Couple of noob questions for the Streamers...

[Weekapaug]

I've been screwing around with streaming right out of my xbox one and doing some youtube uploads for a few months. Kind of getting into it and was hoping I might trouble some experienced streamers for some advice on progressing.

Finally about to do some much needed upgrades to my PCs and I'm starting to work out what all I should be looking at when I order hardware to be able to stream from PC and 360, also. Like, I'm looking at the elgato for a capture card but not sure if there is something else I should be considering. I have extremely fast internet (they advertise a gigabit but it's nowhere near that, of course) and would like to push picture quality as far as possible. The elgato, if i recall correctly, can stream 720p60 and 1080p30...which sounds great but I'm wondering if I should be looking at something else, also in comparison.

Capture card is the main thing....Also curious what broadcast software and accessories people like.

Thanks in advance!

[Skittlez]

Check out Open Broadcast Software, or OBS. It's a free open source streaming program that is great for getting started. Lots of guides on YouTube about it as well. If you are going to be streaming with a webcam, I would suggest the Logitech c615 or c920. The c615 runs about 49.99 most places new, while the c920 runs at about 79.99 new.

If you don't care about the extra price, the c920 can't really be beat, but the c615 is almost the exact same quality to me. They both will look the exact same when you shrink them down and layer it over your game stream but for personal webcam calls or recordings in high resolution, something you will have full screen, the c920 just looks incredible.

Not sure what a capture card is. I just bought a webcam and plugged it in. The only thing holding me back from 30fps 1080p streams, is my incredibly shitty internet speed.

[Weekapaug]

Thanks Skittlez. I will definately check those cams out.

Capture card is needed for casting 360, basicly. The new gen consoles can handle it internally but the older ones can't.

[Cilraaz]

Keep in mind that unless you're a partnered channel (assuming you're going to be streaming on Twitch), you have to consider your viewers' bandwidth as much as your own. If you stream 1080p60 at 4000kbps, your internet may have no trouble pushing that out. Your viewers may have trouble taking that in, however, causing your channel to constantly buffer and resulting in the loss of viewers. Twitch also seems to favor partnered streams over non-partnered. Even though I have 75/35 internet, I often find non-partnered streams at high bitrates buffer for me.

The baseline suggestion for a non-partnered stream is 720p30 at 2000kbps. That is usually the best balance between video quality and stream quality (as far as buffering) for those who are non-partnered. If/When you become partnered, users will be able to manually adjust video quality, so you'll be able to push out the highest quality possible without harming viewership.

As far as software, I use and suggest OBS, as it's free and good quality. Other streamers use Xsplit, but keep in mind that Xsplit does have a monthly cost associated with it. I'm sure there are other options, but to my knowledge these two are the top free and paid options.

I do not stream console games, so I can't comment on the capture card, but I do know that Elgato is a good brand of card.

As far as accessories, I'm currently using a cheap webcam (Logitech C110, which could use an upgrade to a C920) and haven't seen any complaints about quality. For audio, I use Takstar HI 2050 headphones. They're extremely comfortable over long-term play sessions and great quality for the price point ($50-70ish). I use a CAD GXL2200 mic fed into a Behringer XENYX 502 mixer. I'm not sure if a fixed mic (as opposed to headset mic) would work well for a console gamer. I suppose it would depend on your physical setup.

Hopefully at least a little of this has been helpful. If you have any more questions or need help with OBS setup (I'm not as knowledgeable on Xsplit), let me know. I'm not a huge streamer, but I do have experience with the technical end of things.

[2pacalypse]

real talk though, streaming is mad cancerous. if you are that desperate for social interaction pick up the dam phone

[Tapatio]

OBS is good for freeware and can save records to the twitch or straight to local.

I have a poor computer, but I will say I did have higher quality recordings with FRAPS when comparing local recordings. FRAPS did not stream to twitch so...

[Weekapaug]

Thanks for the info, guys.

Had a little IRL delay and decided to approach this a bit differently but still getting set up....shooting for around april 1 to start for real. My 16 year EQ anniversary is on the 11th so thinking that could be cool to shoot for some P99 around that time.

I got the c920, by the way, and had invested in an elgato cap card for the consoles but I decided I don't like that setup and will be going with a 2 box casting setup since I have two identical boxes that I'm working on upgrading. One will be just for gaming and the other just for the cast....casting box gets slid into the other room for the consoles. Also, I will be using OBS, as well, thank you.

[Skittlez]

Good luck! [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]