Question / Help Two PC setup

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TriAtlasGaming

Member
I am hoping that somebody here could assist me in what hardware I need to accomplish a two PC setup for live streaming.

I am planning a build for the second PC, which will most likely be an AMD FX-8350 (will then overclock to at least 4.5Ghz or higher). This PC will execute 100% of the encoding for live streaming.

I understand that I'll need a capture card; can I use an external one? For example: AverMedia Live Gamer Protable.

What else do I need?


Thank you!
 
Krazy

Krazy

Town drunk
If you are building a second PC for dedicated streaming, you really shouldn't skimp out and get an external capture card. They tend to suck a lot more than not, and internal cap cards in general are just much much much easier to deal with.
 
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playboy223

New Member
Krazy said:
If you are building a second PC for dedicated streaming, you really shouldn't skimp out and get an external capture card. They tend to suck a lot more than not, and internal cap cards in general are just much much much easier to deal with.
Click to expand...


the fx are cheap enough


well if you want to play new games, you need at least 4 cores, i5+ video card will be more expensive
 
Krazy

Krazy

Town drunk
playboy223 said:
Krazy said:
If you are building a second PC for dedicated streaming, you really shouldn't skimp out and get an external capture card. They tend to suck a lot more than not, and internal cap cards in general are just much much much easier to deal with.
Click to expand...


the fx are cheap enough


well if you want to play new games, you need at least 4 cores, i5+ video card will be more expensive
Click to expand...

I was talking about capture card choices. AMD FX processors are completely reasonable for a dedicated streaming PC. However, unlike Sandy/Ivy/Haswell processors, you will need to get a GPU as well.
 
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TriAtlasGaming

Member
I totally forgot about the Intel CPU's with their on-die GPU's.

I want to stream 1080p @ 60fps. Is the i7 4770k more than enough?

I might also use a Fast or Medium preset as well.
 
dodgepong

dodgepong

Administrator
Community Helper
I strongly recommend against 1080p60 streaming. Flash is a huge resource hog for viewers, and unless they have a very modern computer, viewers will have a hard time even watching the stream.
 
Krazy

Krazy

Town drunk
I have never once seen 1080p60fps played back smoothly in the Flash player, and I'm on a heavily overclocked 2600k and a GTX 670. The bitrate/decoding requirements for any decent picture quality are pretty much completely unreasonable as well, as Dodgepong mentioned.
 
Boildown

Boildown

Active Member
Keeping what Krazy and dodgepong said about 1080p60 streaming in mind...

If you want to stream at a high quality preset like medium, you should get one of the six-core Intel CPUs, like the i7-4930K or i7-3930K. Even for something like 1080p 30FPS or 720p 60FPS, my i7 2600k at 4.3GHz couldn't do medium smoothly when using a capture card for 2nd-PC streaming.

That said, I don't think shooting for medium is a worthy goal compared to the costs and headaches. Fast or Faster is fine, you'll be able to do that with any of the i7 Sandy, Ivy, or Haswells. Probably that AMD 8350 as well (though I'm not sure of that since I don't have one).

The really cool thing about going with Intel is Quicksync. If you want to save a high quality copy to your hard drive in addition to the bitrate-constrained version you stream, use Quicksync and run two instances of OBS at the same time. Quicksync at a high bitrate to the hard drive, run at whatever preset you can manage to the internet.

Alternatively, you don't even need to get a high-end CPU or a separate video card and you just do one stream. The i3-4330 has Intel's latest integrated graphics, is an inexpensive dual core, and you can use Quicksync to stream with it. You save a bunch of money on the CPU and graphics card in exchange for giving ground on your preset requirement.

If you already have a spare capable video card and don't care about saving a local copy, then the AMD 8350 seems like a pretty good deal. Those eight cores will do a lot for you.
 
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TriAtlasGaming

Member
BUMP.


I have an i7 laptop. I was wondering I could just use this laptop as my second pc for dedicated encoding?

If so, what do I need for this method?

two pc streaming with a laptop.
 
dodgepong

dodgepong

Administrator
Community Helper
You would need a USB capture card. If your laptop has an Intel or Renesas USB 3.0 port, you can use something like the Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1. If not, then you're stuck with USB 2.0 capture cards. Probably the least-bad USB 2.0 option would be an Elgato Game Capture HD.
 
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TriAtlasGaming

Member
dodgepong said:
You would need a USB capture card. If your laptop has an Intel or Renesas USB 3.0 port, you can use something like the Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1. If not, then you're stuck with USB 2.0 capture cards. Probably the least-bad USB 2.0 option would be an Elgato Game Capture HD.
Click to expand...

What about the AverMedia Live Gamer Portable?

That is readily available for me at the moment.
 
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bruschetta

New Member
TriAtlasGaming said:
dodgepong said:
You would need a USB capture card. If your laptop has an Intel or Renesas USB 3.0 port, you can use something like the Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1. If not, then you're stuck with USB 2.0 capture cards. Probably the least-bad USB 2.0 option would be an Elgato Game Capture HD.
Click to expand...

What about the AverMedia Live Gamer Portable?

That is readily available for me at the moment.
Click to expand...

I came to this forum specifically to research this exact question...

I too have an I7 laptop,
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16834230692
and would rather use this to encode for my stream. At the moment i have the Avermedia Live Gamer HD C985 in my Gaming PC, and use this in congruence with xsplit to stream 720p @ 60fps. However, i have been trying to convince myself in using my laptop as a secondary/streaming PC - though, since I am unable to use the internal C985 card w/ my laptop, the Avermedia HD Portable came to mind.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815100150

To experienced streamers, or people who have experience in setting up duel pc's to stream games - is this possible? It would save a whole lot of time and money in building a secondary PC, knowing that my, more than viable ultrabook is readily available.
 
dodgepong

dodgepong

Administrator
Community Helper
That would "work", though I can think of many other better options besides the LGP. For example, if you have an Intel or Renesas USB 3.0 port, you can't go wrong with the Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1.
 
Boildown

Boildown

Active Member
Just from reading these forums and not any hands on experience of my own, it would seem that the performance of the LGP isn't up to par and there are issues getting it to even work at all with OBS.
 
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bruschetta

New Member
dodgepong said:
That would "work", though I can think of many other better options besides the LGP. For example, if you have an Intel or Renesas USB 3.0 port, you can't go wrong with the Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1.
Click to expand...

Are you referring to my post? I will take a look at the "Micomsoft XCAPTURE-1"
 
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