New OBS function helps you to stream higher video for much less bandwidth

In case you ever use OBS to file footage or stream to Twitch, odds are you are utilizing H.264, a video codec that is been in use for many of the final 20 years. H.264 is all over the place. In case you’re streaming a present from Netflix or one other service, it is most likely H.264, too. It is mainly the JPEG of video: there at the moment are way more environment friendly and higher high quality compression strategies accessible, but it surely’s arduous to dislodge a format that is so entrenched. Streaming video is beginning to do exactly that, although, with an open supply codec known as AV1. Netflix has been dabbling with it for a pair years, and now OBS Studio model 29.0 has jumped in with native assist for AV1 encoding on AMD and Intel GPUs.

It is an thrilling step, although not one which we’re all going to have the ability to make the most of instantly. There are two primary varieties of video encoding: software program (which absolutely depends in your CPU, and could be very CPU intensive) and {hardware}, which makes use of your GPU to speed up the encoding course of. {Hardware} encoding is approach quicker and extra environment friendly and will not spike your CPU to 100% utilization, and is how most of us file footage or stream to platforms like Twitch as we speak. Nevertheless it’s additionally sometimes decrease high quality.