Question / Help OBS Winwdows 8 outputs low FPS

S

Suspense

New Member
Hi guys,

After installing windows 8, i noticed that streaming with OBS(And Xplit) results in low fps output.

Ingame FPS is not low, streaming at 30FPS ingame FPS is over 60. OBS is said to output at 30FPS same as Dxtory is capturing at.

When screen is not moving, fps is 30 as supposed to. When i move the screen slightly, fps goes between 28-30

When i am actual playing, running around FPS in OBS drops to 19-21 and stays between this. I noticed that setting OBS to high priority fixes this, and FPS stays at 30. However, the stream begins to lag really bad even though my ingame fps is 30-40 and obs says its streaming at 30.

Anyone else had this issue? Its pretty much impossible for me to stream on windows 8 with this issue, its just unwatchable.


EDIT: I just noticed OBS is using an insane amount of CPU on windows 8. Currently sitting at 50-60% CPU usage just for OBS. Anyone else experienced this?
 
S

Suspense

New Member
Jim said:
It doesn't change the CPU usage on windows 8. A log file however would be most useful to see exactly what's going on if possible. viewtopic.php?f=6&t=97
Click to expand...

Hello Jim.

I fixed the low FPS issue after a reboot, and re-enabling hyperthreading. This helpled with the performance in War Z(The game i was streaming at the time) it had before, a CPU usage of 30-40, after only 10-15.

It did not change the CPU usage of OBS. OBS on my cousins computer is using about 10-20%, on mine 50-60%. I never experienced such high CPU usage when running windows 7.

I am attaching 2 logs, one with steady FPS after reboot, and one with dropping FPS before the reboot.

EDIT: I was unable to attach the logs, forum says .log is an extention not allowed. Here are the 2 logs on pastebin:

Before reboot
http://pastebin.com/iQWV4hA4

After reboot
http://pastebin.com/xJJ8asps

Mind you CPU usage of OBS is still the same in both cases, i just managed to lower cpu usage of the game in order to actually be able to stream. Its still using 50-60+
 
L

Lain

Forum Admin
Lain
Forum Moderator
Developer
well you appear to be using dxtory at a fairly high resolution as well as just streaming in general at a fairly high resolution, so that's probably the reason. Also you have multithreaded optimizations off, but I suppose that doesn't particularly matter because you're still rendering fast enough
 
S

Suspense

New Member
Jim said:
well you appear to be using dxtory at a fairly high resolution as well as just streaming in general at a fairly high resolution, so that's probably the reason. Also you have multithreaded optimizations off, but I suppose that doesn't particularly matter because you're still rendering fast enough
Click to expand...

Forgot to renable that after my tests.

Dxtory is capturing at 1680x1050 outputting at 1680x1050,

http://i.imgur.com/RdI2EnA.png ingame standing still

http://i.imgur.com/7x1jYyc.png capturing still image launcher.

Is it just me not remembering how much it used on windows 7? Or is this wrong behaviour?

EDIT: Heres performance with DXtory at 1280x720 and OBS at 1280x720

http://i.imgur.com/xQJW9kU.png

Barely any difference, seems a little worse actually.
 
A

Antix

Member
Hm, i don't have any problems with OBS and win8. Runs better than anything else, incl. a combination of dxtory + obs ....
 
B

Bensam123

Member
If you turned hyperthreading on you're probably seeing reduced CPU usage because CPU usage is based on a % and you doubled the amount of threads available, which would reduce the % by about half...

This may be unrelated, but 1680x1080 isn't a normal resolution (which is what you're streaming at)... 1680x1050 is a 16:10 resolution...


Honestly your processor might not be able to take that resolution. I upgraded from a i7-860 because streaming was utilizing too much of my processor. A i7-860 is pretty much exactly what you have and I had an almost identical OC. WarZ being a newer game probably gobbles more CPU as well. I don't think that what you have can handle the resolution you're trying to use.

I used to stream at 720p and still do and still think it has too much overhead associated with it when playing FPS's.


Another thought, although not related directly to CPU usage, try disabling core parking (which is supposed to be more aggressive in W8 anyway). That should help with the fluidity of the game.

http://bitsum.com/about_cpu_core_parking.php

Unless you actually streamed with exactly the same configuration in W7 and took notes on CPU usage before upgrading to W8, it's possible this is simply a perception issue. The game became more laggy so you actually investigated and noticed how much CPU usage it's actually using in that particular instance. 50% doesn't sound that far off at that resolution for that processor.
 
S

Suspense

New Member
Bensam123 said:
If you turned hyperthreading on you're probably seeing reduced CPU usage because CPU usage is based on a % and you doubled the amount of threads available, which would reduce the % by about half...

This may be unrelated, but 1680x1080 isn't a normal resolution (which is what you're streaming at)... 1680x1050 is a 16:10 resolution...


Honestly your processor might not be able to take that resolution. I upgraded from a i7-860 because streaming was utilizing too much of my processor. A i7-860 is pretty much exactly what you have and I had an almost identical OC. WarZ being a newer game probably gobbles more CPU as well. I don't think that what you have can handle the resolution you're trying to use.

I used to stream at 720p and still do and still think it has too much overhead associated with it when playing FPS's.


Another thought, although not related directly to CPU usage, try disabling core parking (which is supposed to be more aggressive in W8 anyway). That should help with the fluidity of the game.

http://bitsum.com/about_cpu_core_parking.php

Unless you actually streamed with exactly the same configuration in W7 and took notes on CPU usage before upgrading to W8, it's possible this is simply a perception issue. The game became more laggy so you actually investigated and noticed how much CPU usage it's actually using in that particular instance. 50% doesn't sound that far off at that resolution for that processor.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestions.

I have not got screenshots of my win7 performance, i have had this CPU for 3 years or so(i realize its time to upgrade) but it has NEVER failed me. I have streamed SC2, DayZ and other games heavily over the past 2-3 years. With this exact same setup on windows 7, using Xplit, Dxtory FFsplit and now OBS. I have never ever had this high CPU usage on any of the streaming programs ive used, ive never had the software actually reduce FPS and hitting 100% CPU usage ever.

1680x1050 is the resolution of my monitor, not reducing that through obs results in much clearer picture. However, if you look at my screenshots i show CPU usage @ 1680x1050 and then again at 1280x720 and theres no difference in CPU usage, should this not reduce CPU usage?

Why would OBS usage 40-50% CPU processing and encoding a still image? It all sounds completely out of place.

Before actually looking into this issue myself, i had windows 8 and windows 7 in dual boot(Right now i dont have a windows 7 install)

I would attempt to stream in windows 8 and see the FPS drop to 19-21 in OBS, and without investigating i just thought... Probably windows it...

So i would reboot into Windows 7 and try and stream, and all was smooth. No FPS drops, crispy smooth 1080p stream @ 1680x1050.

I am willing to throw up another windows 7 install to document this, i am very sure something is either wrong with OBS and windows 8, or windows 8. Or just my particular setup, windows 8 and obs combined.

EDIT: And core parking is disabled.
 
B

Bensam123

Member
I was just pointing out your streaming resolution was set to 1680x1080, not 1680x1050 according to your log. It may have been a typo when you entered it.

Hmmm... well looking at some general things that are off... As Jim noted your multithreaded optimizations are off, have you tried streaming with them on? Your buffer also ends up full a lot. A quality setting of 10 shouldn't be used as it causes your connection to spike above your maxbitrate (which would make it laggy in game) and if you have excess bit rate to spare you should simply raise your maxbitrate and lower quality to 8-9. The only time that matters is in high action scenes, where it would normally go over your max bitrate and your buffer can't handle it. If it reduces the quality of your stream normally that generally means you don't have enough bandwidth to stream at those settings.

Honestly though those processor usage numbers look about right for that resolution, that processor, that encoding preset, in a FPS.


That aside, if you're encoding a downscaled resolution it should reduce CPU usage... Reducing the resolution in DXtory using the little yellow arrow wont reduce the CPU usage of OBS. I'd suggest setting your native resolution in OBS then using the downscale option in OBS or set OBS as the downscaled resolution itself.

Posting a log when you're testing different settings is more helpful then just the CPU usage numbers.

Encoding a still image still uses processor.
 
S

Suspense

New Member
Bensam123 said:
I was just pointing out your streaming resolution was set to 1680x1080, not 1680x1050 according to your log. It may have been a typo when you entered it.

Hmmm... well looking at some general things that are off... As Jim noted your multithreaded optimizations are off, have you tried streaming with them on? Your buffer also ends up full a lot. A quality setting of 10 shouldn't be used as it causes your connection to spike above your maxbitrate (which would make it laggy in game) and if you have excess bit rate to spare you should simply raise your maxbitrate and lower quality to 8-9. The only time that matters is in high action scenes, where it would normally go over your max bitrate and your buffer can't handle it. If it reduces the quality of your stream normally that generally means you don't have enough bandwidth to stream at those settings.

Honestly though those processor usage numbers look about right for that resolution, that processor, that encoding preset, in a FPS.


That aside, if you're encoding a downscaled resolution it should reduce CPU usage... Reducing the resolution in DXtory using the little yellow arrow wont reduce the CPU usage of OBS. I'd suggest setting your native resolution in OBS then using the downscale option in OBS or set OBS as the downscaled resolution itself.

Posting a log when you're testing different settings is more helpful then just the CPU usage numbers.

Encoding a still image still uses processor.
Click to expand...

I would try and use the downscale, but at 1680x1050 it wants to downscale to 1120x700, isnt that an odd resolution lol?
 
B

Bensam123

Member
Yeah it's a odd resolution, but it doesn't matter. People can't tell what resolution you stream at unless they look at the specifics of the stream. It's the resolution I stream at. It's so close to 720p it's not even worth stating otherwise.

The other option is to change the height to 720p and increase the width to match that and maintain your 16:10 resolution. 20 pixels wont make much of a difference.
 
S

Suspense

New Member
Bensam123 said:
Yeah it's a odd resolution, but it doesn't matter. People can't tell what resolution you stream at unless they look at the specifics of the stream. It's the resolution I stream at. It's so close to 720p it's not even worth stating otherwise.

The other option is to change the height to 720p and increase the width to match that and maintain your 16:10 resolution. 20 pixels wont make much of a difference.
Click to expand...

Thanks a ton for your advice, downscaling the resolution did help a lot with the cpu issue.

However, the aspect ratio looks really weird now. Twitch is outputting with 2 black borders on left and right side, it looks cramped. Xsplit has an option to ignore aspect ratio, can this be done in obs too?
 
J

jarylc

New Member
I'm also having this problem. I'll follow your thread instead. I don't remember having this problem while I was still on Windows 7 though
 
S

Suspense

New Member
jarylc said:
I'm also having this problem. I'll follow your thread instead. I don't remember having this problem while I was still on Windows 7 though
Click to expand...

I'll admit, while the suggestions in this thread more or less allowed me to keep same quality as before, with "lower" resolution and thus lower cpu usage. I've always streamed at my monitors resolution in windows 7, and never had these cpu issues.

I am definatly certain theres something with obs and windows 8, on some setups thats causing some hiccups. But i can atleast use it for now.
 
J

jarylc

New Member
Suspense said:
jarylc said:
I'm also having this problem. I'll follow your thread instead. I don't remember having this problem while I was still on Windows 7 though
Click to expand...

I'll admit, while the suggestions in this thread more or less allowed me to keep same quality as before, with "lower" resolution and thus lower cpu usage. I've always streamed at my monitors resolution in windows 7, and never had these cpu issues.

I am definatly certain theres something with obs and windows 8, on some setups thats causing some hiccups. But i can atleast use it for now.
Click to expand...

I'll back you up on your last statement for sure. Hopefully we get some light on this soon.
 
B

Bensam123

Member
Unfortunately I haven't stream on W8 so I'll have to take your word(s) for it, but this really does seem like normal CPU usage for that res and processor. Window capture for W8 with OBS is supposed to be quite a bit less stressful on your CPU too (if you use that).

Did you change your native resolution as I pointed out earlier in the thread? It was set to 1680x1080 instead of 1680x1050.

I believe you can disable aspect ratio by clicking on the source>properties. I haven't done it before though, I'm not really a fan of stretching. It's possible to partially crop the image too by setting your resolution for a 16:9 and then making the picture inside bigger then the top and bottom by simply dragging it over the top. You can control the window size beyond the borders.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top