What exactly is "upscaling"?

[Deftones]

In Battlefield 4 there's resolution scale option at which 200% is maximum with 100% being the default value. I slided it up to 200% (max) and the game looked so damn sharp on my 24 inch LG 1080p IPS monitor it nearly popped my eyes. So my question is, is it what 4k looks like? (I mean, if I had a 4k monitor and used 3840x2160 with 100% res (default) scale, would it look like 1080p with 200% res scale?)

 

[juretrn]

It renders the game in higher resolution and then makes it fit on your screen, in layman's terms.

[Techicolors]

renders the game at a higher resolution than what your monitor is capable of. something like nvidia's DSR is a form of upscaling 

[Marvzl1357]

In Battlefield 4 there's resolution scale option at which 200% is maximum with 100% being the default value. I slided it up to 200% (max) and the game looked so damn sharp on my 24 inch LG 1080p IPS monitor it nearly popped my eyes. So my question is, is it what 4k looks like? (I mean, if I had a 4k monitor and used 3840x2160 with 100% res (default) scale, would it look like 1080p with 200% res scale?)

 

This is the exact opposite of upscaling, this is downscaling. It renders the image at 200% original res then drops it back down to 100%. Upscaling would be something like displaying 1080p content on a 4k screen (100% -> 200%).

Nope ignore that, others are right. 

Edit 2: Wiki is definitely wrong about downscaling, it says that rendering 720p on a 1080p is called downscaling

Unfortunately I don't think this is what 4k looks like, simply because the pixels aren't there (obviously), but is probably more like a taste of what 4k will look like.

[Deftones]

This is the exact opposite of upscaling, this is downscaling. It renders the image at 200% original res then drops it back down to 100%. Upscaling would be something like displaying 1080p content on a 4k screen (100% -> 200%). Unfortunately I don't think this is what 4k looks like, simply because the pixels aren't there (obviously), but is probably more like a taste of what 4k will look like.

 

Thanks, dude. I was confused about this up/downscaling thing.

[SPAS-ID]

it means Free Upgrade

[ZetZet]

[ZetZet]

Its only really upscaling when you render at a resolution lower than whats native to the display, then stretching it to fit the whole screen. Consoles tend to do this as they can't produce a good enough framerate at 1080p. The result is blurry images if you look close enough.

no, stretching is NOT upscaling. It's just stretching. Upscaling predicts pixels that should be there and puts them there, it approximates the positions. Refer to the picture I have above.