| Backend |
About |
| Waifu2x Caffe |
Waifu2x Caffe does great with Anime and Manga style images. Both the Image output quality and the Alpha quality are top-notch, on the appropriate image type. |
| Waifu2x Vulkan |
Waifu2x Vulkan approaches the quality of Caffe, while slashing the computational and memory requirements. The image quality is good, but the Alpha handling can be a little fuzzy around the edges (can be defringed to great effect.) |
| RealSR Vulkan |
RealSR's image output is great for more realistic images. The Alpha can be a little dark around the edges, but the detail produced on images is fantastic. |
| SRMD Vulkan |
SRMD excels at upscaling poor-quality material. Great for reworking a bad upscale, and also good for upscaling realistic images. |
| Waifu2x CPP |
Waifu2x CPP's output is visually close to Caffe's (if, a little muddier), but is quite fast with low requirements. It does poorly on images with Alpha (but the results are acceptable with defringing turned on and calibrated). |
| Anime4K CPP |
Anime4K CPP is the fastest of the supported backends. It has a high range of input settings, and is intended for Anime or Manga style images. Visual quality has quite a bit of variance, but can look quite good once the settings are dialed in. |
Images for comparison. The source is not mine, and these images exist purely for edification.
| Source |
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| Caffe 4x |
Waifu2x Vulkan 4x |
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| Waifu2x CPP 4x |
Anime4K 4x |
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| RealSR 4x |
SRMD 4x |
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| ESRGAN (4xBox) |
ESRGAN (4x_FireAlpha) |
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