Feature Request: Low Res Monitor Capture

[FartyGuy101]

Hi, I am wondering if an option can be added to the "Monitor Capture" source called "Low Res Capture" or "Capture at half res" or "Capture at Quarter Res".. or all of the above. :-)

The reason is because, I would like to capture my secondary monitor, but resize it into a little square and position it in the bottom right corner of the scene, without a huge performance hit.

I have determined that scaling the "monitor capture" scene, does not improve capture performance, which is actually quite strange. If you resize your scene, it should improve capture performance.

The reason this is a big deal to me is because I have an expensive capture card that I use to record my primary display at 60fps. Whenever I overlay my secondary monitor in the bottom right corner, it reduces my overall framerate to like 20-30 fps... and makes using my computer quite sluggish... and I'm sure we've all encountered that silly popup by windows stating that system performance is slow, and even when you tell Windows to ignore, it will change your desktop to Aero basic. I am not a fan of Aero basic, as it can cause issues with certain games and programs, and actually make your overall system performance WORSE in some cases, hence why I have a capture card.

I'm sure everything I just said there is immensely confusing. If not, congratulations.

Long story short, capture card is meant to improve performance, and using "monitor capture" for my secondary monitor negates all of the benefits of owning a capture card, which is why I would like OBS to support low res monitor capture, so that I can put a low res capture in the corner of my twitch stream, without a huge performance toll.

Thanks, :-)
-FartyGuy101

 

[Floatingthru]

Using Monitor Capture with Aero on in Windows 7 will always result in poor performance and there is no way to get around that. Also turning off Aero will not impact games as far as I can tell, but I haven't used Windows 7 in awhile. Using Windows 8 will let you leave Aero on as you can't really turn it off, and have awesome performance using Monitor Capture.

Even if there was a "Low Res" Monitor Capture leaving Aero on will still kill the performance under Windows 7. Also Capture Cards are slower than using Game Capture or Window Capture with Aero on in Windows 7. Of course Capture Cards will always just work while showing everything that is on your screen+fullscreen games which might be the reason why you got one in the first place.

 

[FartyGuy101]

Also Capture Cards are slower than using Game Capture or Window Capture with Aero on in Windows 7

Completely false. I honestly don't know how you can say that and believe it.

I capture my primary display at 60fps, and if I flip flop between "monitor capture" and "video capture device" in OBS, the difference in performance is extreme.

Again, if I flip flop between "game capture" and "video capture device", the difference is also big.

Disabling or Enabling Aero when using a capture card results in neither better nor worse performance, the performance is exactly the same because a CAPTURE CARD is doing the capture work.

Disabling Aero when using MONITOR CAPTURE should hypothetically improve capture performance, but in my experience, this greatly depends on both the capture software and the application being used. Sometimes the application performs faster with Aero enabled, sometimes faster with it disabled.

In summary, "monitor capture" and "game capture" is definitely slower than "video capture device" with a capture card, REGARDLESS of whether or not Aero is enabled. You are wrong.

Even if there was a "Low Res" Monitor Capture leaving Aero on will still kill the performance under Windows 7

How? This defies all logic. The reason why it lags right now is because monitor capture is capturing at your desktop's resolution, which in my case is 1920x1080... and then it's being scaled down using the "Edit Scene" interface. This does not result in any improved performance because the desktop is STILL being captured at 1920x1080.

If you look at programs like Fraps, they allow you to capture at half res or quarter res, and the performance improvement is hugely significant, but not really all that useful because people want to capture at high res 90% of the time when using programs like Fraps.

I believe you are wrong on multiple points here.

I have multiple reasons for getting a capture card.

1. 60fps capture with minimal CPU hit. Success
2. Never have to worry about switching to Aero basic mode because the capture card is doing the work. Success.
3. Doing desktop related tasks, like map editing in various programs (maya, unreal editor, zbrush), with a high framerate. Success.
4. Never have to worry about game compatibility issues because the capture card doesn't care, it just records everything from an HDMI cord. Success.

 

[Floatingthru]

I should have clarified slower meaning frame times as all the data has to be downloaded to ram first, whereas Game Capture (unless its an OpenGL Capture) and Window Capture sends the data directly to OBS. Window Capture with Aero as a capture method has zero impact on capture performance, and will only use a tiny tiny bit more CPU, while Game Capture will use more GPU. With a Capture Card Aero on/off will make no difference yes. In terms of general performance yeah a capture card is definitely the most stable method.

It doesn't matter if its a half size capture the moment you turn on Aero while trying use Monitor Capture under Windows 7 it will degrade performance period. You test this yourself by lowering the resolution of your second monitor and see if that changes performance much. No matter how you do it Aero on and Monitor Capture will ALWAYS be horrible in Windows 7. Even with Aero off Monitor Capture is still the worst out of the other capture methods.The WDDM (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Windows_Di ... iver_Model) was greatly improved in Windows 8.

So I would tell you to upgrade to Windows 8 if you want to do exactly what you are asking for. I can capture both my Monitors at the same time at 60fps using Windows 8 with little to no cpu usage as it is that good. Of course Monitor Capture does not work with fullscreen games/software.

I first got a Capture Card to do the same thing that you do, but once I found OBS I no longer need it for my PC as the capture methods OBS has is very good. I only use it for my PS3 these days. The way I setup OBS I get no loss in performance in my games, but I don't need anything over 60fps and I don't mind lowering settings if I do lag. I am not trying to tell you not to use your Capture Card at all since I do love them for 100% compatibily and ease. I am just giving you the information I know.

 

[FartyGuy101]

Acknowledged. I tried Windows 8 for a time, and it had tons of crashing issues. I guess that's a given, considering it's such a new OS, but it was crashing random games and it made things a living h*** for me. I used it for about a month and a half before deciding to go back to win7... I haven't regretted my decision, as this OS is incredibly stable compared to win8.

 

[Lain]

Thanks for the suggestion, but it's not possible unfortunately.

I deleted the posts past this point and the things that were being discussed will not be discussed again, kindly. I don't even care about what everyone said to each other. Just let's all be friends please for the love of god.