Streaming your gaming?

[shukudai]

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone has experience in streaming their console gaming? I've found some random guides online, but i'd rather talk to someone who's done it, or knows what they're talking about before making any purchases.

Basically, I want to be able to stream console games i'm playing, so friends can watch, talk while we're playing, etc.

From what I can tell what I need is:

- A capture card of some kind (Not sure which is good or bad, except the Dazzle ones suck)
- A way to split the signal from the console(s), so it outputs to my PC, as well as my TV so I can still play (or maybe to a second monitor, in some cases)
- A mixer, so I can talk to those viewing the stream (Vent and such is not a great option here, for various reasons).

Is there anything i'm missing here? Or does anyone have any solid recommendations for specific equipment? My PC itself is pretty decent (i7 @ 2.67Ghz, 8gigs of ram), my internet connection itself is mediocore on the upload, 600-700 kbps, and I don't torrent that much, and obviously not while streaming.

[Wintermute]

There's a thread in (old?) Advanced section by Mojo that pretty much tells you how to Stream games you play on your PC but that's buried quite deep in there I think.

Here you go: http://www.bluegartr.com/forum/showt...ight=streaming

That'll pretty much help you set up so you can stream your Desktop onto stuff like uStream and such. If you're using consoles then I assume it would be a similar deal only with the splitter and the Capture Card software.

[Blabj]

I'm fairly sure Xbox 360 component will do HD over the component cables and SD over the composite cables.

However its up to you if you want to stream HD or SD (or capture in HD and serve it to youtube etc.) HD capture cards are slightly pricier than SD, and if you go down this route your options are to either play through the PC's screen or buy a splitter for the video. Hauppauge is a good brand of capture cards, and the HD-PVR is one of the best in class for HD capture (especially for the money)

Your upload pretty much limits you to standard definition. You should be able to get a decent picture quality out of the bandwidth though.

Also, in terms of audio mixing, most programs you'll be likely to use for serving the video (VirtualDub etc.) allow you to inject audio whilst playing back, so you'll just need a relatively decent mic (if you're really considering spending the cash on this then consider a condenser mic from Shure, they're brilliant.)

[shukudai]

I'm a bit familiar with VirtualDub, but I didn't know it could be used in streaming. Part of the trick to streaming + having voice chat chat (for the one streaming) I thought meant you had to basically put your video audio through a mixer, and put a mic through the mixer too, then output both of those into the capture card's audio jack? Is there a way around that, making it so I don't have to purchase a mixer?

[Pyro]

I'm not sure if you have a wired network in your house, but you might be interested in looking into HDMI over IP. Basically you buy a converter and plug your HDMI source into it and it transfers over your network where you plug another converter in on the other end and attach it to your television.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=1157457

[shukudai]

I don't have a wired network, but that looks cool But for streaming purposes it's a bit moot, since I can't upload at a good enough speed for that kind of thing, and most of the streaming sites like Justin.Tv and Ustream have problems with high frame rates, or so i've read.

[Avanarius]

When I was streaming ps2, I used an adaptor to split to 2 seperate Composite Cables, one would go to TV and the Video Source of the other would go to my TV Tuner on my Computer.

To capture the audio, I used another adaptor to convert the red/white to a standard stereo jack and plugged it into the "Line-In" on my soundcard. For talking on stream I plugged mic as normal, then changed windows XP sound config to Stereo Mix Mode then adjusted the volume accordingly.

For software I used Webcam Max and Adobe Flash Media Encoder for best picture quality. Webcam Max auto detected my TV Tuner as a Webcam Source so it was fairly easy to set up.

I wouldn't recommend attempting to play the game via tv tuner software because I seemed to notice a considerable delay while streaming and decided to give up and ghetto split the source.

I'm sure there's better methods of accomplishing this, but this is what I used.

*Edit, thread-jack, but anyone know where I can get latest version of webcam max beta 7.0.2.3, I stopped streaming because it didn't work with windows 7 64bit, but it apparently does now

[Darus Grey]

Also for capture card, really depends on what you want to spend.

My recommendation by far is the Black Magic Intensity Pro, MSRP $199, can find it for $120-$160 realistically.

It's a "prosumer" model, takes SD/HD signals and has tons of auto-compression/encoding/morphing options built into hardware that it can do on the fly.

I've used it on Ustream and for lots of projects and it works great. However there's tons of $50 options if you just want "it works" like Dazzle as you mentioned. I always sound like a shill talking about the BMIP, but for it's price, as a prosumer video editor myself, I fee like it's an amazing peice of hardware for the price.

[shukudai]

Thanks for the advice~ I'm going to pick up a TV Tuner tommorrow, i've read some good things about the Hauppauge ones, and I had a crappy experience with an external ATI USB one recently...

I was looking to get a composite splitter, honestly, I went to like 6 electronics stores today, and not a single one had one, so I guess i'm going to be using Monoprice

[bungiefan]

I didn't have to use a splitter when I recorded while playing on my TV. A lot of the third-party PS2 S-Video cables also include a composite connection, so you can run one to the computer and use one on your TV.

[shukudai]

Yes, I have my old PS2 cable (which I assume works with PS3 as well), which has a composite and S-Video wire, but this still means i'd have to split the sound or something.

I'm just curious, but since a PS3 can output using the normal PS3 composite wires as well as HDMI, can I not just use both at the same time, or does it only output to one source at a time? I'm guessing one source at a time, or two sources, but one of them would be extremely crappy.

From what i've read, there's no solid way to game in HD on my TV while streaming in SD, or if there is a way, it'd be ubber expensive?

[Darus Grey]

I've used HD signal via BMIP to stream plenty of times, are you concerned about bandwidth?

You're right that there's no elegant way to play in HD and stream in SD, you'd need a(relatively) expensive scaler to accomplish that. So if you want to play in HD your best bet is to also stream the HD signal

[shukudai]

To be honest, i'm not certain what you mean to "stream in HD" as well?

To my thinking, when people say "HD" they mean "HDMI", so I looked for cards with HDMI in, but found none. The one I ended up ordering has a Composite Video-In and S-Video-In, neither of those say "HD" to me.

As for bandwith, i'm not too concerned, my connection seems ok to stream in SD, basically in Canada almost NO ISP offers higher than a .8Mbps connection for upload, and it's rarely the full .8Mbps, in my case, it's about .5 ~ .55Mbps.

As for the audio part of it, i've found a program ( http://software.muzychenko.net/eng/vac.html ) that should be able to do it, in a roundabout way, although i've also found a fairly cheap mixer that would work as well if I wanted to go that route.

[Darus Grey]

HD=High Definition(720/1080)... component cable= HD, also the BMIP I mentioned can accept HDMI/Component/Composite/S-Video(also doesn't need a mixer).

Streaming in HD thus means...streaming in HD... as in, play in HD on your TV...and then stream in HD on your computer.

As I said, you're either going to have to play in SD and stream in SD, or buy an expensive scaler to down-convert for streaming. If you really want to play in HD well streaming, streaming the HD signal is your most cost-effective measure compared to the scaler.

[shukudai]

But composite is SD only, yes? I didn't see like any cards with component-in. Where does S-Video lie? I always saw it as a sort of "Better than composite, but worse than component" option.

[Blabj]

S-video is standard definition, just like composite.

You could probably make a point in arguing that s-video is better quality than composite connections, but it's hardly the greatest anymore. For streaming composite will do fine.

[bungiefan]

S-Video breaks the video signal up into four wires or so, so it gets better sharpness and color quality than composite, but it doesn't support progressive scan or higher resolution video modes.

Splitting the audio is easy. 3.5mm headphone plug splitters and RCA connector splitters are always in stock in the home electronics department of my local Kroger chain. The RCA one might even work for video, but if you're recording to the computer, you probably want S-Video input for that anyway for the best video quality.

Of course, the solution I used when I was recording Guilty Gear matches with my friends was that I had a USB sound device with RCA in and out, so I just ran the audio through the computer with that and the output passed it on to my speaker system. It was an Edirol brand sound device. I still use it now for some things because it grounds input to my computer for audio that my microphone jack doesn't, so it gets rid of the buzzing noise.

[Darus Grey]

But composite is SD only, yes? I didn't see like any cards with component-in. Where does S-Video lie? I always saw it as a sort of "Better than composite, but worse than component" option.

Not to sound like a broken record but I mentioned a product that has component and HDMI in like 10 times now >.> (BMIP, black magic intensity pro), the one I recommended before.

I've just been saying if you want to still play in HD, it's cheaper to get that and stream in HD, than it is to buy a scaler to do it the other way.

[shukudai]

BMIP: 300$ after shipping/import taxes here, not really an option at the moment I wouldn't buy a scaler of any kind atm, i'll stick with the cheaper popular option I found, that was like 100$ only, but will probably be SD, and if I stream enough, that BMIP becomes an option, i'll probably end up with that. (I saw someone streaming from a BMIP card, in 720p, and holy crap was it nice, but I doubt my 650kbps upload is strong enough for that)

[Tymon]

I have significant experience doing this, so I'll give you a few things to start off.

1.) Splitting the audio to the "Line-In" jack on your sound card or tv tuner often causes a delay in the audio. It's more beneficial to just get a tuner that has composite audio, there are plenty of these.

2.) This is the most important. Most if not all USB TV capture devices will not work well, if at all, on Vista or Windows 7 x64.. For the most part you're best off using windows XP 32bit if you want the best quality with those.

I have personally tested Dazzle's DVC100 capture device and EasyCap USB, along with 2 Hauppauge internal HVR devices with Windows 7 x64, and only the Hauppauge HVR-1850 worked, and it took a LOT of tweaking. I was able to get the video to work with the DVC100, but the audio does not work in either it or the Hauppauge. I have to use a microphone to get game audio.

Otherwise, I recommend the Dazzle DVC100 if you are using an OS that can support it. It's USB, has good drivers, good capture software (or you can use Windows Media Maker in XP) and has full composite audio, video, and S-video inputs.

Dazzle DVC100: http://www.amazon.com/Pinnacle-Syste...2377188&sr=1-2

EasyCap USB: http://www.amazon.com/Easycap-USB-Vi...2377283&sr=8-1

Hauppauge 1850: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-015-_-Product