I’ve always used a combination of CMAA and MSAA for WoW. It looks like they added CMAA 2, of course with no explanation. Is this an improvement or what?
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Can we get some clarity on this? Everything looks a little fuzzier than it used to and these new options aren’t explained anywhere.
I’m very confused by this as well
It’s just fancy named settings that don’t actually do anything but drop your fps.
It’s actually just the 2nd CMAA.
It’s an update to CMAA; it supposedly provides better anti-alaising quality and performance than CMAA.
We describe updates to the original conservative morphological anti-aliasing (CMAA) algorithm including a new DirectX* Compute Shader implementation that we call CMAA2. This version provides additional performance, improved quality, optional integration with multi-sample anti-aliasing (MSAA), and the ability to be leveraged asynchronously on graphics processing units (GPUs) that support this capability.
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If I want the absolute best AA quality with no regard for performance; what are the ideal settings now?
Anti-Aliasing > Advanced
Image-Based Techniques > CMAA 2
Multisample Techniques > Color 8x / Depth 8x
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Hmm enabling CMAA 2 caused my computer to freeze. Guess it isn’t for me.
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I think CMAA is a form of post-processing anti-aliasing, which tries to get rid of jaggies with a minimal impact on performance, but it doesn’t look as good as MSAA which is the more standard and traditional form of AA (although you can use a mix of both if you want)
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Is there a big difference between Multisample Techniques > Color 8x / Depth 8x and 2x? Nvidia recommends me to run everything at ultra high but multi sampling at only 2x. It seems to tank my fps a good deal when I put it to 8x despite playing on a 3060ti.
MSAA is very computationally intensive. It’s barely better than just turning up the render scale. If it runs slow at 8x, turn it down 
MSAA is very computationally intensive
MSAAx8 is, MSAAx2 & MSAAx4 are not. This is especially true when compared to Render Scale (SSAA), which is the most costly.
CMAA2 is an option included with Dragonflight. As the number implies it is a new version of CMAA.
CMAA is a post-process effect while MSAA is not. Post-processing effects apply to previous frames, which means if you look close enough jaggies on edges are visible while in motion. MSAA does not.
I prefer MSAAx4. I also input ‘/console set ResampleAlwaysSharpen 1’ (0 value disables it) in-game for the FSR Sharpener. FSR on its own is entirely awful and should never be used. You can adjust the Resample Sharpness to your liking.
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