for $40 instead of needing another $200 controller* when those are worn out. I don't understand why Sony should leave it to 3rd parties, or be expected to create a cheaper option. If I'm in the market for a high-end controller on PS5, I can choose Scuf or Hexgaming or Megamodz or Sony. If DS Edge didn't exist, I'd have one less choice and none offering replaceable thumbsticks.

DS Edge is too rich for my blood, I'd prefer better battery life, and I expect Sony would sell many more with better battery life and a lower price. As a gamer, I'd like an elite controller sold at cost - heck gimme a free pack-in game or two as well! As a business move, a product to make profits, this seems a reasonable option for the console company. It feels a step backwards in terms of consumer focus from PS4's days, with Sony's generally pricing feeling to be heading upwards - this is a completely different value proposition to the fabulous DS4 paddle add-on - but if I don't like it I can always shop elsewhere, from controllers to platforms.

* Though ironically possibly needing a new $200 controller instead of a $10 battery replacement!