Question / Help Laggy and Input Lag when Streaming, even when Previewing Stream

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MrWahloh

New Member
So, one of these threads again, I'm sorry but I've been looking for a fix that would help me for a couple of days now.


My problem...
I've been streaming streaming the game Gigantic for two days now but noticed that every time I start streaming or even "Preview Stream" locally [!] the game starts lagging and seems to cause some kind of input lag, it feels like I've enabled a smooth mouse option. Even on the menus.

The CPU never peaks to 100% capability, same for the RAM.

The stream footage seems to be fine, check out the Past Broadcasts below the difference is not the big. No viewers complaining about lag or stutter. It's only me that seems to have a problem while playing.

No Downscale, 3500 Bitrate:
http://www.twitch.tv/mrwahloh/v/52505105

1.50 Downscale, 2400 Bitrate:
http://www.twitch.tv/mrwahloh/v/52764710

[Important to note!] I'm using Monitor Capture to capture the gameplay footage with the game fullscreen. Game Capture or Window Capture doesn't work for this game, see this link: https://www.reddit.com/r/gigantic/comments/448ewi/obshow_to_record_gigantic/

Quote: "This isn't so much Gigantic's issue but Microsoft. The framework they use for apps is good as it allows game developers like Motiga to have a single build for both xbox one and windows 10. However, when you try to use windowed or game capture, all OBS will "see" is said framework and not the game itself."


My system specifications...
Asus Republic Of Gamers G751JY-T7234H
CPU: Intel Core i7-4870HQ 2.5GHz
RAM: 16GB DDR3
GPU: GeForce GTX 980M
OS: Windows 10

This laptop has no Nvidia Optimus or onboard GPU, the GTX 980M is dedicated.

Please believe me that the network connection is not the problem here, I'm not at home to speedtest is for you but I've got a glassfiber connection and stream only using a wired connection. It's a stable 80Mbs up and down.


My streaming settings...
I never had much trouble streaming games (Assault Android Cactus, Rust, etc) and used to stream using no Downscale with 3500 Bitrate, until I tried streaming Star Citizen, from that moment on I used the settings below.

Encoder: x264
Use CBR: Checked
Enable CBR padding: Checked

Max Bitrate: 2400
Resolution Downscale: 1.50 (720p)
Filter: Bilinear
FPS: 30

Process Priority Class: Normal
Scene Buffering Time: 400
x264 CPU Preset: veryfast
Encoding Profile: main


What I tried...
I've tried numerous things to eliminate the problem, things like;
  • Set Max Pre-Rendered Frames to 1 in the Nvidia Configurations for the Gigantic game.
  • Disable Vsync in the Nvidia Configurations for the Gigantic game.
  • Disabling Game DVR in the Xbox App that Windows 10 comes with.
  • Disable Vsync in the Games Settings.
  • Lowering the Graphic Settings to Medium instead of High.
  • [!] Enable the "Disable encoding while previewing" option, but even then the problem persists when using the "Preview Stream".
  • Lowering the Process Priority Class to Idle, to see if that would improve the games performance.
  • Reinstalling OBS completly, deleting the AppData. (That's why I don't have logs right now, will stream again tonight.)


My question...
Can someone give me some things to try? A fix maybe? Anyone else having this problem? I'll probably just keep streaming like this but it's quite annoying because I won't be able to play my best with this weird issue.


The logs...
https://gist.github.com/66d520906f43c9464ef6
 
Last edited:
D

dping

Active Member
MrWahloh said:
So, one of these threads again, I'm sorry but I've been looking for a fix that would help me for a couple of days now.


My problem...
I've been streaming streaming the game Gigantic for two days now but noticed that every time I start streaming or even "Preview Stream" locally [!] the game starts lagging and seems to cause some kind of input lag, it feels like I've enabled a smooth mouse option. Even on the menus.

The CPU never peaks to 100% capability, same for the RAM.

The stream footage seems to be fine, check out the Past Broadcasts below the difference is not the big. No viewers complaining about lag or stutter. It's only me that seems to have a problem while playing.

No Downscale, 3500 Bitrate:
http://www.twitch.tv/mrwahloh/v/52505105

1.50 Downscale, 2400 Bitrate:
http://www.twitch.tv/mrwahloh/v/52764710

[Important to note!] I'm using Monitor Capture to capture the gameplay footage with the game fullscreen. Game Capture or Window Capture doesn't work for this game, see this link: https://www.reddit.com/r/gigantic/comments/448ewi/obshow_to_record_gigantic/

Quote: "This isn't so much Gigantic's issue but Microsoft. The framework they use for apps is good as it allows game developers like Motiga to have a single build for both xbox one and windows 10. However, when you try to use windowed or game capture, all OBS will "see" is said framework and not the game itself."


My system specifications...
Asus Republic Of Gamers G751JY-T7234H
CPU: Intel Core i7-4870HQ 2.5GHz
RAM: 16GB DDR3
GPU: GeForce GTX 980M
OS: Windows 10

This laptop has no Nvidia Optimus or onboard GPU, the GTX 980M is dedicated.

Please believe me that the network connection is not the problem here, I'm not at home to speedtest is for you but I've got a glassfiber connection and stream only using a wired connection. It's a stable 80Mbs up and down.


My streaming settings...
I never had much trouble streaming games (Assault Android Cactus, Rust, etc) and used to stream using no Downscale with 3500 Bitrate, until I tried streaming Star Citizen, from that moment on I used the settings below.

Encoder: x264
Use CBR: Checked
Enable CBR padding: Checked

Max Bitrate: 2400
Resolution Downscale: 1.50 (720p)
Filter: Bilinear
FPS: 30

Process Priority Class: Normal
Scene Buffering Time: 400
x264 CPU Preset: veryfast
Encoding Profile: main


What I tried...
I've tried numerous things to eliminate the problem, things like;
  • Set Max Pre-Rendered Frames to 1 in the Nvidia Configurations for the Gigantic game.
  • Disable Vsync in the Nvidia Configurations for the Gigantic game.
  • Disabling Game DVR in the Xbox App that Windows 10 comes with.
  • Disable Vsync in the Games Settings.
  • Lowering the Graphic Settings to Medium instead of High.
  • [!] Enable the "Disable encoding while previewing" option, but even then the problem persists when using the "Preview Stream".
  • Lowering the Process Priority Class to Idle, to see if that would improve the games performance.
  • Reinstalling OBS completly, deleting the AppData. (That's why I don't have logs right now, will stream again tonight.)


My question...
Can someone give me some things to try? A fix maybe? Anyone else having this problem? I'll probably just keep streaming like this but it's quite annoying because I won't be able to play my best with this weird issue.


The logs...
https://gist.github.com/66d520906f43c9464ef6
Click to expand...
set max prerender back to 3 as 1 will attempt to use a single core to the max and when OBS uses that thread you'll get game stutter. 3 allows spreading the prerender load across multiple threads. since you use a laptop i7 (low core clock), the main game thread with the most CPU usage will bottleneck everything else. a few prerendered frames shouldn't affect much, so no less than 2 imo.

Another thought would be to run the game and have task manage up and running. find what cores the game uses over 50% with out OBS then set affinity of OBS to the unused cores.

http://www.eightforums.com/tutorials/40339-cpu-affinity-shortcut-program-create-windows.html

you'll need to make a new shortcut for OBS and add in
Code: 
cmd.exe /c start "Program Name" /affinity #

before the OBS path.

replace # with the hexadecimal code for the threads to be used.

I would recommend OBS use a minimum of 4 cores.

again, this isn't official advise it is just something I do when I have issues with a specific game.
 
M

MrWahloh

New Member
Thanks for the suggestion, Dping!

I've reset the Pre-Rendered Frames and then tried your other possible fix, sadly it didn't make a difference. Or I might have missed something, so I'll try it again another time.

I'm using a temporary solution at the moment, it's ridiculous but it works. I put a Capture Device between my laptop and second monitor, expand the desktop to that monitor, play the game on there (fullscreen) and then use my laptop screen for monitoring chat, etc. No lag whatsoever, which makes sense because the Capture Device just copies the already rendered output and the laptop won't need to render it twice. Right?

The moment I enable the Monitor Capture in the OBS scene the lag starts.
 
Last edited:
D

dping

Active Member
MrWahloh said:
Thanks for the suggestion, Dping!

I've reset the Pre-Rendered Frames and then tried your other possible fix, sadly it didn't make a difference. Or I might have missed something, so I'll try it again another time.

I'm using a temporary solution at the moment, it's ridiculous but it works. I put a Capture Device between my laptop and second monitor, expand the desktop to that monitor, play the game on there (fullscreen) and then use my laptop screen for monitoring chat, etc. No lag whatsoever, which makes sense because the Capture Device just copies the already rendered output and the laptop won't need to render it twice. Right?

The moment I enable the Monitor Capture in the OBS scene the lag starts.
Click to expand...
when you just run the game, are there any idle cores? by putting a capture device what do you mean? a window capture or game capture? the preview window? post me that fixed log
 
M

MrWahloh

New Member
I meant a physical capture device, an Elgato Game Capture HD to be exact.

There are no completely idle cores but there are some low usage cores, which I assigned OBS to like you said.

What log are you referring to?

I might have found a contributing factor while reading other forum posts.

The games FPS is not capped and the functionality to cap the FPS isn't implemented yet. Could this cause the problem? Maybe the game is eating a bit to much CPU/GPU resources.
 
Last edited:
D

dping

Active Member
MrWahloh said:
I meant a physical capture device, an Elgato Game Capture HD to be exact.

There are not completely idle cores but there are some low usage cores, which I assigned OBS like you said.

What log are you referring to?

I might have found a contributing factor while reading other forum posts.

The games FPS is not capped and the functionality to cap the FPS isn't implemented yet. Could this cause the problem? Maybe the game is eating a bit to much CPU/GPU resources.
Click to expand...
it is best not to frame cap or you might experience tearing. anyway, the capture card is a valid work-a-round but is often not recommended for single PC setups. In this case because Microsoft store is broken when it comes to game capture, this should be alright
 
E

Evilcleric

New Member
mine lags too every time i use monitor capture certain games i can't use game or window capture for some reason and well i go to use monitor capture i start lagging any fixes yet??
 
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