Question / Help OBS Using 40% of my high-end CPU, no matter the settings

[DemiVFX]

Hey all!

So I'm having a bit of an issue with OBS using between 30-40% of my i7-4790k, causing massive framedrops in game. The encoder, bitrate, preset, etc have no effect on this whatsoever. I'd like to note that I prefer to stream using NVENC @720p 30fps for performance reasons, but even setting encoder to NVENC, bitrate to 200kbps, resolution to 720p, framerate to 30fps, the CPU usage remains unchanged. Also, task manager is reading OBS CPU usage to be up to 10% higher than what OBS prints in the bottom right.

A few months ago, OBS used 15% CPU at max, now it's taking almost half. What am I doing wrong? How can I get lower OBS CPU usage? What is causing this?

Screenshots: https://imgur.com/a/9hwXa

For reference, my PC part list: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/TsMsLD

Log files included.

 

[Waistless]

The logs show max audio buffering reached and some memory leaks. It also complains about Media Source "Overlay 1" having an invalid audio buffer amount, which is where it fills its audio buffer.

Does doing any of the following have an effect? (in the order mentioned)

• Removing the "Overlay 1" media source overlay.
• Disabling your voicemeeter output device.
• Reinstalling OBS.
• Create a new scene collection (empty), restart OBS and stay on this scene collection.

 

[DemiVFX]

The logs show max audio buffering reached and some memory leaks. It also complains about Media Source "Overlay 1" having an invalid audio buffer amount, which is where it fills its audio buffer.

Does doing any of the following have an effect? (in the order mentioned)

• Removing the "Overlay 1" media source overlay.
• Disabling your voicemeeter output device.
• Reinstalling OBS.
• Create a new scene collection (empty), restart OBS and stay on this scene collection.

Just did all you suggested, and there's been no improvement or change in CPU usage whatsoever. Seems like it's still reaching max audio buffer and the memory leaks still exist. Could that be the issue in all this? How can I find out whats causing the memory leaks? Most recent log is attached.

 

[DemiVFX]

I went and removed all unused sources, and it reduced the number of memory leaks to 1, and max audio buffer is not being reached, however the high CPU usage remains unchanged.

 

[DemiVFX]

What am I doing wrong? How can I fix this?

 

[EBrito]

I´m not sure, but I think having more than one game capture per scene can be the problem.
Duplicate the scene and leave one game capture per scene.
Maybe this helps

 

[DemiVFX]

I figured out what's causing the stupid high CPU usage, it's the Media Sources. I have small videos I capture with Media Source as an intro, BRB screen, and stream background. Is there any way to reduce the CPU cost of media sources when they aren't active? If I disable hardware decoding or hide the source nothing changes in CPU usage, only removing the source entirely frees up CPU.

 

[OG See OH Zee]

Does the same thing happen when using a VLC Video Source and changing a scene that doesn't have it?

 

[DemiVFX]

Does the same thing happen when using a VLC Video Source and changing a scene that doesn't have it?

That works! CPU usage drastically reduced to around 0.3-2.5% when those scenes aren't active! Thank you!

Now I gotta figure out how to reduce the fps drop/skipping/performance hit OBS has on Overwatch...

 

[OG See OH Zee]

Use the FPS cap in Overwatch (start with around 60) as it can reduce workload on the GPU and CPU.