AMD FSR Redstone Update Is Finally Released earlier this week—the red carpet was rolled out—and it arrived with four separate pieces of technology.
Well, what I'm saying is that these four features have arrived, but they aren't – or rather, one of them hasn't arrived yet, and seems a long way off – plus one of them is actually already here, and isn't new at all.
- FSR Scaling
- Generation of FSR frames
- FSR Beam Regeneration
- FSR radiance caching
If you thought AMD already had frame generation in FSR, you don't understand what FSR frame generation is, or if you thought FSR 4 provides scaling, you are scratching your head about what is FSR upscaling – is it FSR 4, FSR 4.1 or a completely new version? – then I completely understand where you’re coming from.
AMD hasn't done a very good job of clearing up some of these issues, so I'm going to chime in and give my opinion. I'm going to look at these four features one by one and determine what they actually are and whether they've actually arrived or are still waiting in the wings (cough, radiance caching, cough).
FSR Scaling
For the uninitiated, upscaling takes a lower-resolution frame and scales it to a higher resolution, delivering near-original quality while running faster and smoother. How AMD officially announces thisthe FSR Upscaling feature “was previously called AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution 4”, otherwise known as FSR 4.
This used to be FSR 4, but is now called FSR Upscaling and has removed the numbering scheme. It's confusing because we're all used to numbers at this point and AMD hasn't made it clear that there's no difference between FSR 4 and the new version.
However, further down in the blurb, AMD says, “FSR 4 has been renamed FSR Upscaling to better differentiate the various features that now make up FSR Redstone.”
So FSR Upscaling is FSR 4, and that's why the launch press slides compare FSR Upscaling to FSR 3.1 and not FSR 4 – because it's FSR 4 just renamed.
That's not to say that FSR Upscaling isn't a slightly tweaked version of FSR 4, but if there are any hidden changes, they're not worth mentioning (as you can be sure that if there was a selling point in this regard, AMD would have said something).
To summarize, FSR Upscaling is not a new technology; it's simply the existing FSR 4 from AMD, which is given a different naming convention for Redstone. And of course, it now works with all the games that FSR 4 was compatible with.
So, there’s not much to see here, let’s move on…
Generation of FSR frames
As I mentioned at the beginning, this might be confusing because FSR 4 already had frame generation (and indeed FSR 3 had it long before that).
The difference here is that Redstone's approach to frame generation is a significant step forward, as it uses artificial intelligence (machine learning) to achieve higher frame rates by inserting AI-generated frames between real-life frames. AMD's previous approaches to frame generation did not use artificial intelligence.
So, this is a significant difference, and it has a big impact on image quality when generating frames, at least according to early testing. So Redstone's FSR Frame Generation looks like a winner and catches up to DLSS 4, although what it doesn't offer is Multi-frame generation, what Nvidia GeForce video cards benefit from (at least the RTX 5000 models).
The problem with Redstone and the move to AI for frame generation is that it requires hardware acceleration, making it exclusive to RDNA 4 graphics cards. This is also true for FSR 4, which was already based on machine learning, as well as two other technologies we'll look at next.
How PC gamer notes that in order to distinguish between the old generation of Frames (without AI) and the new version of Redstone based on AI, AMD has two names. These are FSR frame generation (analytical) and FSR frame generation (ML), the latter being an AI approach (which uses machine learning or ML). Sloppy? Yes, it's unlikely to be very convenient for less tech-savvy consumers.
AMD's FSR Frame Generation (ML) technology is already supported in about 30 games (up to 40 by the end of this year, AMD says).
FSR Beam Regeneration
This is a brand new addition to Redstone that allows you to use artificial intelligence to improve ray tracing results. It aims to remove noise and glitches and implement those fancy rays with less rendering overhead, so overall it's more efficient with RDNA 4 GPUs. It's essentially Nvidia's equivalent of Ray Reconstruction (possibly Intel it may eventually be possible to implement a technology called Ray Revitalization for Arc GPUs).
I say FSR Ray regen is new, but that's not entirely true since, oddly enough, it was already out long before AMD released Redstone this week. In fact, this feature came along with Call of Duty: Black Ops 7 a month ago, though only in certain modes.
It seems to work quite well in this limited version, again based on initial tests, but the beam regeneration only partially works. Call of Duty game right now.
FSR radiance caching
This is another new AI-powered technology, and this time it aims to provide better lighting and performance in a way similar to Nvidia's RTX Neural Radiance Cache feature. However, FSR Radiance Caching is the odd one out here, as this particular innovation isn't in any games at all right now – and probably won't be for quite some time.
At the Redstone presentation, AMD demonstrated Radiance caching with Warhammer 40K Darktidewhich has led gamers to speculate that this game will be the first game to introduce new and unusual lighting innovations, but apparently this is not the case.
According to Wccftech reportWarhammer game developer Fatshark has stated that the technology is still “experimental” and has no plans for use. In the Dark Tide live assembly. Apparently Radiance Caching still needs development and optimization, so it's unclear when it might eventually arrive. Dark Tide – but it doesn't look like that's going to happen anytime soon.
Indeed, we don't know when this fourth piece of the Redstone puzzle will appear in any game, and it could be quite a long wait before we see it in action. All we know is that this technology will debut sometime in 2026, AMD promises.
Redstone's real pain point
Overall, this looked like a pretty haphazard Redstone rollout, and I believe AMD has this launch and associated messaging around its neck. The coverage of all these different elements feels disjointed and some of the names are confusing.
But does it really matter? Well, maybe I'm making a song and dance about it, and of course the real point of Redstone is how well all this technology works, not how it's packaged. And in this regard, the first signs are encouraging, and this is the most important thing.
The biggest pain point for gamers, however, won't be the confusion around names or what each technology does or was called – it will be the RDNA 4-only barrier to entry that prevents previous-generation Radeon graphics cards from taking advantage of Redstone. This will hurt many RDNA 3 owners, especially if they shell out for flagship RX 7900 XTX at a wallet-shattering price.
The best video cards for any budget
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