Running OBS with a low end computer

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OntarioWX

New Member
I'll cut to the chase here. I'm trying to run OBS on a computer that is.. not so good.

I don't have the money for RAM and I'm wondering if you guys can help me.

I tried assessing the situation yesterday, but the stream started lagging overtime.

Here are my computer specs and info.

HP Laptop Pavillion G7-1333ca c/w a new battery
Intel Core i3-2350M
6GB Memory 640GB HHD
Intel HD Graphics 3000
1600 x 900
Windows 10
 
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AaronD

Active Member
Hoo boy!

The more literate you are with the internal workings of computers, the better you can do this. People *have* done this sort of thing, but it often involves wacky settings in places you wouldn't expect, for reasons that require some pretty deep knowledge to even think of. It quickly becomes specific to that one rig, and impossible to do via a non-technical "game of telephone".

How do your (personal) skills line up with that?
 
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AaronD

Active Member
OntarioWX said:
...the stream started lagging overtime.

Here are my computer specs and info.

HP Laptop Pavillion G7-1333ca...
Click to expand...
Laptops are bad at this in general. The problem is not the specs. It's thermal management.

Unless it has a thick and heavy for-real cooling system ("Mobile Workstation" is the industry term for that), and not just a token fan, it's going to heat up and slow down to protect itself. *That's* when your stream dies.

Desktops don't have that problem, and (as above) neither do "Mobile Workstation" laptops. But the vast majority of laptops, do.
They're designed to be light enough to be trivially portable (you definitely notice a MW!), and to load something quickly, and then sit and cool off while the user looks at it. Live media production doesn't allow it that "time to rest".
 
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OntarioWX

New Member
AaronD said:
Hoo boy!

The more literate you are with the internal workings of computers, the better you can do this. People *have* done this sort of thing, but it often involves wacky settings in places you wouldn't expect, for reasons that require some pretty deep knowledge to even think of. It quickly becomes specific to that one rig, and impossible to do via a non-technical "game of telephone".

How do your (personal) skills line up with that?
Click to expand...

Uhh, zero experience with OBS or computers in general. I do severe weather streams so it’s kinda crucial that I do get these streams running
 
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rockbottom

Active Member
Gen6 & older iGPU's are no longer supported. You'll have a better shot of getting traction using OBS v27.2.4. It's the last version that supports your iGPU for encoding. Unfortunately, it may require an update your iGPU driver but test with what's installed first. The drivers are really old & you may already have the latest installed

I provided the link to get it from Intel but since you're running an HP it might be a good idea to check their support page first.

Intel® Core™ i3-2350M Processor (3M Cache, 2.30 GHz) Downloads, Drivers and Software | Intel

Intel® Core™ i3-2350M Processor (3M Cache, 2.30 GHz) - Download supporting resources inclusive drivers, software, bios, and firmware updates.
www.intel.com www.intel.com

v27.2.4 is near the bottom of the page. Click on Assets
github.com

Releases · obsproject/obs-studio

OBS Studio - Free and open source software for live streaming and screen recording - obsproject/obs-studio
github.com github.com
 
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AaronD

Active Member
rockbottom said:
OBS v27.2.4
Click to expand...
That may get things going, but it also sets a trap:

Any upgrade across the v27 / v28 boundary, breaks a lot! Pretty much requires a complete rebuild, without warning, because the old rig is hosed even if you downgrade back to what it was! That was NOT handled very well at all! So here's the warning that should have been there from the start, and still isn't there officially, because it's old enough now that "it is what it is".
 
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rockbottom

Active Member
Should be OK, might have to settle for 720p or lower. Keep expectations modest & it should get you by until you can pick up another rig.
 
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rockbottom

Active Member
Post the log from the session, I'll be back in a couple of hours or someone else will help you further.

Please post a log with your issue! Here's how...

OBS Studio creates a log file each time you run it which contains very useful diagnostic information. Without a log file, it's much harder for any support volunteers to figure out problems and your post may be ignored. To upload a log file, go to the Help menu > Log Files > Upload Last Log...
obsproject.com obsproject.com
 
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Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
OntarioWX said:
Uhh, zero experience with OBS or computers in general. I do severe weather streams so it’s kinda crucial that I do get these streams running
Click to expand...

The old Project Mgmt axiom regarding - Speed, Cost, & Quality. You only get to pick 2, the 3rd is derived from choice of first two (ie if you want it quick and cheap, it isn't going to be any good)

You have a grossly under-powered (and ancient at 13+ generations old) Mobile CPU (optimized for battery life over performance) for real-time video encoding, that with expertise (both in Operating System and OBS Studio optimizations), might be able to be made to work, and even then only with low expectations on the stream. Expect to spend a fair amount of time if a stable stream platform is important [saying this as someone who literally has decades of experience in this OS optimization realm]. I tried some 720/1080p streaming 5 years ago on a much more powerful rig (4 generations newer i5 than yours, Nvidia discrete GPU, etc) than what you have, and with the other Source constraints I had, couldn't get it to work reliably. And I spent a fair amount of time on that [granted, with what I know now... maybe... but you will have a steep (and likely time-consuming trial and error) learning curve. If you have the time and patience, go for it.]
And then, this fall, your Windows OS computer will stop being able to get Operating System security updates (if you are on Win10 already?? if not, that has its own issues). And you want to connect to/stream to the Internet, so unless you were an IT security expert, you'll need a new computer to run Win11 (or migrate existing PC to Linux and learn whole new environment). For lower-end mini PCs, for lightweight streaming, some new systems aren't that expensive (but not free) though don't expect such low-end system to grow into 4K AV1 video in the years to come (likely to become the new streaming standard (vs H.264) in a new systems lifetime)

All of this to mean... do NOT expect this to be easy. And then you may have to replace it soon anyway.
With realistic expectations, I wish you good luck

There are numerous threads on this forum on optimizing basics for an under-powered system (from OBS Studio perspective, not re-scaling, not using Studio Mode, ensuring all audio devices using same sampling rate, avoiding CPU intensive plugins, filters, effects, etc.)
 
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OntarioWX

New Member
Lawrence_SoCal said:
The old Project Mgmt axiom regarding - Speed, Cost, & Quality. You only get to pick 2, the 3rd is derived from choice of first two (ie if you want it quick and cheap, it isn't going to be any good)

You have a grossly under-powered (and ancient at 13+ generations old) Mobile CPU (optimized for battery life over performance) for real-time video encoding, that with expertise (both in Operating System and OBS Studio optimizations), might be able to be made to work, and even then only with low expectations on the stream. Expect to spend a fair amount of time if a stable stream platform is important [saying this as someone who literally has decades of experience in this OS optimization realm]. I tried some 720/1080p streaming 5 years ago on a much more powerful rig (4 generations newer i5 than yours, Nvidia discrete GPU, etc) than what you have, and with the other Source constraints I had, couldn't get it to work reliably. And I spent a fair amount of time on that [granted, with what I know now... maybe... but you will have a steep (and likely time-consuming trial and error) learning curve. If you have the time and patience, go for it.]
And then, this fall, your Windows OS computer will stop being able to get Operating System security updates (if you are on Win10 already?? if not, that has its own issues). And you want to connect to/stream to the Internet, so unless you were an IT security expert, you'll need a new computer to run Win11 (or migrate existing PC to Linux and learn whole new environment). For lower-end mini PCs, for lightweight streaming, some new systems aren't that expensive (but not free) though don't expect such low-end system to grow into 4K AV1 video in the years to come (likely to become the new streaming standard (vs H.264) in a new systems lifetime)

All of this to mean... do NOT expect this to be easy. And then you may have to replace it soon anyway.
With realistic expectations, I wish you good luck

There are numerous threads on this forum on optimizing basics for an under-powered system (from OBS Studio perspective, not re-scaling, not using Studio Mode, ensuring all audio devices using same sampling rate, avoiding CPU intensive plugins, filters, effects, etc.)
Click to expand...
Oh. That honestly sucks

Do you have any.. recommendations for me. In the past I’ve been using streaming and well, not the best software ever
 
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AaronD

Active Member
OntarioWX said:
Do you have any.. recommendations for me. In the past I’ve been using streaming and well, not the best software ever
Click to expand...
Desktop if you can. It's the cheaper way to avoid thermal throttling. They can be made "luggable" too, if that's all you need. Mobile Workstations are expensive.

Stick with OBS. It's not the software that takes a ton of juice. It's the content that you push through it, or the amount of data that you make it crunch. Unless it's intentionally degrading behind your back, or it's written spectacularly poorly, any software will have similar performance with similar content.

Make absolutely sure that you have a graphics card (GPU) that supports video ENcoding. The popular choice is nVidia's NVENC (creative name, I know), but others exist too, and work with OBS. Not all GPU's can encode video, so make sure that yours does. Not having that, puts a big load on the CPU. If you have a monster CPU, then that can be okay, but it does take a lot.

If you can satisfy that, the other specs almost come along for free. Do check them of course, but they're usually okay.
 
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Lawrence_SoCal

Active Member
I'm full of opinions... but really any recommendations depends on requirements, expectations (as in, WAY more detail than posted here, if trying to be value conscious), as well as budget & timeline, etc. If you know (or have time and are willing to learn) Linux, then a gently used rig, running Linux might be your best value proposition (if you can get decent used PCs for cheap in your local area... depends). Want to stick with Windows, then you need a PC with TPM2.0 and Win11 compatibility, and more than minimum OS requirements in terms of RAM, GPU, etc. A discrete GPU will keep CPU requirements down but for non-demanding 1080p30 H.264, some iGPUs will be plenty/fine, and probably keep overall cost down.

Though it would take some research, there are some recent Mini PCs with an iGPU that might suffice, is space is at a premium.
If a desktop is a space problem, then make sure laptop has a REALLY good thermal solution (I too like mobile workstations, but they can be expensive). Avoid anything mobile marketed as thin and light. The step down from mobile workstations would be some gaming laptops (thermal solutions better than basic consumer laptop, but what you need depends on hardware resource demands, and your sounds like a 24/7 stream ?? ... so thermals will be critical... basically a laptop is NOT a good fit for 24/7 streaming (again, guessing that is yoru plan, or close to it... ie not short video clips with lots of time for system to cool down afterwards)

And, unfortunately, with recent tech change in progress, I wouldn't plan for a long (5+yr) new system life, as only the most recent (and therefore pricey) of discrete GPUs can handle real-time AV1 encoding today. but that is just a guess. If you get a desktop, at least you'll be able to upgrade GPU (vs buying new system) in the years to come if/when desired for new video encode offloading
 
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