Question When using custom resolutions does the ratio between the native and custom resolution matter?

[thilias]

I'm a PC gamer who despises aliasing, but many of the games I play do not have adequate antialiasing settings. If it is too bad I usually use a custom resolution of 3840x2160 through the Nvidia control panel, which makes things much more bearable (been doing this with FFXIV recently). I do have an RTX 2080 so it can handle the extra load.

I sometimes play on my TV (3840x2160 native), or on one of my desktop monitors (1920x1080 or 2560x1440). I was wondering if the ratio between the custom resolution and the native resolution should logically make a visual difference. I started wondering this when I noticed that my 1080p monitor almost looked better than my 1440p monitor while running at a 2160p custom resolution (maybe i'm wrong). I didn't know if that was because 2160p was double 1080p, but 1.5x 1440p. I thought maybe the increase being an even whole number (2x the resolution of my 1080p display) rather than a fraction (1.5x the resolution of my 1440p monitor) somehow made it more visually appealing ? Am i making this up in my head, or do you think that ratio between native and custom resolution matters?

 

[Kurtisdede]

You are not making it up. That's correct(Although I am not %100 sure on this).

 

[laviniuc]

think about it, when running a 4k on 1080 the display shows exactly 4 pixels for every one. so a 4k display forced on 1080 will look exactly like a 1080 display. same when upscaled.

it's the same on 720p versus 1440p. when however you get 4k to 1440p or 1440p to 1080 you get "half pixels" it will look blurry.

 

[Glenwing]

think about it, when running a 4k on 1080 the display shows exactly 4 pixels for every one. so a 4k display forced on 1080 will look exactly like a 1080 display. same when upscaled.

it's the same on 720p versus 1440p. when however you get 4k to 1440p or 1440p to 1080 you get "half pixels" it will look blurry.

This is a theoretical possibility only, on actual displays scaling is not implemented that way, 1080p on a 4K display will still be blurry. Do some testing

OP is talking about downscaling higher resolutions on a lower resolution display anyway.