Question / Help Game Runs Fine, OBS Preview and Streams Lag

[Tactician_M]

For the most part, my games have been running fine with the settings I have, but with Transistor and now with Reigns, the games will run well but the preview and stream itself will lag badly. (With Transistor, the frame rate would drop to ~6FPS). I've been primarily using Display Capture, but when it's even laggy there, I know something's wrong.

I feel like I've tried everything at this point: changing the Video and Output settings, having the games in Windowed Mode, trying Display Capture vs Game Capture, so any help would be greatly appreciated.

https://gist.github.com/8949500bb43b620962936265b2e929a5

 

[Narcogen]

No stream or record attempt in the log, so nothing to really look at.

You need to start streaming, go for awhile, and then stop in order to capture a log that has the necessary info.

 

[Tactician_M]

Sorry about that! Here's the new log:

https://gist.github.com/d94c4df97d46e5a6a553f1700b506761

 

[Narcogen]

There is also no attempt in this log. You need to start a stream or recording session, let it run for a bit, stop it, and then take a log. Both these logs are app startup only, nothing else. If you get a log and you don't see a notice of where streaming or recording starts, then you don't have a log with a stream or record attempt in it.

 

[Tactician_M]

Okay, thanks! I don't think I recorded for long enough last time, but I see the Recording Start/Stop in the log now.

https://gist.github.com/ec80072d620725548fdbd2ebe8393fb0

 

[Narcogen]

From the log:

16:59:02.863: Output 'simple_file_output': Total frames output: 143
16:59:02.863: Output 'simple_file_output': Total drawn frames: 87 (158 attempted)
16:59:02.863: Output 'simple_file_output': Number of lagged frames due to rendering lag/stalls: 71 (44.9%) ​

Your GPU is overloaded. Reduce resolution or frame rate.

 

[Tactician_M]

Thank you for responding! I tried playing around with different resolutions and frame rates, but it doesn't seem like it's gotten any better.

Here's the most recent log:
https://gist.github.com/anonymous/2296c4432fd1876fcac27e94ef77e08f

 

[Narcogen]

You changed your quality setting to CRF 20 which is too high. Your GPU is still overloaded.

22:55:09.064: Output 'simple_file_output': Total frames output: 331
22:55:09.064: Output 'simple_file_output': Total drawn frames: 247 (348 attempted)
22:55:09.064: Output 'simple_file_output': Number of lagged frames due to rendering lag/stalls: 101 (29.0%)

EDIT: The above is wrong, as CRF does not affect the GPU!

 

[Tactician_M]

Using the most effective settings from the last log, I raised the CRF values and the best I was able to get it down to was 27.5%:

https://gist.github.com/anonymous/d8d9274241cf937b06080f76f3c1c3e8

 

[Narcogen]

Oops. That's my error-- I don't think changing that value is going to help because CRF only affects the compressor (the work your CPU is doing). To take load off the GPU you'll need to lower the framerate or the resolution.

12:28:58.099: base resolution: 1920x1200

 

[Tactician_M]

Oh, okay. I tested a few more resolutions, even trying the lowest possible resolutions with the lowest possible framerate, but the best I could get was only 24.2%.

https://gist.github.com/anonymous/000c346dc18aa74971a8a61a41298c12

 

[Narcogen]

That seems high for 720p30... but I don't see any particular reason for it...

 

[Tactician_M]

Do you know of anything else that could possibly be causing this?

 

[Narcogen]

Not that I know of. Having a preview window open alone tends to impact performance in my experience; I've switched to using the Multiview window instead because it seems unaffected. YMMV.

 

[Tactician_M]

Okay, thank you for all of your help!