Ray tracing and DLSS/FSR performance:
Let’s take a look at the seven games we’ve selected that support Ray Tracing as well as DLSS, and in some cases AMD’s FSR, as well as Intel’s new XeSS technology, which is supported by Shadow Tomb Raider and Hitman 3. As we’ve already reminded you, while DLSS remains the property of NVIDIA, FSR and XeSS can be used with all cards from AMD, Intel and even NVIDIA.
The seven DirectX 12 games we’ll be testing with Ray Tracing and DLSS, FSR or XeSS are :
- Shadow of the Tomb Raider (DLSS)
- Watch Dogs: Legion (DLSS)
- Metro Exodus PC Enhanced Edition (DLSS)
- Far Cry 6 (DLSS – FSR)
- Cyberpunk 2077 (DLSS 3 – FSR)
- Hitman 3 (DLSS 3 – XeSS)
- Forza Horizon 5 (DLSS 3)
No change for this new series of games, as we’re sticking with 1080p definition. Depending on the card, we’ll be using DLSS for NVIDIA and either FSR or XeSS for AMD models. If FSR is not available in a game, then we’ll give our AMD card the benefit of XeSS technology.
DLSS 3: watch out for our results!
As you know, NVIDIA unveiled DLSS 3 with the arrival of the RTX 4000 graphics cards, and in particular with the launch of the RTX 4090 version. So why the warning? Because NVIDIA now offers DLSS3 support on many games, but this is only supported by RTX 4000s. To put it simply, if we test a game that benefits from DLSS 3, our RTX 4060 Ti will take advantage of it, but an RTX 30xx will make do with DLSS 2, resulting in even greater discrepancies.
We currently have three games that support DLSS 3, and we’ll be increasing this number over the coming weeks. Updating all our graphics to 1080p and 1440p has taken us a long time. You can find the list of compatible games by following this link.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider:
First, which we’re adding to this comparison and which supports Ray Tracing and DLSS 2.0. Three levels of Ray Tracing are offered in the game (medium – high – ultra) and the four levels of DLSS (performance – quality – balanced – ultra performance).
For our benchmarks, we opted for ” very high ” graphics quality, ” ultra ” Ray Tracing and ” balanced ” DLSS.
With Ray Tracing activated in ultra, an average of 133 FPS is already achieved. The addition of DLSS 2.3 allowed our average to climb to 164 FPS, so there was no difficulty in enjoying 1080p with Ray Tracing enabled. In this first game, our RTX 4060 Ti outperformed the RTX 3070 FE!
As a side note, Shadow Of The Tomb Raider was equipped with XeSS, enabling AMD cards to benefit from this technology. You can still judge the difference in performance between the two technologies.
Watch Dogs Legion:
Second game, Watch Dogs Legion supports Ray Tracing and DLSS 2.0. It proves to be one of the most demanding games of the moment. The game features three Ray Tracing levels (medium – high – ultra) and four DLSS levels (performance – quality – balanced – ultra performance).
For our benchmarks, we opted for very high graphics quality, ” high ” Ray Tracing and ” balanced ” DLSS.
The Ray Tracing in Watch Dogs Legion is starting to take its toll on the cards, but our sample of the day fares rather well, achieving an average of 78 FPS. Activating DLSS 2 will boost FPS to an average of 101 frames per second. Once again, our sample of the day outperforms the RTX 3070 FE!
Metro Exodus PC Enhanced Edition:
Third game to support DLSS 2.0. The game offers three levels of Ray Tracing and four levels of DLSS (performance – quality – balanced – ultra performance).
For our benchmarks, we opted for ultra graphics quality, ” ultra ” Ray Tracing and DLSS in ” balanced ” mode.
Continuing with the greedy games, it’s only our RTX 4060 Ti that once again takes the lead over the RTX 3070, with an average of 73.5 FPS. DLSS in “balanced” mode delivers a gain of almost 52%.
Far Cry 6:
Far Cry 6 supports DXR and AMD’s FSR, but not DLSS.
For our benchmarks, we opted for Ultra graphics quality, activated both DRX options and FSR in ” balanced ” mode.
In Far Cry 6, FSR is the only choice available to boost FPS after enabling Ray Tracing. All our cards can benefit from this, regardless of manufacturer. Nothing really changes in the hierarchy, with the RTX 4060 Ti still on a par with the RTX 3070.
Cyberpunk 2077:
We’ve added a new game whose settings enable both DLSS and FSR. Note that this is the first game to enable DLSS3 for RTX 40xx graphics cards.
For our benchmarks, we opted for “high” graphics quality, “medium” Ray Tracing and ” balanced ” DLSS/FSR.
This is the most demanding game, where our cards have great difficulty keeping up. Here, an average of 57.3 FPS is achieved. DLSS 3, which we mentioned at the start of this page, offers a very significant gain, as you can see from our graph. DLSS2 gives the RTX 3070 a 67% gain, while DLSS3 gives our RTX 460 Ti a 156% gain!
Hitman 3:
Hitman 3 now supports DLSS, FSR and XeSS technology. Depending on the model of card tested, we opt for one of these three technologies.
For our benchmarks, we opted for “high” graphics quality, ” enabled ” Ray Tracing and ” balanced ” DLSS/Xess.
We found a situation already familiar from our RTX 4060 Ti at the level of the RTX 3070. Although it supports DLSS 3, we were unable to judge a greater discrepancy when using our RTX 4060 Ti, since the DLSS3 option remains grayed out, even though our game is perfectly up to date. Let’s find out what’s causing the problem.
Forza Horizon 5:
The latest game to be added to our panel, as it is now compatible with DLSS 3 technology. For our benchmarks, we opted for ” extreme ” graphics quality, ” extreme ” Ray Tracing and ” balanced ” DLSS/Xess.
This new game, which also supports DLSS 3, clearly shows its potential. With Ray Tracing enabled, our RTX 4060 Ti takes second place, but with DLSS 3 active, the clear advantage goes to our sample of the day, with a gain of 24% versus 6.7% for the RTX 3070.
So Ray Tracing with the MSI RTX 4060 Ti Gaming X Trio 8G :
In our seven games tested, our MSI RTX 4060 Ti Gaming X Trio 8G had no problems whatsoever, and apart from Cyberpunk 2077, the average was always over 60 FPS. The good news is that when we use Ray Tracing, the RTX 4060 Ti often performs as well as the RTX 3070. We were also able to judge the undeniable benefits of DLSS3. Once the hardware launches have calmed down a little, we’ll be back with more details on DLSS3, including comparative videos and photos.
