Question / Help Does the video card affect x264 CPU encoding?

[Beast96GT]

I read on a guide somewhere that OBS will offload some of the work onto the video card. Obviously this is the case when using NVENC or similar, but does it make a difference on a streaming PC that's encoding x264?

My streaming PC uses a Core i7-4790k, but I use the built-in Intel graphics to hook up a monitor. Would adding a separate graphics card, say a GTX 1050 or 1060 take some of the load off the CPU? Thanks.

-Chris

 

[Beast96GT]

Bump.

 

[Joe33345]

Yes. For Rendering the preview window in OBS Studio and having a stable framerate when streaming. 720p at 60fps is hard to sustain even with an onboard graphics card.

 

[Beast96GT]

Yes. For Rendering the preview window in OBS Studio and having a stable framerate when streaming. 720p at 60fps is hard to sustain even with an onboard graphics card.

Thank you for the response! Since this is my streaming PC that's just previewing and transcoding, could I get away with adding something like a GTX 1050 or 1050TI to help lighten the load on the CPU?

 

[Joe33345]

It wouldn't lighten the encoding process if you're using x264 since that's all CPU, but it would help with the rendering of the preview window to be as smooth as possible without any rendering lag. :-)

EDIT: It would also make recording using NVENC a lot easier with the 1050 or 1050 Ti. Since they have the newest nvenc encoders. :-)