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Live Video Commissie  
#1 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2020 2:51:56 AM(UTC)
Live Video Commissie

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We are using a PC/Server with two GPUs to be able to use 5 screens and a TV screen for our production direction.
vMix supports up to 4 screens which is not sufficient for our setup.
All 6 screens are working within Windows 10.

At this moment four screens are recognised within vMix.
The four screens shown in vMix appear to be chosen randomly as these screens are not only ones chosen from one GPU.
We are fine with using only 4 screens for vMix but the screens which we would like to choose (eg. multiview on the TV) are not selectable.
This results in the situation that we would like to use certain screens for full screen use (multiview, output, preview) but they are not selectable because vMix only shows 4 screens.
Also the screens are not in the same order as Windows, nor NVIDIA's numbering.

Our feature request is for vMix to support multiple fullscreen outputs.
We would like to be able to at least be able to choose from all screens available and not maximum 4 random screens.
If possible we would like to be able to use 3 screens as fullscreen outputs (multiview, output, preview).

GPUs used:
NVIDIA GeForce GT 710
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti
ask  
#2 Posted : Friday, May 8, 2020 9:24:04 AM(UTC)
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If you watch back past episodes of the VFTLS (I can't tell you which one), you will find a very detailed explanation from Martin why this is not possible. In short, it is a limitation of the underlying technology (hardware etc) not vMix. Consequently it is not recommended to use multiple GPUs.
Highway20Productions  
#3 Posted : Sunday, November 10, 2024 4:09:41 AM(UTC)
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I have the exact same issue. 2 GPUS to support 7 Monitors. The 1-4 choices seems completely random and I haven't found a way to make them map to the monitors I want. It also spans the GPUs, for instance, 1=3090 Port 2, 2=3070 Port 1, 3=3090 Port 4, 4=3070 Port 3

I am searching for help but so far, haven't found it.

Some guidance here would be helpful!

EDIT - I did find in the manuals that the 1-4 is based on the order of the windows according to windows desktop LEFT to Right, top to bottom. So I will see if I can make that work.

But why stop at 4? Why not show all 7 monitors? Seems very arbitrary.
nikosman88  
#4 Posted : Sunday, November 10, 2024 9:26:54 AM(UTC)
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I assume it stops to 4 because it recognises only 1 gpu or it "freaks" somehow it confuses the ports between the 2 gpu from the system. Or because the outputs in vmix are 4 and most of cards dont have more than 4. The thing here is simple. Vmix is awesome software. But OBS has some functions,that users ask from vmix team for years! So your best bet i personally believe is to share your workflow between vmix and OBS or other software that can use your 2nd GPU outputs.This is what im doing some times because i cant find such "complex" solutions in vmix.
Also if you search the forum you will see many requests for making more outputs and fullscreen. Into this for the limited outputs some people say that because the trikaster that costs at least about 10x times that vmix software costs,has more outputs but it also it is a pc box,so vmix can have more also but for now it doesnt have.
But un-fortunatelly the thing is "take it as is,or leave it". Un-fortunatelly this is for any product either is software or hardware for most people that we are not programmers ourselves to do our custom solutions or dont have the budget for this. I also had a hope that vmix 28 will have more fullscreen outputs,but no. We wait now for this function vmix 29,30 or who knows when!
Highway20Productions  
#5 Posted : Sunday, November 10, 2024 3:36:34 PM(UTC)
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I don't think it is the number of outputs on a graphics cards, I think they simply hard-code a lot of values. Why only 4 outputs for example? Should be able to just add and delete them like other software does. I like vMix and it does many things better than obs, but I do think they "hardcode" many things, somewhat arbitrarily, IMO. This kind of thing is difficult for me because I have programmed for 25 years and owned a couple of software companies, so that type of mentality is a little frustrating.

VMix... If you need another programmer hit me up!

WaltG12  
#6 Posted : Sunday, November 10, 2024 4:02:11 PM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: Highway20Productions Go to Quoted Post
I like vMix and it does many things better than obs, but I do think they "hardcode" many things, somewhat arbitrarily, IMO.


They absolutely do hardcode things like this.

But "arbitrarily" is a bit harsh.

They do it based off what they believe machines will support.

Historically, there's been an emphasis on saving people from themselves.

Which makes sense, because it's their reputation on the line and it's their team that has to provide customer support.

I don't necessarily agree with the choices they make sometimes on what lines they draw or where they draw them, but I can generally see where they're coming from in drawing them there.

While you may know better and I may know better, look through some of the posts these forums. Do you really think they all know better? And can you really begrudge Martin, etc. for not wanting to deal with them pushing their system beyond the boundaries that we'd know it could handle?
nikosman88  
#7 Posted : Monday, November 11, 2024 4:33:19 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: WaltG12 Go to Quoted Post
Originally Posted by: Highway20Productions Go to Quoted Post
I like vMix and it does many things better than obs, but I do think they "hardcode" many things, somewhat arbitrarily, IMO.


They absolutely do hardcode things like this.

But "arbitrarily" is a bit harsh.

They do it based off what they believe machines will support.

Historically, there's been an emphasis on saving people from themselves.

Which makes sense, because it's their reputation on the line and it's their team that has to provide customer support.

I don't necessarily agree with the choices they make sometimes on what lines they draw or where they draw them, but I can generally see where they're coming from in drawing them there.

While you may know better and I may know better, look through some of the posts these forums. Do you really think they all know better? And can you really begrudge Martin, etc. for not wanting to deal with them pushing their system beyond the boundaries that we'd know it could handle?

Yes you`re right in many you say. But when i as simple user i see in vmix page they say "Camera / NDI Inputs 1000" and we all know that is a theory thing. How this "saves" me?
So why not have in theory 1000 outputs and give me the option if i want to "save" or not myself?
WaltG12  
#8 Posted : Monday, November 11, 2024 6:38:32 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: nikosman88 Go to Quoted Post

Yes you`re right in many you say. But when i as simple user i see in vmix page they say "Camera / NDI Inputs 1000" and we all know that is a theory thing. How this "saves" me?


The simple answer is that most people who don't know what they're doing probably don't have connections for 1,000 cameras or a NIC that can support 1,000 NDI inputs.

Both are physically impossible.

When they try and fail, they aren't going to vMix and screaming about how it's their fault that they don't have enough PCIe lanes to connect to that many cameras or a network card that can't handle the bandwidth of that many NDI inputs.

But if they try to use too many Outputs and vMix crashes, a lot of people won't be that introspective.

There was a thread we were both part of, what, about a week ago? People were very upset that Apple took away the ability to use external Lightning microphones in Safari with iOS 17.

And they proceeded to demand that vMix fix that issue, because it was vMix's website where they first encountered it, so, therefore, it must be vMix's problem to fix.

At least one of them even contacted support directly to demand an explanation after both of us explained to them that they were complaining to the wrong people.

Like I said, there may be a number of us who'd know it's not anyone else's fault if we overtax our system, but other people--like the ones who think it's vMix's problem when Apple disables the ability for their browser to see certain microphones--will only see how they tried to use vMix and it crashed.

That said, I think they've gotten better with it.

v27 included the change to 4 hardware Externals with the caveat that people should be very careful using it because they didn't think most machines could handle it.

And Martin has talked a bit about a plan to remove the output limit.
thanks 1 user thanked WaltG12 for this useful post.
nikosman88 on 11/11/2024(UTC)
Highway20Productions  
#9 Posted : Monday, November 11, 2024 7:12:17 AM(UTC)
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Having only two "Full SCreen" options is not really even my gripe. It is letting us only pick from the first "4", found by enumerating the monitor positions, from left to right, top to bottom. They are clearly enumerating the monitor list to do this. Why not let me pick my two full screen options from the 7 available. There is no performance issue here, as we still only are using two full screen.
nikosman88  
#10 Posted : Monday, November 11, 2024 10:00:40 PM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: Highway20Productions Go to Quoted Post
Having only two "Full SCreen" options is not really even my gripe. It is letting us only pick from the first "4", found by enumerating the monitor positions, from left to right, top to bottom. They are clearly enumerating the monitor list to do this. Why not let me pick my two full screen options from the 7 available. There is no performance issue here, as we still only are using two full screen.


You`re right but the outputs 5-7 is another GPU and not the main one that vmix use. So i believe that they hardcode it like this in order to en-sure that perfomance will not be degraded while the system need to move data between 2 GPU.Even if un-officially you order the monitors in windows in a way that allows you in the total 4 monitors to use from both GPU. Personally back at 2021 end when i started use vmix and the gpu prices were been too expensive for what they offer, i used in my i7 10th gen the intel graphics from m/b outs and a gt 1030 in order to have 4 monitors. It worked ok. I didnt have any vmix crash or a message that "dont do it". I also took the responsibillity to do what i do. So if im asked personally i dont see why not be able to use all the outputs/screens
kuuminsh  
#11 Posted : Tuesday, November 12, 2024 12:09:50 AM(UTC)
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The way vmix counts screens is very interesting.
Not as shown by the windows screen settings, but counting from the left :D :D

As for the multi-screen situation, maybe the BlackMagic Smart Videohub is the solution?

nikosman88  
#12 Posted : Tuesday, November 12, 2024 12:55:30 AM(UTC)
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Also something i see now is that if we go to vmix-->settings-->perfomance-->show advanced settings-->tick in order to see the hidden settings in the Graphics Adapter beyond default our GPU is appeared 1 or more times and that depends on how many connections/screens we have. For example if we have connect 2 monitors,in this setting beyond default we will see 2 times our GPU to exist.
So i dont have personally now 2 gpu to try,but one can see (and of course take the risk) if there appears also the other (2nd) gpu and proceed further by using also the option "vmix multiple instances" maybe in order to (un-official) solution
WaltG12  
#13 Posted : Tuesday, November 12, 2024 5:47:12 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: Highway20Productions Go to Quoted Post
Having only two "Full SCreen" options is not really even my gripe. It is letting us only pick from the first "4", found by enumerating the monitor positions, from left to right, top to bottom. They are clearly enumerating the monitor list to do this. Why not let me pick my two full screen options from the 7 available. There is no performance issue here, as we still only are using two full screen.


My guess, and this is only a guess, is that they set the limit to 4 back when there was, for whatever reason, cause to have a limit of 4.

Maybe 4 was more than anyone was using at the time. Maybe there were actually performance reasons that have since been mitigated.

Then they just never revisited it.

There are some things, like the request for more Outputs, that are constantly at the forefront.

There are others, like this one, that only come up every once in a while, because there still aren't that many people running into this issue.

I made a Feature Request a little bit ago that got absolutely no traction, asking that they expand the "AddInput" shortcut, because it hadn't really been touched since it was introduced like 10+ years ago, despite multiple new input types (Zoom, Mix, Output, Preview) being added since that are just one click adds & perfect for the shortcut.

I think they probably have their use cases, which they incorporate, and for everything else, they rely on the community to tell them what does or doesn't work, rather than maintaining a list of every limit that they've imposed that they then check against as tech changes/improves.

And anything niche, like this, falls by the wayside, because it's not something they run into & it's not something that the community keeps bringing up.

But, again, that's only a guess.
Highway20Productions  
#14 Posted : Tuesday, November 12, 2024 10:10:33 AM(UTC)
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Do they monitor these forums? How would I so an official request?

Again, I am not even requesting more that two full screen options, which would increase performance. I am just requesting that they let me choose which 2 out of my seven (not four) to use. Rather than use some arbitrary left to right, top to bottom weirdness.

It is like getting to choose 2 of your dogs to go on a road trip with you. But you only get to choose 1-4, not by name. So I have 5 dogs, lets say. So, which number applies to which dog? Whatever scheme you come up with, there will always be the dog that doesn't get a number and doesn't get to go on a road trip! That's just not fair, and it makes for an unhappy dog. LOL

WaltG12  
#15 Posted : Tuesday, November 12, 2024 10:18:44 AM(UTC)
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Originally Posted by: Highway20Productions Go to Quoted Post
Do they monitor these forums? How would I so an official request?


https://forums.vmix.com/topics/4-Feature-Requests

But for something this niche, I wouldn't get my hopes up.
Highway20Productions  
#16 Posted : Tuesday, November 12, 2024 11:52:12 AM(UTC)
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