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Question about integrated video graphics
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Joined: 5/7/2012(UTC) Posts: 185  Location: Bucharest Thanks: 48 times
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Hello, I plan to use vmix for HD (hdmi) mixing and recording from 4 cams using 4 Intensity Pro and an i7-2600K SandyBridge on a micro ATX MB (GIGABYTE - GA-Z77MX-D3H, Intel Z77, LGA1155 - http://gigabyte.com/prod...ct-page.aspx?pid=4145#ov ) All this just to have a much smaller, portable solution. Now, in order to save the PCI-e slots I wonder if it is possible to use the integrated graphics card ( Intel GMA HD ) for vmix (mixing and recording). Can you please, let me know your thoughts on how viable will be? Thank you,
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Joined: 1/13/2010(UTC) Posts: 5,228  Location: Gold Coast, Australia Was thanked: 4332 time(s) in 1528 post(s)
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Integrated Graphics may work ok mixing the cameras, but recording is difficult due to the way most integrated graphics is designed.
I have tested the Intel HD 2000 and it struggled to record at SD resolution if that is any indicator.
The new Ivy Bridge HD 4000 might be a lot better, but I haven't had the chance to test it yet.
Regards,
Martin
vMix
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Joined: 5/31/2012(UTC)
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To follow up on this discussion of graphics cards I'd like to know what the role of the GPU is as far as vMix is concerned. By that I mean does vMix use the GPU to perform any computation intensive tasks?
For instance would there be any performance difference between mixing and streaming on a computer with a fast CPU + Integrated Graphics GPU and mixing and streaming on a computer with the same fast CPU + Dual SLI nVidia Series 5 GPUs?
Thank you,
Chris
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Rank: Administration
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Joined: 1/13/2010(UTC) Posts: 5,228 Location: Gold Coast, Australia Was thanked: 4332 time(s) in 1528 post(s)
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Hi,
All rendering in vMix (video mixing, effects and processing) is done on the GPU which means integrated graphics will usually
struggle with recording HD sources. That said even a cheap dedicated graphics card will work fine in comparison.
Regards,
Martin
vMix
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Rank: Member
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Joined: 5/31/2012(UTC)
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Location: Romania
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Hi,
Thanks for that reply! There was a cheap dedicated card installed in that system. Yesterday we went and bought an ASUS GTX560 and the difference was spectacular. Smooth mixing, no dropped frames while exporting and recording at the same time.
The funny thing is we started up vMix and tested it without restarting the computer after the new GPU driver was installed.
This morning I had to move the server so I closed it and restarted it once it was back in its rack. The inputs from the Blackmagic capture cards started being laggy again (not as laggy as before the GTX560) and recording to the HDD not only drops frames but when I try to stop it vMix stops responding to user input, it's still streaming but none of the buttons work anymore.
Any thoughts?
Thank you!
Chris
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Rank: Administration
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Joined: 1/13/2010(UTC) Posts: 5,228 Location: Gold Coast, Australia Was thanked: 4332 time(s) in 1528 post(s)
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Hi,
What are the specs of the computer running vMix? (memory, cpu, etc)
Does it have integrated graphics as well, if so is it possible that is being used instead of the dedicated card?
Thanks,
Martin
vMix
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Rank: Member
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Joined: 5/31/2012(UTC)
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Hi,
The computer contains the following:
MB ASUS P8Z77-V Deluxe
CPU Intel i7 2700K 3.5GHz
MEM Corsair 32GB DDR3 1600
and since yesterday also
GPU ASUS GeForce GTX 560 DirectCU II with 1GB DDR5 256-bit
The MB and CPU together do indeed provide integrated graphics on one HDMI output. The graphics processor embedded in this CPU is Intel HD Graphics 3000.
What you're saying does indeed make sense. How do I tell vMix which GPU to use?
Cheers,
Chris
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Rank: Administration
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Joined: 1/13/2010(UTC) Posts: 5,228 Location: Gold Coast, Australia Was thanked: 4332 time(s) in 1528 post(s)
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Hi Chris,
As long as the screen is plugged into the graphics card hdmi output instead of the port on the motherboard it should be fine.
So assuming that is plugged in correctly, what does the "Render Time" value at the bottom of the vMix screen display when you run into issues?
Thanks,
Martin
vMix
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Rank: Member
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Hi Martin,
I've checked and the Integrated graphics don't even show up in the Device Manager. So, you are right, it is probably using the GTX 560.
We've updated the GPU drivers and have stopped trying to use the same machine to record at the same time and it is currently live streaming (as we speak) on a full scale production broadcast and performing well.
I had previously decided to take this computer off the production rack till we could rely on it but yesterday our main machine crashed and started doing all sorts of weird things so we had to bring this one as a backup.
I can tell you it's still not performing as well as it did in the original tests. If there is high motion in the video capture inputs it starts having a harder time trying to keep up. For what we are broadcasting now it's ok.
At the moment render times are between 4-5 ms and peaking at 8 ms when we have transitions. When we go offline I'll go create some "issue" conditions and come back with the information.
One additional piece of information I can give you is that yesterday when we first had to use this machine as a backup we had a large variable amount of audio to video delay (up to 4 seconds). We've now pinned that on the fact that there were 8 title inputs loaded and waiting that were bringing CPU usage up by 30-80%. Without them CPU usage is under 10%.
Cheers,
Chris
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Rank: Administration
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Joined: 1/13/2010(UTC) Posts: 5,228 Location: Gold Coast, Australia Was thanked: 4332 time(s) in 1528 post(s)
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Hi Chris,
Are the titles in some custom format or are you using the built in templates?
Using the built in vMix title templates I can 10 or more templates with little to no impact on the CPU on my test system (Core i5 2500k)
My guess is something strange is going on as your system specs are more than enough for HD mixing and recording.
Regards,
Martin
vMix
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Rank: Member
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Hi Martin,
Something strange indeed.
The titles we are using are the built in templates. TickerHD2 to be specific.
We are currently running some more tests and I might have more information soon.
Cheers,
Chris
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Rank: Member
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Joined: 5/31/2012(UTC)
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Hi Martin,
I've only had time to look at the titles so far.
Every time we load a title using the TickerHD2 and play it CPU usage jumps by 10-12%. Ten titles will max out the CPU, mess up render times and make the output skip many frames and delay the video from the audio. Considering that we need about 30-40% of the CPU to encode the output for live broadcasting even 5 titles are enough to ruin the output.
This only happens when we play the title (i.e. it scrolls in the preview at the bottom of the vMix screen). If the ticker is paused there is only a slight difference in CPU consumption.
Cheers,
Chris
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Rank: Advanced Member
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Joined: 5/7/2012(UTC) Posts: 185 Location: Bucharest Thanks: 48 times
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Hello,
I confirm that same behavior on our system, too.
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Rank: Administration
Groups: Administrators
Joined: 1/13/2010(UTC) Posts: 5,228 Location: Gold Coast, Australia Was thanked: 4332 time(s) in 1528 post(s)
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Hi Chris,
The TickerHD is a special case as it has to render every frame in HD when playing.
I would suggest keeping them all paused when not in use!
(There is an option in v3 where you can tell vMix to pause the input automatically when not in use)
Regards,
Martin
vMix
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