As if the Meta Quest platform didn’t already have enough technology squeezed into its headsets, Meta has just announced another feature. ‘Super Resolution’ as the company calls it, is designed to make Quest games and apps look even better. An upscaling algorithm, developers can enable Meta Quest Super Resolution now for their projects.
Built to help developers maximize their project’s image quality for Meta Quest’s displays, Super Resolution is described as “2x faster than the “quality” sharpening algorithm currently used for Link Sharpening+.” Due to the rollout of the v55 updates: “we will be replacing our existing quality sharpening method with Super Resolution providing two distinct algorithms with different levels of quality and associated performance costs,” Meta notes.
Quest Super Resolution
Meta began rolling out the v55 software update at the end of June, giving the Meta Quest 2 a performance boost. This saw both Quest 2 and Quest Pro benefit from higher CPU and GPU clock speeds. With the addition of Super Resolution games should look even better, providing a high-quality alternative to current bilinear scaling.
It was a combined effort between Meta and Qualcomm a blog post notes. “Super Resolution is a VR-optimized edge-aware scaling and sharpening algorithm built upon Snapdragon Game Super Resolution with Meta Quest-specific performance optimizations developed in collaboration with the Qualcomm Graphics Team.”
However, ordinary consumers aren’t likely to see the benefits straight away as it’s not automatically on. Developers need to activate the feature, and may not choose to do so as there are limitations. These include Super Resolution increasing Timewarp GPU cost and the fact that it can’t support YUV textures and Cube maps currently.
On the plus side, those using Meta Quest Link can activate Super Resolution via the Oculus Debug Tool. Simply set Link Sharpening to “Quality”.
Let us know what you think of this new quality enhancement in the comments below.