Question / Help QuickSync, Best Rate Control Option???

[BlockAboots]

So up until recently i have been using x264 encoding with veryfast, high, and none presets with a crf of 16 which has been producing nice quality files but the CPU usage if fairly high when using this encoding method. Ive been playing around with QuickSync and the cpu usage is so much lower (4% compared to 65% of x264) but despite the files sizes with QuickSync being ever so slightly larger im not getting anywhere as good video quality, ive been playing around with the different Rate Control options and i think that ICQ is the best one to use??, i have the ICQ quality set to 18 but still the video quality isnt as good as when using x264.

Is there a way to get as good quality with QuickSync as x264 and similar file sizes??

 

[RytoEX]

If you're recording (not streaming), there is a great guide on high quality local recordings here.

 

[BlockAboots]

Yeah there more or less the settings i have (QuickSync, ICQ @18, with high profile) but the quality still doesn't seem as good as x264, especially on dark scenes there appears to be artifacting going on!

 

[RytoEX]

If I recall correctly, the list of best rate control methods for Quick Sync goes like this (best to worst):

1. LA ICQ
2. ICQ
3. CQP
4. LA (VBR)
5. AVBR
6. VBR
7. CBR

However, x264 still produces better quality per bitrate than hardware encoders. If you still want to use Quick Sync, make sure you also set Target Usage to quality. Set the ICQ (or LA ICQ, if you have it) to 15.

If that doesn't work, go back to trying x264:

• Rate Control: CRF
• CRF: 18
• CPU Usage Preset: superfast/ultrafast

 

[havokwrecker]

I am using QuickSync with preset veryfast, profile main, keyframes 3 and ICQ @ 24.
I have tried recording many times and the quality is fine for me, but at times the recording stutters maybe when the game uses too much cpu. However, I want to reduce that. I have already tried running it as admin and increasing process priority but the issue persists. Is there an fix? Also, should I change my keyframes and b-frames settings too much from the default which is 3?