I was afraid this was going to be about twitch aiming and was prepared to be disappointed

that's a tutorial for another day...

Also, unrelated but if any of you ever have any questions about setting up your stream, you can contact me through this thread or TFTV message and I'll get back to you ASAP.

Hope to see some more high level players stream their POV in officials like Exxon is doing

Coming from personal experience, Kevin made setting up OBS much, much easier than any guide I found did. Definitely worth watching.

my fps drops when i stream from a regular 200+ to 60-100. Is this just because of my hardware or could my quality settings possibly be too high/unoptimized?

hardware specs:
amd phenom II @ 3.4ghz
radeon hd 6970
gigabyte 990FXA-UD3
4 gb ram

obs settings screenshots

I would recommend making a video talking about what draws in viewers, and what pushes them away. Not about what to stream, because you should just stream what you like, but how to keep viewers so that streaming is interesting for the broadcaster and the viewers.

A lot of people make mistakes like video/audio issues or music that turns people off, and it would be helpful for new streamers and old ones.

Yes, it's the hardware. 720p 30fps is very demanding for a Phenom II. (Also 1000 bitrate is too low for that resolution, so i'm willing to bet your stream looks pixellated whenever there's movement)

Try changing "Encoding profile" in your advanced options to "high" rather than "main". Regardless, you're really trying to push that poor cpu further than it was intended to go. 720p30fps streaming WITH a cpu intensive game like tf2 is not gonna bode well for anything other than a top of the line processor.

If you're looking at upgrading to resolve this, you may just want to go for a cheap-ish motherboard with an integrated Nvidia graphics card. You can use that rather than stacking all that work on your processor.

Also 1000kbps is probably not going to create a good looking 720p game. You could probably get away with it with a game like hearthstone, but it's just not gonna cut it for an fps.

gl!

edit

The thing with that is that I'm not exactly to keen on this stuff. I stream mainly so I can hang out with some friends I've met through my chat. I can potentially talk about what I find interesting about streaming, but that doesn't really overlap with what keeps viewers or anything.

I will be working on common problems with streams tech-wise (if that's what you meant), but that's all I'm really good at.

you'd be right! :(

okay, i'll give it a try, thanks guys

do you think getting a better cpu that fits the am3+ socket on my current mobo is worth it at all? or should i just save for a different mobo/intel cpu?

Yes. The AM3+ socket boasts what some think is an actually stronger chip for livestreaming than an equal-costing i7. The FX Black is an extremely powerful CPU for multitasking, check it out.

http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/controller/home?O=&sku=1095661&gclid=CjwKEAjwmfKpBRC8tb3Mh5rs23ASJACWy1QPlKXricuz6qb8myYcd-fEn9gzAA14IArElcMhouWNqhoCD_Pw_wcB&Q=&is=REG&A=details

wow thanks a ton! i'll definitely look into getting one of these.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EyVPVnTEzN0

I'd love feedback on how much these makes sense. It makes sense to me because I've been using OBS for 2 years, but I have no idea if what I'm saying can be interpreted as anything close to coherent.

I found these tutorials helpful and easy to follow, nice job dog

I knew what you were trying to explain when you started talking about the Global Sources, but the first example you gave made it unclear because you weren't actively showing it in a typical scene/source setup, but once you included the Initialize scene it was much more clear. Otherwise solid tut

#12
You got something mixed up there.
There are no equal-costing i7s. That's the point.
2 Years ago the FXs traded blows with the i5s, FX > i5 for multithreaded (the other way round for singlethreaded).
While today I wouldn't recommend them anymore, they're still a cheap upgrade if you got an AM3+ mobo.
Cheap being the main point. 220$ isn't cheap.

Overclocking an FX-8320/8350 is a far better idea than buying an FX-9370 or even 9590.

I'd recommend buying an aftermarket cooler anyway, the 125W FX are known for overheating, what do you think will happen with a 220W SKU?

Sorry, I was in a rush writing that, and I should have worded it much, MUCH better. The FX is a better option per $ if you factor in the cost of a new motherboard as well. Better to keep the AM3+ socket, and just upgrade the CPU than to change everything.

old

The reason that's happening is because you're trying to stream 1080p at 60FPS. I'd recommend a lower resolution (something like 720p) if you're going to stay at 60FPS. You could also do 1080p at 30FPS.

Chrome is a resource hog too.

awesome, I've been thinking about loading up the stream again but have been bouncing around different tutorials, these seem like they can help, thanks

Glad you guys like the resource. I'll be making more of them now that I'm back home with a more optimal setup.

Should I use NVENC? I have an i7 3770k so it can easily handle streaming
Can I have a global source to have the same positioning and size on all my scenes?

also, would like to see how to get mumble overlay on stream, without capturing whole monitor

@alfie

Try NVENC. It will probably help you out, especially in CPU intensive games like TF2. It all depends how good your integrated gfx card is.

As for mumble overlay, there's a plugin. That's what the next tutorial is for, but here's a link to the plugin itself http://catchexception.org/downloads/mumble-overlay-plugin/

You need to run in 64bit for any plugin to work... I thought I had done something wrong for ages :P

That's new, I've seen plugins work fine on 32-bit OBS

OBS installs two instances of itself on your computer: one 32 bit and one 64 bit. If you only put your plugin in the 64 bit OBS it will only run in 64 bits. I will cover this in more detail in the video.

That's not how it works.

NVENC needs a ton of bandwidth to get decent quality, forget about it.

That depends on your needs. If you're primarily focused on the game working well over the steam, NVENC is very good. I recommend trying it to see if it works well for you.

At the same bitrate, it's comparable to a very fast or lower x264 encoding.

Ok, I'll elaborate.

NVENC on an integrated gfx card? Integrated into what? A PC? That's called a dedicated graphics card.

NVENC at x264 streaming bitrates looks like shit.
https://obsproject.com/forum/threads/obs-benchmarking-1080p-60fps-cpu-vs-nvenc-vs-quick-sync.15963/

To sum it up
https://obsproject.com/forum/threads/new-nvenc-presets.18900/page-3#post-130579
x264 will always win for streaming.
The only reason to use NVENC or Quicksync is if your CPU can't handle x264. With a 3770K it'd be plain stupid.

Got a new PC and was finally able to test your (and other peoples') claims (not the reason i got the new pc, but a good little bonus).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXMGlhB1fEc

Looks pretty much exactly the same as x264 on anything lower than "veryfast".

Also, more tutorials coming soon because now I can actually have a decent workflow because I don't have a five year old entry level gaming PC anymore. So yeah, get hypee etc