Question / Help Trying to set up for my kid...choppy recording

[hardcorelion]

Hi. I am trying to set up a rig so that my son can create game play youtube videos. We have everything connected and the resulting video (both game and webcam) is choppy...the audio is fine (both game and microphone.). I, admittedly, don't really know the optimal settings nor do I know if this computer can fundamentally handle what we are trying to do. On the attached log, he is making a short recording of himself playing ROBLOX.

Any assistance on the proper OBS settings for optimal video performance would be extremely appreciated. Also, if it is the system that is the problem, if there is any recommendations on what to do there, I would appreciate that too.

Thank you in advance.

His system:
MacBook Pro (13-inch, 2017, Two Thunderbolt 3 ports)
macOS: Sierra 10.12.6
Processor: 2.3 GHz Intel Core i5
Memory: 8 GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3
Graphics: Intel Iris Plus Graphics 640 1536 MB

 

[Narcogen]

From the log:

15:41:07.416: Output 'simple_file_output': Total frames output: 2975
15:41:07.416: Output 'simple_file_output': Total drawn frames: 3001 (3058 attempted)
15:41:07.416: Output 'simple_file_output': Number of lagged frames due to rendering lag/stalls: 57 (1.9%)
15:41:07.416: Video stopped, number of skipped frames due to encoding lag: 1372/2998 (45.8%)

The recording is choppy because your computer can't play the game at that resolution and framerate and record it at that quality simultaneously. There's a bit of rendering lag (meaning the GPU is overloaded) but most of it is encoding lag, meaning the CPU is the bottleneck if you're using software x264 encoding. If available you could switch to the Apple Hardware encoder and see how that works.

Alternatively, you could lower the framerate from 60fps to 30fps, downscale the frame from 1080p to 720p, or increase the CPU preset from veryfast to superfast or ultrafast. Any one or a combination of these changes would most likely eliminate the encoding lag. Experiment with them and what you want to prioritize. If you want fast action, keep 60fps but change your resolution to 720p, for instance.