AMD Hardware Encoder(s) [Deleted]

[everyth1ng]

I'm on 1.4.1.5, and I'm happy to report that bitrate is staying on target now with frame skipping enabled. However, I seem to be getting green artifacting again. What should I be setting my VBV Buffer Size to? Should I be entering a value there in kbps like I do with Target Bitrate? This is for streaming, btw: CBR, 2500 kbps bitrate, 60 FPS.

 

[Xaymar]

I'm on 1.4.1.5, and I'm happy to report that bitrate is staying on target now with frame skipping enabled. However, I seem to be getting green artifacting again. What should I be setting my VBV Buffer Size to? Should I be entering a value there in kbps like I do with Target Bitrate? This is for streaming, btw: CBR, 2500 kbps bitrate, 60 FPS.

Ideally you'd use strictness, but the size is in kbps, yes.

 

[everyth1ng]

Ideally you'd use strictness, but the size is in kbps, yes.

Actually, my bad. I just remembered that you included descriptions in the plugin. So bitrate divided by frame rate is 100% strictness? I'll try that.

 

[Xaymar]

Actually, my bad. I just remembered that you included descriptions in the plugin. So bitrate divided by frame rate is 100% strictness? I'll try that.

You'll massively undershoot the target bitrate with a VBV Buffer Size that low. A better value is Bitrate/(FrameRate/4)

Edit: Why are you modifying the VBV Buffer Size anyway?

 

[everyth1ng]

Edit: Why are you modifying the VBV Buffer Size anyway?

Because I'm still getting massive dropped frames and very large bitrate spikes if I leave VBV on automatic.

 

[Xaymar]

Because I'm still getting massive dropped frames and very large bitrate spikes if I leave VBV on automatic.

Enable Frame Skipping. VBV Buffer has not much to do with bitrate spikes, that happens when it can't compress a frame more (QP at 51).

 

[everyth1ng]

Enable Frame Skipping. VBV Buffer has not much to do with bitrate spikes, that happens when it can't compress a frame more (QP at 51).

Yeah, I had frame skipping enabled. Frame skipping, VBV automatic, I get dropped frames and very large bitrate spikes.

Edit: Yeah, it looks like with frame skipping enabled, the only way I do not get dropped frames and large bitrate spikes is when I set VBV to a value that matches or exceeds my target bitrate. However, if I have VBV at a value that matches or exceeds my target bitrate, I get artifacting (at what appears to be only the beginning of the stream - for about a minute).

I don't have time now, but I'll make a log in a few hours and edit this post again.

 

[Tivan]

Is it just me or does this plugin tak e at least twice the filesize when going for constant quality (22/22/22, 1080p60fps, gcn1.1, quality preset balanced) and using OBS 0.16.5 instead of 0.16.2?

Why would changing OBS version affect this? Also seems to take a reinstall of the plugin to actually get it to work with constant quality, at least when upgrading.

edit: it might have something to do with default settings, since when downgrading, it seems to take more bitrate as well.

edit: actually can't recreate this right now, very strange. On the bright side, when the bitrate is acceptably low with the plugin (which I can't seem to recreate now), it's in line with the now discontinued (media foundation) thing.

edit: after looking through a log of a good and a bad outcome, it seems like it disabled cabac on the bad one but had it on on the good one.
Logs:
has the good session (2016-11-16_23-39-44): https://gist.github.com/anonymous/515c9b6aad3a0b5639dc96f558f81f5f
has the bad session (2016-11-16_23-37-25, third of the bunch): https://gist.github.com/anonymous/dd220f0ceaa12b6ba4cd2d437939d34c

same content recorded.

edit: just turning on cabac manually is already a big help, though still not as good as the one time when it randomly was doing really well on the encode.

edit: oh I was running a different version of the plugin as well there, it seems. Either way, quite curious that the default settings would be acting up in this manner.

edit: going for IDR period 120, B picture pattern 0, B picture reference disabled (and cabac on) leaves me content with the size. Not sure what exactly did the trick there just yet but sure is odd to see such a big filesize difference. GCN 1.1 things I guess.

edit: doesn't seem to be IDR period.

edit: having B picture reference on is fine, but picture pattern 2 and 3 make bitrate significantly worse. pattern 0 is fine.

tl;dr: cabac disabled rather than enabled, and B picture pattern 3 rather than 0, double bitrate usage for gcn 1.1 (at least on the Path of Exile login screen. Rather noisy scene with the rain, but nothing unpredictable going on). and for some reason I wasn't getting cabac enabled or the 0 B picture pattern by default, more often than not. Just one time randomly.

edit: actually cabac seems fine either way! midnight not the best time to troubleshoot. Still a massive increase in bitrate from B-picture pattern 0 to 3. Maybe closer to 50% than double though.

 

[RytoEX]

Please keep in mind that different versions of this plugin are bundled with different versions of OBS. OBS Studio 0.16.2 was bundled with AMD AMF encoder plugin 1.3.1.0. OBS Studio 0.16.5 was bundled with AMD AMF encoder plugin 1.4.1.0.

Your "good" session shows OBS Studio 0.16.2 and AMD AMF encoder plugin version 1.3.1.0, while your "bad" session shows OBS Studio 0.16.5 and AMD AMF encoder plugin version 1.4.1.5. So you're not really comparing two OBS Studio versions directly with no other changes.

 

[Xaymar]

Xaymar updated AMD Advanced Media Framework Encoder Plugin for OBS Studio with a new update entry:

1.4.2.0 - Multi-GPU Support And Filler Data Fix

With this update the encoder plugin now supports multi-GPU setups, such as RX 480 + R9 390, R9 285 + R9 290, and others. You can select which GPU to use with the Advanced View Mode. The UI will also now update according to the supported features of the selected GPU and by default uses the primary GPU. Unsupported features will be hidden, just like unused features.

The 'Filler Data' property has now been fixed, Delta QP for B-Pictures is now visible when not using Constant QP, 'Memory Type'...

Read the rest of this update entry...

 

[Xaymar]

Is it just me or does this plugin tak e at least twice the filesize when going for constant quality (22/22/22, 1080p60fps, gcn1.1, quality preset balanced) and using OBS 0.16.5 instead of 0.16.2?

Why would changing OBS version affect this? Also seems to take a reinstall of the plugin to actually get it to work with constant quality, at least when upgrading.

edit: it might have something to do with default settings, since when downgrading, it seems to take more bitrate as well.

edit: actually can't recreate this right now, very strange. On the bright side, when the bitrate is acceptably low with the plugin (which I can't seem to recreate now), it's in line with the now discontinued (media foundation) thing.

edit: after looking through a log of a good and a bad outcome, it seems like it disabled cabac on the bad one but had it on on the good one.
Logs:
has the good session (2016-11-16_23-39-44): https://gist.github.com/anonymous/515c9b6aad3a0b5639dc96f558f81f5f
has the bad session (2016-11-16_23-37-25, third of the bunch): https://gist.github.com/anonymous/dd220f0ceaa12b6ba4cd2d437939d34c

same content recorded.

edit: just turning on cabac manually is already a big help, though still not as good as the one time when it randomly was doing really well on the encode.

edit: oh I was running a different version of the plugin as well there, it seems. Either way, quite curious that the default settings would be acting up in this manner.

edit: going for IDR period 120, B picture pattern 0, B picture reference disabled (and cabac on) leaves me content with the size. Not sure what exactly did the trick there just yet but sure is odd to see such a big filesize difference. GCN 1.1 things I guess.

edit: doesn't seem to be IDR period.

edit: having B picture reference on is fine, but picture pattern 2 and 3 make bitrate significantly worse. pattern 0 is fine.

tl;dr: cabac disabled rather than enabled, and B picture pattern 3 rather than 0, double bitrate usage for gcn 1.1 (at least on the Path of Exile login screen. Rather noisy scene with the rain, but nothing unpredictable going on). and for some reason I wasn't getting cabac enabled or the 0 B picture pattern by default, more often than not. Just one time randomly.

edit: actually cabac seems fine either way! midnight not the best time to troubleshoot. Still a massive increase in bitrate from B-picture pattern 0 to 3.

The default settings between 1.3.* and 1.4.* are different. If you want to compare OBS Versions, always install the latest plugin. @RytoEX was faster than me here.

Internally there are no large differences between 1.3 and 1.4, 1.3 just did things the wrong way which caused the encoder to restart multiple times. 1.4 does things correctly now, properly assigning dynamic and static properties when they should be assigned without causing an encoder restart.

 

[Tivan]

Thanks for the replies. Either way, I'd encourage to make B-Picture Pattern default to 0, at least for Second generation GCN, given the major bitrate hit the other patterns cause.

Right now, interestingly enough, only 'Lossless' and 'reset to default' change the B-Picture Pattern (lossless to 0, default to 3). This seems to have been the cause of me randomly getting the bitrate efficient setting once.

 

[Xaymar]

Thanks for the replies. Either way, I'd encourage to make B-Picture Pattern default to 0, at least for Second generation GCN, given the major bitrate hit the other patterns cause.

Right now, interestingly enough, only 'Lossless' and 'reset to default' change the B-Picture Pattern (lossless to 0, default to 3). This seems to have been the cause of me randomly getting the bitrate efficient setting once.

1. You are still on driver 16.10.1, which has broken B-Picture support on VCE2.
2. 1.4.2.0 changes the default of B-Pictures to 0 for better quality.
3. Lossless preset disables B-Pictures because they would be useless there. Can't get any benefit in quality or bitrate from them. All QP values are at 0, B-Pictures won't do much here.
4. Reset to Default literally resets things back to default.

Changing something just for one GCN generation makes no sense, especially because it was already fixed in the latest drivers.

 

[Tivan]

1. You are still on driver 16.10.1, which has broken B-Picture support on VCE2.
2. 1.4.2.0 changes the default of B-Pictures to 0 for better quality.
3. Lossless preset disables B-Pictures because they would be useless there. Can't get any benefit in quality or bitrate from them. All QP values are at 0, B-Pictures won't do much here.
4. Reset to Default literally resets things back to default.

Changing something just for one GCN generation makes no sense, especially because it was already fixed in the latest drivers.

Thanks for the heads up!

edit: strangely enough, I get tiny visual glitches for a small fraction of a second every now and then unless I disable b-frames on 1.4.1.5, and on 1.4.2.0 I get a crash when trying to go to settings. Going to experiment sometime with the quality preset on speed, and/or resolution settings to see if that fixes that.

edit: seems that that just about did the trick (and/or going for 2 rather than 3 B-picture pattern. is that number of consecutive b frames? that'd explain a lot.). The whole 'up to' disclaimer does make a lot of sense now.

 

[Xaymar]

edit: strangely enough, I get tiny visual glitches for a small fraction of a second every now and then unless I disable b-frames on 1.4.1.5, and on 1.4.2.0 I get a crash when trying to go to settings. Going to experiment sometime with the quality preset on speed, and/or resolution settings to see if that fixes that.

You got a crash when opening the settings page? That's odd. Do you have a crash log?

 

[Xaymar]

Xaymar updated AMD Advanced Media Framework Encoder Plugin for OBS Studio with a new update entry:

1.4.2.1 - Multi-GPU Support And Filler Data Fix (Hotfix 1)

With this update the encoder plugin now supports multi-GPU setups, such as RX 480 + R9 390, R9 285 + R9 290, and others. You can select which GPU to use with the Advanced View Mode. The UI will also now update according to the supported features of the selected GPU and by default uses the primary GPU. Unsupported features will be hidden, just like unused features.

The 'Filler Data' property has now been fixed, Delta QP for B-Pictures is now visible when not using Constant QP, 'Memory Type'...

Read the rest of this update entry...

 

[R A F I D]

awesome ! @Xaymar do you think adding another 280x will help me get rid of the fps drop ? like let obs use one card and another one for the game..

 

[Xaymar]

awesome ! @Xaymar do you think adding another 280x will help me get rid of the fps drop ? like let obs use one card and another one for the game..

The answer to that question is no. Your system is not equipped to handle two high performance applications at once. Upgrade the CPU, RAM and Motherboard.

 

[Xaymar]

Xaymar updated AMD Advanced Media Framework Encoder Plugin for OBS Studio with a new update entry:

1.4.2.2 - Multi-GPU Support And Filler Data Fix (Hotfix 2)

With this update the encoder plugin now supports multi-GPU setups, such as RX 480 + R9 390, R9 285 + R9 290, and others. You can select which GPU to use with the Advanced View Mode. The UI will also now update according to the supported features of the selected GPU and by default uses the primary GPU. Unsupported features will be hidden, just like unused features.

The 'Filler Data' property has now been fixed, Delta QP for B-Pictures is now visible when not using Constant QP, 'Memory Type'...

Read the rest of this update entry...

 

[ELIMIN883R]

I ran the test above, and am curious as to why I take such a hit on the higher quality. My txt file is attached.