Question / Help Does the GPU on the 2nd PC increase encoding quality?

[Palgrave]

I went through the sticky and searched for what I could but everything seems to center around the GPU on the gaming PC but not on the a streaming PC.

So I started streaming (Yay!) on my gaming computer, amd 8 core + 970gpu but as soon as I got an elgato hd 60 for my Dslr my fps dropped. Research here lead me to diagnose my CPU wasn't up to the task so I picked up another i7 950 and added an elgato HD 60 pro. The i7 can do the job at 30 fps but at 1080p60 I need to turn down the quality in the for each elgato. I ordered a gt710 for the i7 so I could offload some of the encoding but I don't know if I am barking up the wrong tree?

p.s. what happened to rich's log analyzer? I went through Dodgepong's sticky and tried to find the analyzer but I cannot find it anywhere.

 

[Fenrir]

The analyzer only ever worked for Classic, and since Classic has been deprecated it's no longer available.

Going off the log you provided, we see this:

5:53:05 PM.674: Output 'adv_stream': Number of lagged frames due to rendering lag/stalls: 41 (0.0%)

Normally, that wouldn't be enough to mention, but lagged frames are an indication of GPU overload. It's definitely possible that the older GPU you have in your system is not up to the task of running 1080p60fps. OBS does use GPU to composite the scenes and output, so if you have a decently complex scene, it's not a stretch that it can quickly overload a old, weaker GPU.

 

[Palgrave]

Thank you so much Fenrir! I am hoping with a better gpu it will give me the quality I desire and allow me to run extras such as web and a custom chatbot i am working on.

 

[Boildown]

Generally speaking you need a GPU that retailed for at least US$100 (when new) for OBS.

Your log shows a GTX 465 which looks like it should be fine but I can't say I've seen anyone post a log with a 400 series GTX before. I do know that the GTX 200 series has serious problems with OBS so maybe that carries over to the 400 series as well. Not sure on that. I've ran a GTX 560 in the past and that worked great, so I'm a bit surprised the GTX 465 isn't working well. If possible I would beg borrow or steal a modern GPU to test with for a day to make sure you don't have some other problem.

If you decide to get a new GPU, I wouldn't go for a GT 710, it won't be strong enough (I've tried a GT 630 and it stunk). I would go for something like a GTX 1050. If you can get it cheaper, a GTX 750 or 750Ti will be great as well.

 

[Palgrave]

Generally speaking you need a GPU that retailed for at least US$100 (when new) for OBS.

Your log shows a GTX 465 which looks like it should be fine but I can't say I've seen anyone post a log with a 400 series GTX before. I do know that the GTX 200 series has serious problems with OBS so maybe that carries over to the 400 series as well. Not sure on that. I've ran a GTX 560 in the past and that worked great, so I'm a bit surprised the GTX 465 isn't working well. If possible I would beg borrow or steal a modern GPU to test with for a day to make sure you don't have some other problem.

If you decide to get a new GPU, I wouldn't go for a GT 710, it won't be strong enough (I've tried a GT 630 and it stunk). I would go for something like a GTX 1050. If you can get it cheaper, a GTX 750 or 750Ti will be great as well.

I should have said a used GPU, after dropping so much for an i7 (used) + 2 elgatos I dont want to spend a couple hundred on a 1050. I really just want to offload some encoding to the GPU since the CPU isnt really cutting it.

I do have a new question that may be related, i picked up a gt710 off ebay, installed it but after the driver installation it doesn't come up in the video adapter under the the advanced settings. I was sure to pick up a card using the kepler chipset to make use of nvenc, does it matter if I am running DX11 or does it have to be 12?

*EDIT* attached latest log

 

[Fenrir]

The video adapter dropdown in advanced settings has never worked in OBS Studio, it's a placeholder right now. It has no impact on the ability to use NVENC or not.

The video options in advanced are used for the scene composition, and should largely be left alone unless you know exactly why you need to change them.

 

[Boildown]

I don't expect the GT 710 to work for you at all, as I previously posted. You need something better.

~ $100 is what you'd need for something (new), not $200:

https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814137058
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127870
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127783
https://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127981

I'd go with the 1050 since its NVEnc chip is better than the others. And all the others are Maxwell chips which are in turn better than the one on the Kepler series. If you want to "offload to the GPU", a Kepler-based chip is particularly poor when Maxwell and later is available.

Regardless of offloading to the GPU, a GT710 isn't fast enough to run OBS in general, CPU or GPU. It just won't work, get rid of it.

 

[Palgrave]

Actually the GT710 works great! The lag problem was on my end cause I was trying to watch the stream on the stream PC at the same time it was encoding/streaming. I totally forgot about the resources needed to decode the stream from YouTube. I am starting to wonder if I even needed a new GPU but I am happy the CPU load went from 60%+ down to 16%.