Some streaming help (for 2 PC streaming setup)

REVERSEDSKIES · April 16, 2021

Hiya everyone! o/

Recently I have set up a second PC to hopefully be able to stream pretty much everything that my main PC can run, however it seems to not work as well as I thought it would.

My main PC has;

i5 8400

16GB 2666 MHz
GTX 1050 Ti from Asus
My second PC has;

i5 6600
16GB 2133 MHz
GTX 1050 Ti (probably from MSI, low-profile card)

Running on a 7200rpm mechanical drive, no SSD.

Now, I have this all set up using the NDI plugin since I do not have a capture card and am honestly not interested in getting one because I have a feeling this should work just fine.
Now I am not sure what my second PC is capable of. I thought that, since the second system has to do basically nothing but encode a stream to Twitch, I could use NVENC at 6000 bitrate, 320kbps audio at the max quality preset at 1080p60. I'm not sure if a 1050 Ti is actually capable of this, but I have a feeling it might not be. I tried streaming FH4, and while my main PC can run the game at pretty much max settings at 1080p, it seemed that the settings I dialled in didn't go too well. Now, if I lower the bitrate to 5000 and set the preset to quality it runs better but not super smooth, there are still some stutters here and there. I have noticed that the CPU and GPU never really get past 50% utilization, but I'm not sure if this matters. My internet is perfectly capable, I have a 500Mb up and down fibre connection so that shouldn't be an issue. I'm not sure if anyone here has ever tried to stream with a 1050 Ti and can give me some info on what it might actually be capable of or what I could improve? Currently both PCs have a network switch in between them but do not have dual network interfaces so I am limited to just one cable to each PC.

Also, in case you're wondering, my OBS setup is pretty limited. All I really have is just my mic with a few effects on it that are built in to OBS. Other than that it's just captures for my monitor and some specific windows. So no scenes or any overlays or intergrations yet.

I still want to do some more testing when I have the chance but I thought I'd ask here in case someone tried a similar method with a similar streaming PC.

So if anyone has anything I would appreciate any help!

Also, just so you know, I'm not looking for advice on upgrading as people like to mention. This is the hardware that I have and this is the hardware that I'm going to use. So please do not tell me to sell one system and buy a better GPU or something.

LogicalDrm · April 17, 2021

Do you see same issues on recorded stuff that you see on streamed stuff? And you don't see OBS reporting any dropped frames, just these hiccups?

REVERSEDSKIES · April 17, 2021

6 hours ago, LogicalDrm said:

Do you see same issues on recorded stuff that you see on streamed stuff? And you don't see OBS reporting any dropped frames, just these hiccups?

Recording is easier on a system than streaming. A recorded video looks better and runs better with no issues, however my streams are choppy and a blocky mess at my current settings. OBS is reporting 0 dropped frames even though when you watch the stream back you'd think OBS has dropped about 100 frames already in the first 20 seconds so I'm really not sure what's going on here.

LogicalDrm · April 17, 2021

21 minutes ago, REVERSEDSKIES said:

Recording is easier on a system than streaming. A recorded video looks better and runs better with no issues, however my streams are choppy and a blocky mess at my current settings. OBS is reporting 0 dropped frames even though when you watch the stream back you'd think OBS has dropped about 100 frames already in the first 20 seconds so I'm really not sure what's going on here.

If you record and stream with same settings, then the system hardly is the issue. The rendering done is same. The difference is sending data to streaming platform. Which would mean that any issues you have either come from your upload, or the handling of stream in the platform.