How to broadcast live gaming with Twitch?

Kain

Kain

Well-known member
Rage3D Subscriber
Just signed-up today. However, I noticed you have different options for software(?) that allow you to broadcast live. Which is best? Which should I use?
 
all depends really. I am in the process of writing a guide/review of all available options within reason.

I can tell you the short of it right now.

Dxtory's Directshow output into a streaming program (OBS,FFsplit, X-Split) will give anyone the best quality and least amount of performance impact shy of using a dedicated capture card. It is hands down the best method available. It will also work great with any game and whether you use crossfire or SLI supports windowed and fullscreen, it is basically flawless and perfect and worth every penny.
It is better than using the game capture in obs or xsplit, it is dxtorys ace in the hole and why so many people use it. Also the only program that offers this feature.


Secondly, I can say that for free OBS is probably the best solution you can get for actually streaming content. If you're willing to spend some money, then in all honesty X-Split is more functional. The features are easier to use, and provide more functionality. That said, it is debatable that those features are that much better to justify the price of X-Split. If X-split was 9/10, I'd say OBS is 8.5 /10 and it is free. OBS would be the winner clearly. I use X-Split though, because of the extra functionality.


Some other tips:

If you want a twitch chat overlay in your stream, then use CHATTY.

If you want a twitch chat overlay in your game that you can use while in game use Trillian.

I will work on getting the guide/review setup. I tested, OBS, FF-Split, Action!, Raptr, Overwolf, Playclaw and X-Split broadcaster and X-Split gamecaster.

Nothing has the features of OBS and X-Split broadcaster however.

Gamecaster is pretty neat in that while in game you can hit a hotkey and draw on the screen which would be cool for some people who do in game streaming guides.


Here is OBS + DXTORY at 1440p all ultra 4xmsaa and high post process AA streaming at 720p/30 fps with dxtory and obs. think it was the x264 codec.

http://www.twitch.tv/the9quad/b/601847927

that is how well dxtory does.

here is chatty and trillian

http://www.twitch.tv/the9quad/c/5760474
 
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Ok, this seems it is a little more complicated that I thought. :p

When I originally signed-up, I thought it was as simple as creating a Twitch account and using a "pre-defined" software for the stream.
 
Kain said:
Ok, this seems it is a little more complicated that I thought. :p

When I originally signed-up, I thought it was as simple as creating a Twitch account and using a "pre-defined" software for the stream.
Click to expand...

You can, just use shadowplay if you have Nvidia or Raptr if you have AMD. Those are pretty much one step twitch programs.

There are other one step twitch programs as well, but they aren't free like the above: Action! and Playclaw are both pretty decent but they are like $40.

Thing is, on sites like this, people usually want to spend time tweaking and getting the best quality. That is why I suggested Dxtory and OBS. For example: If someone on here said, "what is a good phone?", and someone said "Apple", you'd have people coming out of the wood work saying why they might be easy to use, they are limited- therefore you should use X phone instead.

So if you want easy, but limited functionality and not the greatest quality- use Shadowplay (since you have a titan) if you want to mess around and tweak things until you get a nice looking stream with overlays and crap use Dxtory and OBS.
 
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t0adp1p3 said:
You can, just use shadowplay if you have Nvidia or Raptr if you have AMD. Those are pretty much one step twitch programs.

There are other one step twitch programs as well, but they aren't free like the above: Action! and Playclaw are both pretty decent but they are like $40.

Thing is, on sites like this, people usually want to spend time tweaking and getting the best quality. That is why I suggested Dxtory and OBS. For example: If someone on here said, "what is a good phone?", and someone said "Apple", you'd have people coming out of the wood work saying why they might be easy to use, they are limited- therefore you should use X phone instead.

So if you want easy, but limited functionality and not the greatest quality- use Shadowplay (since you have a titan) if you want to mess around and tweak things until you get a nice looking stream with overlays and crap use Dxtory and OBS.
Click to expand...

So what is the best program if I want the best quality stream? Has to be free though.
 
caveman-jim said:
AMD Gaming Evolved app does this.
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No disrespect to gaming evolved, but it has a lot of issues:
  1. The performance hit is pretty high (even though it is using AMD VCE).
    (I think maybe the Raptr people need to take a look at Action! version 1.17.3.0, that version of Action! uses AMD APP for streaming and it is pretty much zero performance hit, and it works in crossfire. Ironically, Mirriilis has since broken it in the latest version...)
  2. Raptr can't stream in crossfire without it automatically disabling all cards but one.
  3. No ability to add an overlay for an external camera or any overlays to your stream for that matter.
  4. Streaming resolutions are limited to 100%, 50%, and 25% of your game resolution. (This means if you game at 1440p you cant stream at 1080p. if you game at 1080p you can't stream at 720p etc..).

It's a nice start, and it is free, but it is all but useless really for streaming. It is a handy app for other stuff if you don't have crossfire though.

So that would be the pros:
  1. it is free
  2. it is stupidly easy to use
  3. it can do some other stuff (the twitch chat overlay is pretty nice if you don't use crossfire).
 
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caveman-jim said:
none of the tests Ive seen who any performance hit like you describe, most I've seen is ~3%. I'll check on the rest.
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well probably because I am using crossfire i see the performance hit. But the difference between AMD APP and AMD VCE is night and day.

raptr using AMD VCE notice the framerate in the corner:
http://www.twitch.tv/the9quad/b/601362118

Action! 1.17.3.0 using AMD APP

http://www.twitch.tv/the9quad/b/601709444

believe me man I am not knocking raptr, I think it is a great thing for free. It just has issues when streaming.

If you guys at AMD took a look at what Dxtory does with directshow output, holy balls that would be amazing. I think picking up that guy from radeonpro was a sweet move, would be cool if they started implementing the stuff in radeonpro that people loved. I think AMD is poised to do some great stuff, and I hope they do.
 
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