Question / Help Minimum GPU for Hardware Encoding

[Ian Bachelor]

As the title says, I'm looking for the absolute lowest end GPU I could grab to use the NVENC encoder and still achieve 1080p 60fps. I stream SSB, mostly Sm4sh and Melee, so maintaining the 60fps is incredibly important.

I recently upgraded my desktop, and moved the old components into a more mobile, smaller case. Currently I have a Phenom 965, which I know will struggle to do 720p FPS, and while the 7950 in the system can use VCE with the OBS fork, VCE tends to look blockier than either NVENC or Quicksync. The SSD in the system is more than fast enough to save the file, regardless of bitrate, and the connection is a non-issue as well.

So I want to hear other users experiences with NVENC/Shadowplay at 1080p 60fps, to gauge what I need.

 

[XCanG]

Just know, that ShadowPlay is old application. If you upgrade NVIDIA GeForce Expirience to beta, it will be replace to Share. http://www.geforce.com/geforce-experience/gfe-beta

 

[raindeeers]

Your card can only utilize VCE 1.0, which is pretty basic. It can still record good quality, but it requires a really high bitrate to do so. With a card that supports VCE 2.0 or 3.0, your quality will look a lot better and at lower bitrate as well.

 

[Ian Bachelor]

Your card can only utilize VCE 1.0, which is pretty basic. It can still record good quality, but it requires a really high bitrate to do so. With a card that supports VCE 2.0 or 3.0, your quality will look a lot better and at lower bitrate as well.

Well my newly built desktop has a couple 390's in it right now, so I may take a look at what I can get out of it. If it looks nice, I might reconsider on an AMD over Nvidia for a GPU.
I know as of right now its not really enough to do what I want, I'm just trying to figure out what to upgrade to to get what I want.

 

[Boildown]

The best cheap NVEnc GPU is either the GTX750 or GTX 750Ti. Last time I checked the 750Ti was actually cheaper than the 750, so I assume the 750 is out of production or something. Also the GTX 950 would be worth a look as well.

 

[raindeeers]

Also VCE 1.0 has a limit to 1080/30 while the newer VCE can do 1080/60 without breaking a sweat.

Well my newly built desktop has a couple 390's in it right now, so I may take a look at what I can get out of it. If it looks nice, I might reconsider on an AMD over Nvidia for a GPU.
I know as of right now its not really enough to do what I want, I'm just trying to figure out what to upgrade to to get what I want.

If using the fork version, make sure you choose the quality preset. If using the multiplatform one, I don't think you can manually pick a preset. I could be wrong, I haven't used it that much.