Small/mini PC recommendations for OBS recording

[Acon]

Hi, I make music educational videos for my YouTube channel. I need small/mini PC (Windows) recommendations for OBS recording. Below is my current setup, and I hope the new PC can do the same good job.

My current PC specs: Intel i7 14700K + 96GB DDR5 RAM + RTX 4070 GPU on an Asus ROG Maximus Z790 motherboard. With plenty I/Os on the back I can do this:

(1) My digital piano is connected to one of the PC’s USB 3.0 ports (for sending the MIDI signal).

(2) An overhead webcam (Insta360 Link 2C) to a 10Gbps USB Type-C port, feeding 1080p 60fps top view of my hands playing the piano.

(3) My DSLR connected to a 10Gbps USB Type-A port via the Elgato Cam Link 4K adapter, feeding clean HDMI output 1080p 60fps of myself talking.

(4) Two external portable 15.6” LCD screens connected to two Thunderbolt 4.0 ports on the PC. One of the screens is for showing sheet music or info on the screen, the other for controlling/monitoring OBS. These little guys support power-through technology so I don’t need any extra power adaptors, which is a big plus to my setup because I want it as tidy as possible.

(5) My audio device Steinberg UR-RT2 is connected to the PC via a USB 3.0 port.

OBS side, I arranged the video/audio sources as below (it’s just one of the combinations; I switch from different scenes. This is the one that uses all of the video sources).

I’m recording 1080p 60fps with NVIDIA NVENC H.264 now. I don’t apply any filters at the moment but I use a plugin called “ASIO plugin for OBS-Studio” to utilise all of the channels of my audio device. Not sure how it consumes the resources though.

Haven’t tried streaming or virtual camera but might use them in the future.

My current PC is quite powerful and capable for this. The results have been really good. The only problem is my PC is in a different room so every time I wanted to record something I needed to move this heavy beast to my studio and reconnect all the cables, etc. It’s quite annoying. I tried to use my 7-year-old Microsoft Surface Book 2 laptop to do this job, but the recorded videos lag with audio and video unsynchronised, which is due to the lack of processing power I reckon. (FYI this laptop has an Intel Core i7-8650U + 16GB LPDDR3 RAM + GTX 1060 GPU)

I want to buy a small/mini PC that is capable of doing the recording as I need here.

(1) It doesn’t need to be as powerful as my current PC but it needs to record at least 1080p 60fps smoothly. No gaming or video editing is required since these can be done on my main PC.

(2) I/O should be plenty enough to meet my requirements here. Better to have two Thunderbolt 3.0/4.0 or USB 3.1 Type-C DP ALT-MODE so I can keep using the two screens without power adaptors.

(3) GPU? Idk because OBS utilises the GPU to help encoding but most mini PC don’t have a discrete GPU. I always used Intel products but I heard some new AMD CPUs have a great integrated GPU. If you know such products that help OBS recording please let me know.

(4) Most importantly, it needs to be as cool and quiet as possible so I don’t record the fan noise into the videos. For this I need to find a PC powerful enough so it doesn’t drive the fan too crazy when taking the load.

A prebuilt small/mini PC is preferred but if no products on the market can meet my need, I don’t mind building a small PC myself.

Any input is appreciated.

Regards,

Acon

 

[Lawrence_SoCal]

The U in the laptop CPU means Ultra long battery life (ie lowest possible performance)... and that CPU is ancient (for real-time video) on top of it. no surprise Surface choked on a real workload [mind you I have a similar model... can even run VMs on it... but not things that are computationally demanding]

My recommendation on things to consider [sorry not an answer, but there are too many variables/assumptions required to answer your question as posted)
- what do you want as an expected system lifetime? I ask as AV1 encoding is likely to become more mainstream in the years to come, and that has very demanding hardware (usually GPU) requirements. A Mini PC with discrete GPU is an option ... though granted., more limited
- I get small size desire... but beware thermal throttling (system slowing itself down to prevent overheating... as system gets smaller, engineering for thermals gets harder/more involved (expensive)... understand your trade-offs / implications of this
Running monitor power via mini PC only makes thermal situation worse... doable, but possibly (probably?) not worth it.
oh, and the extra power runnign thru PC... thermal impact... means fans most likely running louder

I am a fan of Thunderbolt in concept... in Intel reality and deployed systems ... not so much. Saying TB effectively means Intel at this point. Is that truly required? or would some of the USB4 modes work for you? I personally like using DisplayPort MST and daisy-chaining monitors (so single connection from PC).
In my case, my PC is about a 50ft cable run from where I set up livestream. I use a single 50ft fiber DisplayPort cable to drive a dual-monitor setup, and then an Active USB cable/hub... and I'm all set. I say this only as there are options for leaving PC in other room... maybe... depends. [gotta love that answer right? /sarcasm ... sorry]

There are plenty of small system that have discrete GPU options. And it may well be cheaper to get a system that meets your needs now, and replace it sooner (when it not longer suffices) vs getting more powerful/flexible system now... Especially if sticking with 1080p60 H.264... some integrated CPU/GPUs might be able to handle that in your scenario

 

[Acon]

Hi Lawrence_SoCal,

Thanks so much for your reply. That was very insightful and helpful. I also did some research this week and came to a similar conclusion that the mini PC is a bad idea regarding cost-effectiveness and productivity.

I might just go with building my own micro-ATX PC, which seems to be a good balance between size and processing power. It's much cheaper than ITX PCs and mini PCs for the same processing power.

What you said about the DisplayPort MST, long DP cables and daisy-chaining is new to me. Will do some research about it.