Question / Help Need recommendations for a capture card

[Ragnus]

Hello,

I plan to stream console games and I'm looking for a capture card that might fit to my setup.
I plan to stream on 480p due to my connection. Also, do all capture cards enlighten my CPU? If not then it should do so.

I stream with 700 kbit/s and I'm testing settings while streaming pc games which end up being blurry. Will I have the same problem even though using a capture card? I push my PC to it's limit so I know what my PC can handle to stream. I'm just concerned that streaming console games will end up being blurry when moving like on pc right now.

Thanks in advance.

 

[WayZHC]

1. What's your streaming pc? (Desktop or laptop and what specs and OS?)
2. Also what console you are playing on?
3. And what's your budget?

Answering to these 3 question helps a lot finding a capture card for your needs. Since there are USB, firewire, thunderbolt and pci-e capture cards, we need to know about your pc.

 

[FerretBomb]

Think of a capture card as (effectively) a webcam. A really good one, that gets exceptionally clean video. That's all it is.
Some have internal bits to help offload some *.264 encoding duties (most modern video cards also do this too, though).

You will have the same blurriness, capture card or no. That's more a function of your available bit rate and quality setting (if you're using VBR, which I'd recommend), which is pretty low for streaming purposes. Anything low-action (platformers, puzzle games) should come through better than anything with full-screen motion (any FPS, most MOBAs). Consider dropping to 320p, and seeing if you can bring the bitrate up to 1000kbps; you can also try lowering your encoding frame rate to 15-20 (or lower), sacrificing some smoothness for greater image fidelity. If you have a VERY BEEFY CPU, you can drop the encoding preset from Veryfast to Fast; uses more CPU, but slightly lower bitrate.

Depending on the console, you may have other considerations (like the HDCP protection on the PS3 that prevents HDMI capture without an anti-HDCP box inline).

Beyond that, WayZHC's questions would provide a lot more insight, along with a streaming log file.

 

[Ragnus]

1. What's your streaming pc? (Desktop or laptop and what specs and OS?)
2. Also what console you are playing on?
3. And what's your budget?

Answering to these 3 question helps a lot finding a capture card for your needs. Since there are USB, firewire, thunderbolt and pci-e capture cards, we need to know about your pc.

1. PC (desktop)
CPU: intel E8400 (@3.4Ghz)
GPU: geforce gtx 550 ti
OS: win7 32bit
ram: 4gb (3.25 useable)

2. I'll want to stream ps3 games (games like Dark Souls/ Metal Gear Solid series and some more)

3. There isn't really a small limit. I was hoping to find something between 100-200 €

 

[WayZHC]

1. E8400 and GTX 550Ti combination will do pretty well since you are just capturing/streaming with it and playing with console. Will do 720/30p but you are going to stream in 480p and fps 20-30 so it's gonna be easily done by your system.

2. Okay with PS3 you need to use AV Component cables since PS3 uses HDCP so capturing with hdmi wont work.

3. At that price point and with that kind of pc i'd recommend going with external usb capture card like Elgato Game Capture HD. Also Avermedia Live Gamer Portable would be a nice card but it's not currenty compatible with OBS. Avermedia is currently beta testing streaming engine drivers so after those are released, LGP will be compatible with OBS.

If you have one free pci-e 1x slot, Avermedia Game Broadcaster HD would be a good choise capturing PS3 and it's cheaper than Elgato or LGP.

And to answer to one of your questions, capture card will not ease cpu at all. Cpu still does the encoding. Scene rendering is made by GPU but you have a great GPU for that job.

 

[Ragnus]

1. E8400 and GTX 550Ti combination will do pretty well since you are just capturing/streaming with it and playing with console. Will do 720/30p but you are going to stream in 480p and fps 20-30 so it's gonna be easily done by your system.

2. Okay with PS3 you need to use AV Component cables since PS3 uses HDCP so capturing with hdmi wont work.

3. At that price point and with that kind of pc i'd recommend going with external usb capture card like Elgato Game Capture HD. Also Avermedia Live Gamer Portable would be a nice card but it's not currenty compatible with OBS. Avermedia is currently beta testing streaming engine drivers so after those are released, LGP will be compatible with OBS.

If you have one free pci-e 1x slot, Avermedia Game Broadcaster HD would be a good choise capturing PS3 and it's cheaper than Elgato or LGP.

And to answer to one of your questions, capture card will not ease cpu at all. Cpu still does the encoding. Scene rendering is made by GPU but you have a great GPU for that job.

Good to know that atleast my PC is good enough to get the job done.
I've checked inside my PC and I have a free pci-e 1x slot so I'll go with the game broadcaster hd then. So according to amazon it would come with a component to vga cable (I assume I can't use the hdmi input at all due to HDCP).

So I don't need any more cables. The only problem is, that I can't find a Component to Component adapter so I guess I'll have to go for a HDMI splitter so I can get one into my TV and one into a Componen to HDMI adapter and use the Component to VGA on it to get it connected to the capture card. Or are there easier ways then this? Finding a component to component adapter would be the best solution for me because I still have the ps3 component cable free while the other methods would need me to buy 2 hdmi cables and a splitter as an extra

 

[WayZHC]

Yes PS3 uses HDCP which blocks HDMI capturing.

Here is one way to capture:

...................... ----------- TV
PS3 -----------------| <-- component splitter (analog signals can be easily splitted)
.... component ^...----------- Game Broadcaster HD

(video quality might suffer if using cheap splitter. Splitters with amp are better and they are not even necessarily expensive)

Also Hauppauge Colossus HD is one good option to look at. I'm not sure will it work with OBS but maybe someone knows??

And Blackmagic Intensity Pro which i know to work for sure but it's more expensive card

 

[Krazy]

Hauppauge devices still don't work with OBS