I am in desperate need of help. If anyone is able to help me get this working without having to upgrade any hardware and preferably within 24 hours, I will gladly pay $10 through PayPal or other reliable source. The problem is when I stream or even just preview scenes, it runs fine for a maybe a minute and then the computer starts freezing and OBS gives a "Warning high CPU usage try lowering encoding settings" message. Then, shortly after that, the audio and video starts skipping and I really don't want that to happen at all... A steady stream is absolutely vital; especially because I am playing paid commercials in mp3 format and that would be bad for business.
Unfortunately, I didn't think to save any log files and I'm not currently at the computer's location to get one, but if someone absolutely needs one, I can drive over there. Also, I don’t have the internet speed figures at the moment, but considering the location is an office building with other businesses, I’m sure that this is not an issue.
I started with OBS Studio 64bit, but now I use the latest OBS Classic 64bit (because Simple Scene Switcher is saving me a LOT of work).
A note about my experience with OBS Studio on my first stream: Although the preview was perfectly fine in all aspects and the computer wasn’t running slowly, the final resulting video had a frame rate that made it virtually unusable (captured MAYBE 10 seconds of motion from an entire HOUR of recording). What’s weird though is the audio was smooth and perfect..
Spread across 7 scenes, the stream basically consists of:
*These mp4 files are the only video source in their individual scenes and I’ve already tried re-rendering all of these videos from their original format and are all now at 1280x720 resolution and the largest one is 46 MB, but the others are around 10MB…
I have looked up numerous tutorials and done a lot of reading and these are the current settings I’ve tried multiple adjustments for...I've linked screenshots of my settings if it’s easier for anyone or in case I’ve left something out below:
Use CBR: Checked
Enable CBR Padding: Checked
Use Custom Buffer Size: Checked
Max Bitrate: 250kb/s (I know this is ridiculously low, but I still have high CPU usage here. I started with 2500 default and went down.)
Buffer Size: 250kb (As suggested in OBS, I’ve just kept this matched with Max Bitrate)
Audio Codec: MP3
Bitrate: 112
Format: 44.1kHz Stereo
Stream is saved to a local mp4 file and replay buffer is 1 second (I don’t need a replay buffer).
Video Base Resolution: 1280x720 (monitor resolution is 1280x768 if this matters… but I’m not using a screen capture so I don’t see why it would…but I think I want to stick with 16:9 aspect ratio)
Resolution Downscale: 1.25 (1024x576) Bilinear (also tried No downscale)
FPS: 29 (I believe I also tried 24)
Use Multi-threaded Optimizations: Checked
Process Priority Class: Above Normal (also tried High and Realtime)
Scene Buffering Time: 700 milliseconds (also tried 900, but audio seemed way too out of sync)
X264 Preset: superfast (also tried ultrafast)
Encoding Profile: main (I don’t know what this setting does, but I saw somewhere to use main instead of high)
Keyframe Interval: 0 (I know 2 or 4 is ideal and optimized for better quality streaming…but again, the CPU is already bogged down).
Use CFR: Unchecked
System Specs:
Dell Precision T3400
Intel duo core E8200 2.6GHz
4GB RAM
Windows 8 64 bit
NVIDIA Quadro NVS 290
I know that the hardware isn’t good for quick high quality and I do have some spare parts around that I may be able to upgrade the CPU, RAM, or graphics card with but this would be an absolute last resort because it’s a company computer and I would probably need to ask permission before changing out hardware.
If I’m just overlooking something in the settings, please let me know…I am at a loss of what to do. If upgrading the hardware is my only option, my next question would be what would be the best for cost and most likely to work: a better graphics card, a better processor, or adding more RAM?
Unfortunately, I didn't think to save any log files and I'm not currently at the computer's location to get one, but if someone absolutely needs one, I can drive over there. Also, I don’t have the internet speed figures at the moment, but considering the location is an office building with other businesses, I’m sure that this is not an issue.
I started with OBS Studio 64bit, but now I use the latest OBS Classic 64bit (because Simple Scene Switcher is saving me a LOT of work).
A note about my experience with OBS Studio on my first stream: Although the preview was perfectly fine in all aspects and the computer wasn’t running slowly, the final resulting video had a frame rate that made it virtually unusable (captured MAYBE 10 seconds of motion from an entire HOUR of recording). What’s weird though is the audio was smooth and perfect..
Spread across 7 scenes, the stream basically consists of:
- 2 Webcams (both are typically displayed at once, one is full-size while the other is maybe 10% of original size and placed in the top corner)
- Chat window using the browser plugin
- 3 png images +1 GIF
- 5 mp4 files*
*These mp4 files are the only video source in their individual scenes and I’ve already tried re-rendering all of these videos from their original format and are all now at 1280x720 resolution and the largest one is 46 MB, but the others are around 10MB…
I have looked up numerous tutorials and done a lot of reading and these are the current settings I’ve tried multiple adjustments for...I've linked screenshots of my settings if it’s easier for anyone or in case I’ve left something out below:
Use CBR: Checked
Enable CBR Padding: Checked
Use Custom Buffer Size: Checked
Max Bitrate: 250kb/s (I know this is ridiculously low, but I still have high CPU usage here. I started with 2500 default and went down.)
Buffer Size: 250kb (As suggested in OBS, I’ve just kept this matched with Max Bitrate)
Audio Codec: MP3
Bitrate: 112
Format: 44.1kHz Stereo
Stream is saved to a local mp4 file and replay buffer is 1 second (I don’t need a replay buffer).
Video Base Resolution: 1280x720 (monitor resolution is 1280x768 if this matters… but I’m not using a screen capture so I don’t see why it would…but I think I want to stick with 16:9 aspect ratio)
Resolution Downscale: 1.25 (1024x576) Bilinear (also tried No downscale)
FPS: 29 (I believe I also tried 24)
Use Multi-threaded Optimizations: Checked
Process Priority Class: Above Normal (also tried High and Realtime)
Scene Buffering Time: 700 milliseconds (also tried 900, but audio seemed way too out of sync)
X264 Preset: superfast (also tried ultrafast)
Encoding Profile: main (I don’t know what this setting does, but I saw somewhere to use main instead of high)
Keyframe Interval: 0 (I know 2 or 4 is ideal and optimized for better quality streaming…but again, the CPU is already bogged down).
Use CFR: Unchecked
System Specs:
Dell Precision T3400
Intel duo core E8200 2.6GHz
4GB RAM
Windows 8 64 bit
NVIDIA Quadro NVS 290
I know that the hardware isn’t good for quick high quality and I do have some spare parts around that I may be able to upgrade the CPU, RAM, or graphics card with but this would be an absolute last resort because it’s a company computer and I would probably need to ask permission before changing out hardware.
If I’m just overlooking something in the settings, please let me know…I am at a loss of what to do. If upgrading the hardware is my only option, my next question would be what would be the best for cost and most likely to work: a better graphics card, a better processor, or adding more RAM?
