So I decided to test out OBS today and see what kind of performance hit it would take. This wasn't intended on being a full write up and as i've spent about 6 hours messing with OBS today this is just essentially a haphazard list of my findings. Wasn't sure where else to post so as this was primarily testing the CPU I thought it could go here :) Mods feel free to move to more appropriate category if suitable.
The game under test was Alien Isolation.
These are my computer specs:
i5 [email protected]
Noctua U14S
8gb DDR3 corsair vengance @ 1600
GTX 980
Asus P8Z77V -LK
Dell U3415w.
I had to change the desktop resolution from 3440x1440 (native) to 2560x1440. Then adjust the ingame resolution from there. This is due to the 21:9 aspect ratio creating black bars in OBS. The 2560x1440 allows for 16:9 and no black bars on recording with OBS.
Test 1:
Native Resolution: 2560x1440
Downscaled: 1920x1080
FPS: 60FPS
Result: Choppy and terribly poor gameplay and capture. I used the x264 codec as well as nvidia codec. Neither worked very well.
Test 2:
Native Resolution: 2560x1440
Downscaled: 1920x1080
FPS: 30PS
Result: x264 was still unsuable. The Nvidia codec worked surprisingly well, the gameplay was pretty smooth but there was a horrible bloom effect that wasn't quite ghosting but was still absolutely horrid to look at. This was the nvidia codec behaving well.
Test 3:
Native Resolution: 1920x1080
Downscaled: 1920x1080
FPS: 60PS
Result:SCPU usage still going up to 100% straight away and semi choppy and stuttery gameplay. Nvidia codec still giving bad examples of bloom.
Test 4:
Native Resolution: 1920x1080
Downscaled: 720p
FPS: 30PS
The x264 codec was viable at this resolution. It produced acceptable quality footage that didn't stutter both in gameplay and in game. The Nvidia codec also worked very well in game but while the recordings were better they are still not as sharp as the x264. Through fairly fast mouse movements from side to side the bloom comes back, not as significantly as higher resolutions but still noticeable enough for it to look bad on the recording. CPU usage sat at around 60-70% sometimes spiking to 100. Exampleof the x264 quality.
I was also recording with a microphone as well and had a chrome browser open as, personally i'll be also recording with a facecam also (which I don't have yet). I was attempting to use up a little extra ram and cpu cycles to emulate that.
Outcome:
An i5 is ok to record with at 1920x1080p with the x264. With the settings I used - can post screenshots if people would like to see I was getting good framerates and quality local recordings. The Nvidia Codec doesn't really hold up in terms of quality but the smoothness of the recording is better than the x264.
If anyone has some experience with game capture who would like to chime in on the most efficient way to record locally please do! I'm all ears I'd ideally like to record locally at 1080p 60fps and apart from upgrading to a i7 4790k or X99 system i'm not sure how. (I did look into game capture but i don't think they would work with my setup).
My aim is to be able to capture gameplay at 1920x1080 natively at 60 fps, starting with Alien Isolation and for it to be of high enough quality to put on youtube that looks professional.
Request:
If someone has an i7 and alien isolation if you could please do a recording at 1920x1080p downscaled to 720p at 60 frames just so I could get an idea of the performance that would be very much appreciated!