Question / Help Gradual audio desynching issue

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xxmacguyverxx

New Member
Hello spoke with @OBSProject on twitter and they suggested i post my info here for trouble shooting

I have noticed on my last few streams that my audio is slowly but surely desynching. The issue isnt present when I first turn on my stream I can test this with certain accuracy using an extra laptop or the help of a member in stream.What happens is slowly over the course of the stream my audio begins to delay little bits and then finally it gets so bad it looks like horrible Japanese voiceover. By about 2 hours into a stream my webcam video and audio are completely off as well as my game audio and video.

I hadnt streamed in about a month I came back and updated OBS and within a few days of I noticed excessive complaints of audio issues in my stream. This bothered me somewhat because I have spent 100s of hours fine tuning and adapting my stream to get rid of issues like this a long time ago. I have used OBS for over a year now so Im pretty familiar with its ins and outs and I am certain my settings are fine especially cause my stream is all lined up for the first 30 mins or so.

Stream Example: http://www.twitch.tv/xxmacguyverxx/b/563888107
Between 7 & 16 mins or so im checking and re-checking audio/video with a laptop as well as had a member verify that everything was good but by the last 30 mins of the stream its completely effed. My last week or so of stream all have the same problem. Attached is a daily log file associated with that link so you can check it out.

Also here is my Hardware/Software if you need it
Win 7 64
OBS .625 32bit
I7-3610qm
8gb ram
Elgato Game Capture HD
Logitech Webcam pro 9000
M-Audio producer Usb Mic
 

Attachments

This is really strange to me -- your webcam is in sync despite the buffering, and yet the elgato is in sync even though it's also using buffering (buffering on devices forces sync between its audio/video). This is definitely unusual. I'm not entirely sure yet. The last time I heard someone reporting something like this said that turning off the webcam made the issue stop, but he never stuck around to verify (which usually means that he fixed the issue somehow or another), though I just don't know for sure. It may require some experimentation.

Having to deal with delayed USB 2.0 devices is always extremely painful in terms of configuration but this definitely is out of the ordinary.
 
Im willing to try a few things out but I have to have my webcam its a critical part of my stream people watch me for my game face ;)


Its just so strange that the audio is fine for about and hour then its just worse and worse as time goes on.

If you want me to try anything or change any setting let me know
 
I wasn't suggesting to stop using the webcam, I was merely suggesting it as a potential lead for troubleshooting (USB issues do happen, and sometimes switching ports can be all that's needed)
 
tried changing my usb hub and my ports as well as any cables i could swap and the issue is still present. Stream starts off great and about 2 hours in audio is super desynched. its like every minute i am streaming the audio desynchs 1 millisecond till its super bad. When i restart my stream its great for another hour or so but that is a band aid solution at best
 
USB hub? Just to clarify - you should have the Elgato plugged directly into a USB port on your PC, not a hub.
 
Just to clarify I have always had a powered hub present with no issues until now but event still I have tried a direct connection with the exact same results
 
I have the same problem, and also use the Elgato. I noticed that restarting my console (which forces the capture to restart) temporarily fixes it, but after a while, it always comes back. I have been using version 1.42.23 something of the software and it still happens. The device has Use Buffering on (0) and it appears to build up at least a second or two after a short while of streaming with it.

It's super frustrating to stream with, and it makes it hard to live commentate. Sometimes I react to something that hasn't happened yet on my viewers' screens and it defeats the whole point of using a webcam and microphone. I would appreciate the slightest form of help to counter this.
 
Tried the older elgato software variation and I still get the gradual audio delay...

Downloaded the new obs update today ill let you know if it gets any dif results
 
Last edited:
Vetoed.. If you're meaning desync as in "my webcam or mic desync from my elgato" then that's a different thing. If you're meaning desync as in "the elgato sound desyncs from the elgato video" then that was what I was talking about in my previous post.

Right now there is very little I can do about it gradually desyncing off from the webcam/mic, at least at this moment. I have a plan in store for the code. But anyway, right now you're using an encoded, delayed device. The encoding/decoding that they do in order to fit the video over the tiny USB 2.0 pipe is subject to delays and those delays are not always constant delays. It's a very difficult situation to deal with programmatically (and if you're on a desktop PC and capturing HDMI you really should not have bought a USB 2.0 device to begin with).
 
Jim said:
Vetoed.. If you're meaning desync as in "my webcam or mic desync from my elgato" then that's a different thing. If you're meaning desync as in "the elgato sound desyncs from the elgato video" then that was what I was talking about in my previous post.
Click to expand...

Both of these occurrences happen not just one or the other


I use a laptop not a desktop so USB is my only option but thanks for pointing that out

I have been streaming over a year at first i had audio issues i fixed them by setting delays on my cam mic and now. This is incredibly frustrating because i cant figure it out & it ruins my stream EVERYTIME. I cant go one day without complaints and I did nothing to cause this all my setting and equipment are the same but suddenly i desynch all the time? WHY?

I never had these problems til recently so what changed?
 
if you're using x264 for encoding, try enabling "Custom X264 encoder settings" and putting in
Code: 
tune=zerolatency

This has helped with my audio sync in the past. It disables some features that provide slightly better quality (B-frames namely), but it should fix audio sync. It's worth a try at the least.
 
achmetha said:
if you're using x264 for encoding, try enabling "Custom X264 encoder settings" and putting in
Code: 
tune=zerolatency

This has helped with my audio sync in the past. It disables some features that provide slightly better quality (B-frames namely), but it should fix audio sync. It's worth a try at the least.
Click to expand...
Ill give it a shot at this point I will try anyhting because Im about to just quit because its driving me insane
 
Jim said:
Vetoed.. If you're meaning desync as in "my webcam or mic desync from my elgato" then that's a different thing. If you're meaning desync as in "the elgato sound desyncs from the elgato video" then that was what I was talking about in my previous post.

Right now there is very little I can do about it gradually desyncing off from the webcam/mic, at least at this moment. I have a plan in store for the code. But anyway, right now you're using an encoded, delayed device. The encoding/decoding that they do in order to fit the video over the tiny USB 2.0 pipe is subject to delays and those delays are not always constant delays. It's a very difficult situation to deal with programmatically (and if you're on a desktop PC and capturing HDMI you really should not have bought a USB 2.0 device to begin with).
Click to expand...

I did mean that the Elgato sound desyncs from the Elgato video. I was able to fix the webcam / mic sync with the settings.

I'm using a laptop so I'm afraid I don't have a choice. Trust me I would rather not use USB 2.0 at all with hindsight. Just a shame because I used to get a similar issue with the Hauppauge HD PVR / Xsplit, which made me consider OBS, to then make the switch to it. But I needed an Elgato or something supported by OBS. It was fine for a while, and all of a sudden, I can stream once without someone mentioning it at some point.

Do you have any suggestions to help reduce the strain?

achmetha said:
if you're using x264 for encoding, try enabling "Custom X264 encoder settings" and putting in
Code: 
tune=zerolatency

This has helped with my audio sync in the past. It disables some features that provide slightly better quality (B-frames namely), but it should fix audio sync. It's worth a try at the least.
Click to expand...

Care to elaborate on what this does? Will it affect the my other delays? Let's say I have a delay on desktop audio, webcam, microphone all on a similar time to match the game capture, will this affect them?
 
Vetoed said:
Care to elaborate on what this does? Will it affect the my other delays? Let's say I have a delay on desktop audio, webcam, microphone all on a similar time to match the game capture, will this affect them?
Click to expand...

Basically, certain aspects/features of x264 create some latency which causes the video to take longer to process than the audio. For instance, b-frames take longer to process, so while your audio comes out at the same rate constantly, the video may slowly become out of sync slowly as the frames are being constantly passed through to the encoder and the latency increases over time.

I may be completely wrong on this, but this is how I understood it to work. So Zero Latency tune kills look ahead, uses sliced threads, & disables b-frames (all of which add latency to encoding).

I have used zero latency tune with all programs where you can adjust x264 encoder settings (dxtory using x264vfw, obs, etc..). I first noticed this issue when I would try to export x264 into the avi container from premiere pro, it is VERY evident that these features of x264 cause audio sync issues in these circumstances especially (particularly because avi doesn't support b-frames to begin with). tune=zerolatency has always fixed these issues.

None of your other audio delays will be affected because the audio will come out at the same rate, it's only an x264 video encoding issue. However, if your mic audio/video do NOT gradually grow out of sync, then you are probably having a different issue altogether, which is probably directly related to your capture card.

If elgato has a native recording program (like hauppauge capture), I would try to do a window capture of that program (instead of a direct capture) and see if it happens that way.

Sorry if this is a lot of text, trying to be helpful - but not so great at short and sweet.
 
tune=zerolatency shouldn't have any effect on audio synchronization but it is significantly detrimental to quality. There are many far more likely culprits for synch issues when dealing with USB 2.0 devices.
 
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