Video Capture only showing black screen

[solnarch]

Hi

Recently purchased an HDMI video capture USB card off Amazon intending to use it with OBS studio to allow me to record HDMI feeds from various devices on to my laptop/PC. I connect the original HDMI cable from source system into the input port and use a second HDMI cable connected from output port into my display device (monitor) and the capture card USB port is connected to my laptop/PC USB port I have tried this on several laptops and a PC, all running Windows 10 21h2 and with OBS Studio 27.1.3 (64 bit) installed and quickly end up with a system that only shows a black screen in the preview mode when the source is configured as "Video Capture Device" and the device as "USB Video".

As a simple test system I have used a second monitor connected, using HDMI, to my PC or laptop, and have connected the capture card in the HDMI feed to the monitor, as described above. Plugging the capture card USB into the PC/laptop and watching device manager I see the USB Video driver load under Camera's section. I also see the extended screen output displayed exactly as if connected without the capture card inserted into the HDMI connection. So I know the card is successfully forwarding the HDMI connection through to the target display device and also that the card is being seen by the PC/laptop and the expected driver is loading.

Using a previous similar capture card, using their supplied configuration guidelines for OBS, I found that on initial connection I was able to display the captured HDMI feed on the OBS preview screen and was also able to record the screen on the PC/laptop. However, after 2 or 3 test runs the system seemed to get confused and thereafter reconnecting the card resulted in the black screen being displayed instead of the expected copy of the monitor and all attempts since (restarting the app, rebooting, reconnectiong the different cables in different sequences and trying the USB connection into various USB ports and uninstalling and reinstalling OBS studio) result in still getting the black screen.

I used the OBS logs to check the previous capture card and there seemed to be a problem with data.getdevice failing so I returned that device and bought a similar device from another manaufacturer. Trying the same setup as above I have only ever seen a black screen in ithe preview mode although the monitor display is as expected. However, one key difference I noted was that running the auto-configure tool did actually seem to show more activity in terms of trying different resolutions but I also see lots of failures in loading different modules reported in the log files (see attached) but not sure if this is normal or not ?

I have tried display capture and that works normally but that does not involve this HDMI video capture card so the problem is specific to the OBS Studio capture video function.

My main PC has AMD processors with pretty basic GPU NVIDIA GeForce 210 and no other built in graphics facilities, my main laptop has an Intel I5-6200U processor with Intel HD Graphics 520, I have also used three other laptos with various specs but they all show the same problem, so either I am missing something fundamental in the OBS config or OBS will not work with these kind of cards, although the guidelines with the previous device suggest that they got it working.

Can anyone suggest a solution to this problem, I have googled the problem but always seem to hit the black screen with the Display capture but that clearly is not part of this problem (I only have 1 graphics card in all my devices).

Thanks

John

 

[nbratt2001]

Hi

Recently purchased an HDMI video capture USB card off Amazon intending to use it with OBS studio to allow me to record HDMI feeds from various devices on to my laptop/PC. I connect the original HDMI cable from source system into the input port and use a second HDMI cable connected from output port into my display device (monitor) and the capture card USB port is connected to my laptop/PC USB port I have tried this on several laptops and a PC, all running Windows 10 21h2 and with OBS Studio 27.1.3 (64 bit) installed and quickly end up with a system that only shows a black screen in the preview mode when the source is configured as "Video Capture Device" and the device as "USB Video".

As a simple test system I have used a second monitor connected, using HDMI, to my PC or laptop, and have connected the capture card in the HDMI feed to the monitor, as described above. Plugging the capture card USB into the PC/laptop and watching device manager I see the USB Video driver load under Camera's section. I also see the extended screen output displayed exactly as if connected without the capture card inserted into the HDMI connection. So I know the card is successfully forwarding the HDMI connection through to the target display device and also that the card is being seen by the PC/laptop and the expected driver is loading.

Using a previous similar capture card, using their supplied configuration guidelines for OBS, I found that on initial connection I was able to display the captured HDMI feed on the OBS preview screen and was also able to record the screen on the PC/laptop. However, after 2 or 3 test runs the system seemed to get confused and thereafter reconnecting the card resulted in the black screen being displayed instead of the expected copy of the monitor and all attempts since (restarting the app, rebooting, reconnectiong the different cables in different sequences and trying the USB connection into various USB ports and uninstalling and reinstalling OBS studio) result in still getting the black screen.

I used the OBS logs to check the previous capture card and there seemed to be a problem with data.getdevice failing so I returned that device and bought a similar device from another manaufacturer. Trying the same setup as above I have only ever seen a black screen in ithe preview mode although the monitor display is as expected. However, one key difference I noted was that running the auto-configure tool did actually seem to show more activity in terms of trying different resolutions but I also see lots of failures in loading different modules reported in the log files (see attached) but not sure if this is normal or not ?

I have tried display capture and that works normally but that does not involve this HDMI video capture card so the problem is specific to the OBS Studio capture video function.

My main PC has AMD processors with pretty basic GPU NVIDIA GeForce 210 and no other built in graphics facilities, my main laptop has an Intel I5-6200U processor with Intel HD Graphics 520, I have also used three other laptos with various specs but they all show the same problem, so either I am missing something fundamental in the OBS config or OBS will not work with these kind of cards, although the guidelines with the previous device suggest that they got it working.

Can anyone suggest a solution to this problem, I have googled the problem but always seem to hit the black screen with the Display capture but that clearly is not part of this problem (I only have 1 graphics card in all my devices).

Thanks

John

Having the same problem where the video capture device screen will stay black no matter what I try. I'm using the Avermedia Live Gamer Portable 2 Plus capture card, and for the first few sessions using this card in conjunction with OBS to run my Sony A6000 as a webcam in Discord, it worked perfectly fine. It really was just plug and play, but ever since a few days ago the video capture device source will just stay black. I tried reinstalling OBS multiple times, removing the video capture device and adding it back, as well as making sure all my device settings in OBS matched the settings on the camera, as well as uploading my log files with the help of a dude in the OBS Discord. And nothing worked. I'm going to try returning this card and switching it for an Elgato or one of its counterparts. I may also try a higher quality micro HDMI to HDMI cable to run from the camera to the capture card. Its been very upsetting having to deal with this when it worked no issue for a number of days.

 

[solnarch]

Hi

Recently purchased an HDMI video capture USB card off Amazon intending to use it with OBS studio to allow me to record HDMI feeds from various devices on to my laptop/PC. I connect the original HDMI cable from source system into the input port and use a second HDMI cable connected from output port into my display device (monitor) and the capture card USB port is connected to my laptop/PC USB port I have tried this on several laptops and a PC, all running Windows 10 21h2 and with OBS Studio 27.1.3 (64 bit) installed and quickly end up with a system that only shows a black screen in the preview mode when the source is configured as "Video Capture Device" and the device as "USB Video".

As a simple test system I have used a second monitor connected, using HDMI, to my PC or laptop, and have connected the capture card in the HDMI feed to the monitor, as described above. Plugging the capture card USB into the PC/laptop and watching device manager I see the USB Video driver load under Camera's section. I also see the extended screen output displayed exactly as if connected without the capture card inserted into the HDMI connection. So I know the card is successfully forwarding the HDMI connection through to the target display device and also that the card is being seen by the PC/laptop and the expected driver is loading.

Using a previous similar capture card, using their supplied configuration guidelines for OBS, I found that on initial connection I was able to display the captured HDMI feed on the OBS preview screen and was also able to record the screen on the PC/laptop. However, after 2 or 3 test runs the system seemed to get confused and thereafter reconnecting the card resulted in the black screen being displayed instead of the expected copy of the monitor and all attempts since (restarting the app, rebooting, reconnectiong the different cables in different sequences and trying the USB connection into various USB ports and uninstalling and reinstalling OBS studio) result in still getting the black screen.

I used the OBS logs to check the previous capture card and there seemed to be a problem with data.getdevice failing so I returned that device and bought a similar device from another manaufacturer. Trying the same setup as above I have only ever seen a black screen in ithe preview mode although the monitor display is as expected. However, one key difference I noted was that running the auto-configure tool did actually seem to show more activity in terms of trying different resolutions but I also see lots of failures in loading different modules reported in the log files (see attached) but not sure if this is normal or not ?

I have tried display capture and that works normally but that does not involve this HDMI video capture card so the problem is specific to the OBS Studio capture video function.

My main PC has AMD processors with pretty basic GPU NVIDIA GeForce 210 and no other built in graphics facilities, my main laptop has an Intel I5-6200U processor with Intel HD Graphics 520, I have also used three other laptos with various specs but they all show the same problem, so either I am missing something fundamental in the OBS config or OBS will not work with these kind of cards, although the guidelines with the previous device suggest that they got it working.

Can anyone suggest a solution to this problem, I have googled the problem but always seem to hit the black screen with the Display capture but that clearly is not part of this problem (I only have 1 graphics card in all my devices).

Thanks

John

OK playing around finally decided to uninstall the 64bit version and try the 32 bit version and guess what - now I am getting video capture correctly previewing my test screen (which is displaying the task manager - performance tab, i.e. constantly changing display and whats better is that it is recording this and I can play it back ok.

So can anybody explain why the 64 bit version of OBS won't work on a 64 bit processor and operating system but seems to work (at least on my PC) when the 32 bit version is installed ?

 

[solnarch]

OK playing around finally decided to uninstall the 64bit version and try the 32 bit version and guess what - now I am getting video capture correctly previewing my test screen (which is displaying the task manager - performance tab, i.e. constantly changing display and whats better is that it is recording this and I can play it back ok.

So can anybody explain why the 64 bit version of OBS won't work on a 64 bit processor and operating system but seems to work (at least on my PC) when the 32 bit version is installed ?

OK just more confusing, I tried installing the 32bit version on my 1 year old Windows 10 (21H2) laptop and that still stubbornly gives a black screen when trying video capture - what is going on ?

 

[NeverQui]

Something similar is happening with me, but on Mac. No idea why. It just started all of a sudden.

I was able to get the video capture feed back by switching scene collections, and then switching back. That worked for a while, and then OBS started freezing/crashing on me.

Then I downloaded the OBS beta and the black screen would appear half the time. When it did, I was able to switch scene collections without OBS freezing or crashing.

Trying to solve a different problem, I read a suggestion on this forum that recommended creating a new profile. I did, and now I can change scene collections without freezing or crashing on the non-beta version of OBS.

Not a fix, but hope it helps. I've got my fingers crossed that the next update to OBS will solve this for me. Good luck!

 

[AidenDavis]

Hey bro, sometimes, my obs show black screen while recording games, and below are several reasons for the black screen
● The PC’s error
● The OBS Studio itself
● Permission to capture
● Software conflict
● Multi-GPU recording environment
● The target content of recording is copy protected
I searched google and find this detailed article, hope it helps you too.
[Fixed] OBS Black Screen Error on Game/Display/Browser Capture