DLAA vs MSAA for VR

[Qcumber]

Now that DLAA has been around a few months I wanted to get an idea of what people are using for AA in VR. Here is my take. 

DLAA is all round better for AA. Everything is smooth and even electricity pylons look sharp and non-jaggy. In QVFR centre vision is crisp and peripheral vision is soft and non pixelated which is good. However, there is the annoying smearing effect with moving aircraft. Very distracting.

MSAA is great for aircraft. No smearing or blurring. Nice and crisp. But landscape,  objects and cockpit shadows can still have a jaggy edge even at x4. In QVFR you can get distracting pixilation in clouds and landscape.

Interestingly when using QVFR I don't see a huge difference in FPS between DLAA and MSAA. That surprised my at first as when I previously tried MSAA without QVFR the fps tanked. However MSAA has much lower performance impact on lower resolution images so this makes sense when only a very small part of the image is high res. It's a pity we can't get MSAA applied to the centre and DLAA applied to the edges. 

For me it is now DLAA for sightseeing or ground attacks and MSAA for air-to-air. Hopefully DLAA/DLSS will improve, or is that wishful thinking? 

[Raven (Elysian Angel)]

As it stands I find neither AA method worth using. Mind you, I have an AMD card so I can't use DLAA.
That being said, I find TAA great for still images but a blurry mess with so much ghosting it's unusable in practice (and it turns close-range bandits invisible).

I hope the implementation will improve too.
Meanwhile this is an interesting watch:

 

[Steel Jaw]

MSAA improves textures but has a FPS hit.  DLSS makes the cockpit look fuzzy.  Dunno about DLAA as I too have a AMD card.

[okopanja]

2 minutes ago, Steel Jaw said:

MSAA improves textures but has a FPS hit.  DLSS makes the cockpit look fuzzy.  Dunno about DLAA as I too have a AMD card.

For me DLAA introduces some latency, when switching cockpit lights on/off. Might be better for others.

[Mr_sukebe]

DLAA for me.

I found DLAA by accident when using that Civ Sim and was amazed by the improvement.  At the time, I didn’t even understand how it was meant to work.

 Day 1 of DLSS landing for DCS and I ran tests in VR comparing DLSS, MSAA, DLAA.  Since then, it’s been permanently in DLAA mode.

For ref, I use a Quest Pro via link cable with DFR

 

[ricktoberfest]

2 hours ago, Raven (Elysian Angel) said:

As it stands I find neither AA method worth using. Mind you, I have an AMD card so I can't use DLAA.
That being said, I find TAA great for still images but a blurry mess with so much ghosting it's unusable in practice (and it turns close-range bandits invisible).

I hope the implementation will improve too.
Meanwhile this is an interesting watch:

 

I tried TAA but it made all aircraft look like they had canards in a dogfight situation. Just couldn’t handle it. 

[Qcumber]

3 hours ago, Mr_sukebe said:

DLAA for me.

I found DLAA by accident when using that Civ Sim and was amazed by the improvement.  At the time, I didn’t even understand how it was meant to work.

 Day 1 of DLSS landing for DCS and I ran tests in VR comparing DLSS, MSAA, DLAA.  Since then, it’s been permanently in DLAA mode.

For ref, I use a Quest Pro via link cable with DFR

 

I also have QP with DFR. It's a great headset. DLAA works really well except for the "aircraft bleed". Have you found any way of minimizing this? I've manually installed DLSS 3.5.10 but it's not really helped much. 

[Glide]

4 hours ago, Qcumber said:

manually installed DLSS 3.5.10

DLSS is binary compatible.  This means that you can replace the executable, but you don't get the new features.  There's another video from Digital Foundry on YT that covers DLSS 3.5 in Cyperpunk 2.0.  Check it out.  The newer, cleaner DLSS will not be available until the Dev's add the new features to the DCS engine.

[Dentedend10]

I haven’t experimented that much, as I soon settled with DLSS. To counteract the unclear cockpit texts, i upscale the foveated region. 
Visuals are very nice and FPS is generally good (expect for the F14 at Nellis ). 

hardware in description

[nikoel]

DLAA all the way, no comparison

My number one annoyance with DCS was the shimmering. Especially around towns and cities. I don't mind a few jaggies here and there, but DCS was on an other level. DLAA makes this a thing of the past. Whilst you can't quite get the sharpness of MSAA, its truly a massive improvement. Like yourself I use DFR with Quest Pro and it looks great

There is ghosting, but on the newest DLSS release its reduced by a lot and it's a non issue. Especially for those of us who can remember the times where we couldn't get the FPS above the refreshrate of the headset. VR has moved in strides and I can not wait to see what Vulkan will bring

[Qcumber]

2 hours ago, Dentedend10 said:

I haven’t experimented that much, as I soon settled with DLSS. To counteract the unclear cockpit texts, i upscale the foveated region. 
Visuals are very nice and FPS is generally good (expect for the F14 at Nellis ). 

hardware in description

I would suggest trying DLAA. You will be able to lower the centre resolution and get a sharper image compared to DLSS. Particularly with regards buildings. I find the performance gain for DLSS when you are using DFR is negligible.

[SkateZilla]

MSAA + Post Process Effects = Stupid high frame times,

MSAA was not designed to run with excessive post process shaders or multiple texture layers, let alone on multiple viewports.

DCS even in 2D has at least 10 texture layers on most of the models, and most cockpits run multiple viewports, and globally, the amount of post process shaders is way up there.

The performance penalty is huge on 2D, So naturally VR is more than twice as bad .

TAA has it's quirks but will only get better, DLAA uses TAA + Tensor Core powered Shaders, FSR 3 ( I think DCS still uses 2.0), uses TAA + AMD's Shaders.

I haven't gotten around to using DLSS -> FSR 3 Wrapper, to see if it's better than FSR2 in DCS.

Edited February 21 by SkateZilla

[Mr_sukebe]

13 hours ago, Qcumber said:

I also have QP with DFR. It's a great headset. DLAA works really well except for the "aircraft bleed". Have you found any way of minimizing this? I've manually installed DLSS 3.5.10 but it's not really helped much. 

Maintaining a solid 72fps seems to solve the visual issues.  Unfortunately that’s just not possible with my settings and hardware at low altitude (eg airfields, carrier decks).

After that, enabling and disabling ASW has both advantages and disadvantages 

[Qcumber]

28 minutes ago, Mr_sukebe said:

Maintaining a solid 72fps seems to solve the visual issues.  Unfortunately that’s just not possible with my settings and hardware at low altitude (eg airfields, carrier decks).

After that, enabling and disabling ASW has both advantages and disadvantages 

Flying high and sightseeing I can maintain 72 fps but in the "real world" this never happens. I am usually at about 60 fps. If it drops to 50 or less I toggle ASW to lock it at 45.

The blurring seems worse in some maps than others. For example, on the Marianas Lagoon Island Patrol the 190/zeros look very mushy with bleeding trails even when my fps is around 70. In contrast on the N2 map the Mosquitos in the airfield defence mission look very good even when my fps is about 55. It might be an aircraft speed, colour/contrast and background issue!? 

[Mr_sukebe]

Maybe, don’t know.

I’’m hoping that the move to Vulkan will help solve some of the visuals and maybe allow a more consistent higher frame rate.  
In the Civ Sim that enabled Vulkan, I saw a significant improvement in smoothness and frame rate, hence fingers crossed 

[SkateZilla]

Also, to reduce TAA / DLAA Smearing and bleeds, keep the frame times as low as possible, and the FPS as close to the headset's native as possible.

in my experience, the smear/bleeding is barely visible at 75Hz w/ low frame times,

once the FPS starts to drop, the smearing gets worse as the frame times go up, 

Longer frame times = more movement between frames = smearing / bleeding.

Turning off Screenspace shaders and lowering rendering and water detail typically has good results.

Edited February 21 by SkateZilla

[WipeUout]

I use the DLSS/DLAA combination only.  The MFDs are the main issue for me but tolerable, the smearing is not a problem (very much personal tolerance here).  DLAA alone without DLSS is a 2ms hit on my GPU frame time, not good.

As for TAA I have two issues.  It does look nice with a bit of sharpening but air targets disapearing is a problem.  Second issue is with movement in general, it makes the image a bit blurry.

[Qcumber]

6 hours ago, SkateZilla said:

Also, to reduce TAA / DLAA Smearing and bleeds, keep the frame times as low as possible, and the FPS as close to the headset's native as possible.

in my experience, the smear/bleeding is barely visible at 75Hz w/ low frame times,

once the FPS starts to drop, the smearing gets worse as the frame times go up, 

Longer frame times = more movement between frames = smearing / bleeding.

Turning off Screenspace shaders and lowering rendering and water detail typically has good results.

 

I've tried adjusting my settings by tweaking QVFR so that I have a narrow centre (0.22x0.22) and can get a much better fps (up to steady 90 in some situations). It's a trade off though due to a slight distraction from low res periphery. When I maintain higher fps the bleeding does appear to be less. I can still maintain high/extreme settings in DCS. Lowering them does not make much difference. 

[Glide]

6 hours ago, SkateZilla said:

keep the frame times as low as possible

 

I'm not sure that's correct.  According to Digital Foundry, with TAA/DLSS, the more frames the better because AntiAliasing will be better.  I've had my Crystal for about a week now, and I've had a few kicks at the graphics settings.  Today, I tuned my settings to get me 90 frames in the menu, and even 90 fps in game.  Headset 90hz, Balanced, no Smoothing, but no Quadviews.  Then I enabled Quadviews, and I got a solid 72ish FPS.  See Below.  It was really solid.  3080Ti with i7 11gen.

One more thing, I noticed the odd stutter with Low Latency Mode = Ultra.  Smooth as silk with Low Latency = On. 

[Qcumber]

1 hour ago, Glide said:

One more thing, I noticed the odd stutter with Low Latency Mode = Ultra.  Smooth as silk with Low Latency = On. 

Thanks. I'll try the change. 

[OldFlyer]

I run with MSAA at 2x because as much as I want to use DLSS / DLAA I find that everything is just way too out of focus somehow. Just not sharp

This is with a Quest 3 and a 3060Ti

Edited February 22 by OldFlyer

[edmuss]

DLSS quality / DLAA for me, through either the high resolution of the aero or high enough framerates (75-90 generally) I don't see any noticeable smearing.  The DLAA allows me to drop the peripheral resolution right down and it kills all the specular shimmers associated with MSAA.  The DLSS just gives me more frames for neglible visual loss, the higher render resolution of the aero gives more information for the upscaler to work with so apart from a very, very minor reduction in crispness it's all positive.

In my testing MSAAx2 alone cost me 10fps, DLAA alone cost me 10fps, DLSS quality gained me 20 fps, thereby the net gain of DLSS quality setting is 30fps in my instance.

 

[CMDR Shepard]

After hours of testing and visual comparison I'm stick with MSAA 2x for now. Much sharper. I've tried every possible compination in different scenarios. MSAA 2/4x, DLAA, DLSS Quality (with higher rendering resolution ofc), etc. I would use MSAA 4X if I could (too much frametime GPU hit with no so big visual gains) and higher rendering resolution (for now it's only ~2600x2600). Still have dips at night with rain and FLIR. The only hope is Vulkan and a 5090. My current setup in the signature. I'm stick with MSAA 2x for now. Much sharper. I've tried every possible compination in different scenarios. MSAA 2/4x, DLAA, DLSS Quality (with higher rendering resolution ofc), etc. I would use MSAA 4X if I could (too much frametime GPU hit with no so big visual gains) and higher rendering resolution (for now it's only ~2600x2600). Still have dips at night with rain and FLIR. The only hope is Vulkan and a 5090. My current setup in the signature.

Edited February 22 by CMDR Shepard

[davidrbarnette]

39 minutes ago, CMDR Shepard said:

 The only hope is Vulkan and a 5090. My current setup in the signature.

 

Do you think you're GPU constrained? You may be correct for all I know, but on my system (7950X, 4090, 64GB DDR5) I can run with settings pretty well maxed-out and it still appears that I have GPU headroom. As long as it is a super-simple mission, I maintain 72 fps (Quest 3) without a problem. As soon as the number of units goes up, the FPS starts to suffer. I can easily bring my pretty high-end system to a crawl in DCS Liberation, and it seems like the number of units chokes the processor. 

I don't think much will change without some optimization on the software side of things. 

[CMDR Shepard]

3 часа назад, davidrbarnette сказал:

Do you think you're GPU constrained? You may be correct for all I know, but on my system (7950X, 4090, 64GB DDR5) I can run with settings pretty well maxed-out and it still appears that I have GPU headroom. As long as it is a super-simple mission, I maintain 72 fps (Quest 3) without a problem. As soon as the number of units goes up, the FPS starts to suffer. I can easily bring my pretty high-end system to a crawl in DCS Liberation, and it seems like the number of units chokes the processor. 

I don't think much will change without some optimization on the software side of things. 

With OpenXR toolkit I can see GPU and CPU time in the game, also I use MSI Afterburner for monitoring frametime and GPU load. So yes. I need steady 75hz, reprojection is too bad at Pimax (also when I had the CV1 I didn't like it either).
I have a Q3 but prefer to use 8KX with PCVR. I would get even worse results with Q3 due to additional encoding-transmitting-decoding overhead. It's not free. I'm going for Somnium VR1 if it's good.