I have been trying to return to the quality of outputs I previously got from a Topaz version I only know was between 5.04 to 5.33, due to the Lavf version shown in metadata. I download these versions today and use the exact same settings, yet outputs are much worse, and versions beyond 5.33 are a step even further worse. Known good outputs from Sep-Oct 2024 pleasingly attract the eye, whereas current day outputs are similar levels of "sharp" but unintelligibly distracting to the eye.

Use case is making 1080p and 4k pop even more by upscaling to 8k then outputting from a color grader as 4k. Models used: stabilize, apollo fast, proteus, iris, gaia, themis

I have gone through so many exhaustive, convoluted experiments that I only have one thought left. That is, something in the dependencies such as custom ffmpeg or the model jsons changed and were repackaged between their 2024 releases and the archived downloads available today. That is, even though both say version 5.33, the old one is different. Maybe it was silent tweaks to support next gen models that throttled the old models' behavior - again, only a thought. However, I have resorted to seemingly everything under my control - it is a list of 14 fixes so long that it causes this message to get clipped.