Does SMAA make a difference or is it a placebo?

[Black Sun Dog]

I've been running with SMAA on utltra in the settings and can't notice any difference in graphical improvement. Has anyone noticed any differences? What do you think of this new feature?

[Jewelman of Japan™]

Depending on your hardware configuration and if you have high specifications for graphics SMAA (Sub-Pixel Morphological Anti-Aliasing) will smooth out the jagged edges of the picture but at a cost of performance. Mine is set at high because I have a fast 2080 graphics card and I like it very smooth but my weather is set at low because I didn't notice any changes in that because it was more of a placebo like you were wondering and it saved a lot of performance for other things more important to me like SMAA.

If I were you I would keep the SMAA and change the Weather if you need more performance.

Good luck!

[synthohol]

The effect is subtle but it is there: edges aren't looking as much as a staircase anymore. How much it influences performance is hard to tell, in my experience a GTX1060 6GB can handle it. Nevertheless, it definitely is an improvement over MLAA.

[Nimir-Raj]

At 4k on Ultra there is an obvious difference compared to MLAA. Also MLAA dropped the FPS by a minimum of 10 (out in the open) possibly more in cities as a result I always kept it off.

SMAA doesn't do this for me. So I see two benefits, one frame rate and two better AA. Don't get me wrong the game's AA isn't perfect by any means, but I highly favour SMAA over the old option.

[ketfliper]

Hi,
ATS .. if everything is set up correctly, you won't find much jagged graphics in 4k, so SMAA doesn't have much to fix

[Robinicus]

It depends on how you configure your system and game settings. If you are using either DSR at 4x or scaling at 400, there is no visual difference in either 4K or 1080P. If you are using lower settings there is some improvement, however, the improvement is on a “dirtier” sample so the end result is no better.

AA has always been poor in SCS titles; the advantage of DX9 was that the API was unlocked meaning programs like nVidia Inspector were able to manipulate memory addresses to improve the AA drastically. Now we are in a scenario where we still have poor AA performance from SCS but do not have tools to work around the coding due to MS locking the API in DX10+. Hopefully they look at this as a priority but not holding my breath when they almost completely ignored improving it under DX9. The one hope I have after reading all the ETS2 posts on it after their switch to DX11 is that maybe some thing will be done now that the more popular audience is upset about it.

[ketfliper]

Escrito originalmente por Robinicus:

It depends on how you configure your system and game settings. If you are using either DSR at 4x or scaling at 400, there is no visual difference in either 4K or 1080P. If you are using lower settings there is some improvement, however, the improvement is on a “dirtier” sample so the end result is no better.

AA has always been poor in SCS titles; the advantage of DX9 was that the API was unlocked meaning programs like nVidia Inspector were able to manipulate memory addresses to improve the AA drastically. Now we are in a scenario where we still have poor AA performance from SCS but do not have tools to work around the coding due to MS locking the API in DX10+. Hopefully they look at this as a priority but not holding my breath when they almost completely ignored improving it under DX9. The one hope I have after reading all the ETS2 posts on it after their switch to DX11 is that maybe some thing will be done now that the more popular audience is upset about it.

Hi,
SMAA will always bring complete removal of jaggies without impacting of performance.
If you still experience jagged graphics, you have wrong set scaling against resolution.

[Robinicus]

Escrito originalmente por ketfliper:

Hi,
SMAA will always bring complete removal of jaggies without impacting of performance.
If you still experience jagged graphics, you have wrong set scaling against resolution.

This is absolutely an incorrect statement