Is NVENC worth the extra expense?

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sosleadgtr

New Member
Hi folks,

I've recently started streaming on Twitch and I'm in need of a streaming PC. I'm currently using my wife's laptop which has worked great so far, but I don't want to tie her pc up every time I stream. I have an old work laptop with 8gb RAM and i56500, but with the same settings below OBS hardly functioned, taking 80%-90% CPU just having the program open, no streaming or recording.

So really I have 2 questions: Is it worth drastically downscaling the quality of my stream to use the old work laptop? If not, what should I get for CPU/GPU for a new laptop in the $500-$750 price range?

The title mentions NVENC because I found a decently priced Lenovo Gaming laptop with 8GB RAM, core i51135g7, and a GTX 1650 card. If I can get a machine with that GPU in my price range, should I prioritize it for NVENC encoding over a cheaper pc with the same CPU I already know works?

I appreciate any tips/suggestions.

Working Current Setup:
Xbox Series X with Elgato HD60X
1080pWebcam
USB Mic
Browser based Overlays from StreamElements
Lenovo IdeaPad with Core i51135g7, 8GB RAM
x264 encoder, 1440p Canvas downscaled to 1080p via bilinear, 60fps
Presets are veryfast and high
 
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TryHD

Member
don't buy a laptop in generell for streaming and don't buy anything now if you can wait 6 months because then GPUs with hardware AV1 encoders will launch.
 
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sosleadgtr

New Member
TryHD said:
don't buy a laptop in generell for streaming and don't buy anything now if you can wait 6 months because then GPUs with hardware AV1 encoders will launch.
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Why not? The laptop I'm using now works great, and I like the convenience of taking it away from my desk and uploading from the couch or whatever. Recording is secondary to me, if all I want is a decent looking 1080p 60fps stream on Twitch, what's the minimum CPU/GPU in a laptop form factor? Also, will GPU's with AV1 encoders be available for reasonable prices anyway? Seems like overkill
 
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sosleadgtr

New Member
Tomasz Góral said:
Good choice GTX1650, but check chipset, some old version has 1. gen (NVEnc), new not 2.gen like in RTX 2060.
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I've heard that the nvenc encoder (if this card even has it) is worse quality than x264 anyway, the benefit being nvenc has no CPU load. If the 11th gen i5 is having no issues, and I'm only streaming, is there any reason I should try to get a pc with a GPU?
 
Harold

Harold

Active Member
sosleadgtr said:
I've heard that the nvenc encoder (if this card even has it) is worse quality than x264 anyway
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Your information is severely outdated.

Current nvenc (GTX 1660 and all RTX cards) gives comparable picture quality to x264 set to the medium preset.

The amount of CPU time you need to dedicate to x264 just to beat that is cost prohibitive.
 
Harold

Harold

Active Member
Tomasz Góral said:
Good choice GTX1650, but check chipset, some old version has 1. gen (NVEnc), new not 2.gen like in RTX 2060.
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Generation 1 nvenc was in the 7-series cards
We're currently on generation 5 nvenc with the 1650 super and up/RTX cards
The plain 1650 has a high chance of having generation 4 nvenc instead of 5.
 
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sosleadgtr

New Member
Harold said:
Generation 1 nvenc was in the 7-series cards
We're currently on generation 5 nvenc with the 1650 super and up/RTX cards
The plain 1650 has a high chance of having generation 4 nvenc instead of 5.
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Very helpful! As far as I can tell from the site. there's no chipset number or sku for the gpu, just the model GTX 1650. Anyway to know if it has the Volta or the Turing encoder? Is Volta still worth using over x264 veryfast or superfast presets?
 
FerretBomb

FerretBomb

Active Member
Harold said:
Your information is severely outdated.

Current nvenc (GTX 1660 and all RTX cards) gives comparable picture quality to x264 set to the medium preset.

The amount of CPU time you need to dedicate to x264 just to beat that is cost prohibitive.
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x264 Slow, according to the objective scores coming from VMAF. They trade back and forth but stay within a few points of each other.
 
L

Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
sosleadgtr said:
Very helpful! As far as I can tell from the site. there's no chipset number or sku for the gpu, just the model GTX 1650. Anyway to know if it has the Volta or the Turing encoder?
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From what I recall, The GTX 1650 came with the older nVidia chipset (Pascal?). The GTX 1650 Super always shipped with the Turing based chips. More recently, there has been observations that some desktop PCIe GTX 1650 GPUs may have Turing.. but no obvious SKU to differentiate.... just luck of the draw. So, if aiming for Turing NVENC (recommended) for encode/decode offload, then get a desktop GTX 1650 only if you can easily return at no cost. Otherwise go for the 1650 Super and higher/newer. As for a modern laptop with a 1650 mobile and getting Turing?? sorry, no idea... you could try asking vendor directly, but getting wrong/bad info is a real possibility (with little chance for recourse). so... good luck

As for the above discussion, due to thermal constraints and battery life, a laptop will almost always be under-powered compared to a similar desktop. Previously, laptops had a price premium, but with volume shipments now being skewed towards laptops. that isn't always the case. And there are workstation class laptops that are quite powerful, heavy, loud, and expensive. You absolutely can stream using a laptop (I did, but using a Dell Precision mobile workstation), but you just need to be aware of the limitations. A cheap laptop in the under $1K price range... definitely at risk for thermal throttling/performance limits. And I avoid consumer compute gear most of the time, as usually a poor lifecycle value
lower-end consumer laptops will tend to thermal throttle much sooner than a desktop or upper-end performance laptop (ie not the thin/light type models), and real-time video encoding is computationally demanding, regardless if using CPU or GPU. So, you have to be thoughtful in terms of exact model and specs, and your expectations (ie 1080p at what framerate, vs higher resolutions, etc). And what will work for 1080p streaming won't necessarily work in a few years if the industry moves to 4K livestreaming (using AV1 ? not outside realm of possibility). So, think of this sort of like a multi-variant calculus problem... doable, but not always obvious, intuitive...
 
FerretBomb

FerretBomb

Active Member
sosleadgtr said:
That's for Turing right? Any idea of a comparison with the Volta 1650's compared to x264?
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Volta is close to Pascal in performance. The 1650 and 1650Ti behave close to 10-series in encoding performance. The 1650 Super has a Turing core though, if you're looking for the cheapest encoding card you can get with Turing quality.

(Note: Do NOT put a second 'encoding' GPU into the same system as your 'gaming' GPU! It's something many have thought to do, but causes FAR more problems, and worse, halves the PCIe bandwidth to the card, which absolutely can cause issues with OBS! You *need* your GPU to be running x16 mode to avoid frame timing issues, with the amount of data OBS transfers into VRAM for hardware-accelerated compositing!)
 
KattPhloxworthy

KattPhloxworthy

Member
FerretBomb said:
(Note: Do NOT put a second 'encoding' GPU into the same system as your 'gaming' GPU! It's something many have thought to do, but causes FAR more problems, and worse, halves the PCIe bandwidth to the card, which absolutely can cause issues with OBS! You *need* your GPU to be running x16 mode to avoid frame timing issues, with the amount of data OBS transfers into VRAM for hardware-accelerated compositing!)
Click to expand...

In my case, I use a completely different computer to do this. It has a GT730 with a Kepler core for NVEnc. The card is only 8 lanes, but I don't seem to have any issues with encoding, but that's likely only because the sole video sources are either bars or an NDI scene piped in from my main PC. It's set to use that card as the main output device.

--Katt. =^.^=
 
FerretBomb

FerretBomb

Active Member
KattPhloxworthy said:
In my case, I use a completely different computer to do this. It has a GT730 with a Kepler core for NVEnc. The card is only 8 lanes, but I don't seem to have any issues with encoding, but that's likely only because the sole video sources are either bars or an NDI scene piped in from my main PC. It's set to use that card as the main output device.

--Katt. =^.^=
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Ouch. Kepler delivers quality even worse than x264 Ultrafast. Would recommend at least bumping to a 900-series card, which are on-par with Superfast. That or just running Ultrafast x264 on your main system. The load is so light, you're unlikely to notice it on a modern(ish) machine.
 
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