Chapter 1: Learn Your Equipment

Meeting new people, sharing your hobby of gaming (or other types of content you can stream), as well as establishing a brand while having a few bucks to your name from it?

Indeed, jumping into the world of livestreaming is very enticing for multiple reasons.

But its never smart to jump into an ocean without checking your equipment.

Dive too deep too quickly and you may find a leak in your goggles or your oxygen tank malfunctioning.

If you have an unknown cut you didn't check for? You may have a Great White Shark bearing down on you.

Ok that's a bit dramatic, but the point I'm making is to make sure that you learn the ends and outs of your setup before you attempt your first stream.

Be it OBS (and its different variations through Streamlabs and StreamElements) or Xsplit, your streaming software is what connects you to the world.

Without it? You have no stream, and if you have only familiarized yourself with it somewhat or not at all? You're going to have a very rocky first broadcast if all you did was copy your oauth key from the streaming site to the streaming software, pick a server, and attempt to go live.

There's other settings such as bitrates, keyframes, encoding, etc, and one of the best sources for info on that is YouTube. Although given the difference in requirements for settings per PC build? It's best to use any video watched more for an understanding of these and other functions vs settings to copy.

The reason I say that is that if you're watching an OBS video tutorial that says 'Best OBS Settings' then you have to keep in mind that those settings may be best for them, but it does you no good if they have a latest gen CPU and a $800-$1000 GPU, but you have something nowhere near as strong (my current build at the time of writing this is listed below as an example of something not as strong).

OBS is what I've always used over Xsplit and its very overwhelming the first time you boot it up, but once you learn how to make scenes/sources and tweak the proper settings by your own trial and error? It'll be much easier. If there is a YouTube channel I recommend? Check out EposVox who has many in depth tutorials not only for OBS, but XSplit as well.

Truth is, there will be setbacks with your stream where something doesn't work due to an issue with your streaming software or the site itself, and I myself have dealt with the latter from time to time on each site I've streamed on, which can only be helped with time as the site irons out whatever bug it currently has.

However you can at least minimize and even be more well equipped to fix tech issues on your end. Lag and dropping frames, horrible sound quality or NO sound at all, your video not showing, or your stream crashing entirely assuming it starts at all are examples of problems that could arise yet be avoided if you educate yourself on the functions of the program.

Try different settings based on what you learn as well as take time to study the different streaming requirements on the site you plan to broadcast on. And if you have plenty of upload speed to spare? Don't use too much just because you've got it.

You want to find a balance where your bitrate isn't too low that it affects the quality of your stream, but also not too high to where your viewers can't watch the stream because the bitrate you set for your channel exceeds what their internet speeds can handle.

Do test streams and ask your friends to watch so they can help you troubleshoot things such as choppy video or audio/video desync.

You can also simply start a recording for testing the levels and quality of your microphone and other functions that don't require a live feed.

Dropped frames? A cause could be your internet speed for one reason or another has throttled. Speed tests such as Fast can help troubleshoot if that is the cause.

Knowing what your computer itself can handle is key as well. How good are your graphics card and processor? A good way to research all of this is google your GPU/CPU vs another model and compare specs.

How much RAM do you have? As long as you have at least 16GB then that's plenty for gaming while having enough memory to handle your stream, since most games in the current market don't use nearly that much.

What kind of games do you plan to stream and at what resolution? The site Can You Run It can show you if your computer can handle a certain game.

Lets say your PC checks out and you can run a specific game with no issues. Does this mean you're ready to stream?

Well, that depends.

Something else to keep in mind is that even though you may be able to play a game with no complications? Streaming it is a different story.

Your streaming software itself will consume a decent bit of resources alongside that game's demands of your computer, meaning that technically speaking? It'll possibly be using more resources than it can give for the purposes of a livestream.

If the computer you plan to stream with has enough horsepower for both the load of both whatever game you plan to play as well as OBS/Xsplit? As long as the game itself is properly built for streaming (I've had a few that didn't work well with OBS regardless of my specs) then you're good to go.

But if things don't run smooth, what next?

Can you adjust the output resolution in your stream software? What settings do you have the game on? Try stepping down from ultra or even high settings and/or play in a window to see if that helps.

Open up task manager and see what all programs you can shut down that are hogging CPU and memory.

If none of that works, do you have a second PC you can use to handle the full load of the stream software and use your main gaming PC for the other part of the load?

All of this may seem like much but its simply a concept of things to consider based on the factors listed and just a general example. This doesn't mean you yourself will be faced with in inability to stream.

I said above that my current build isn't the most powerful. I have a Ryzen 7 2700x CPU, Sapphire Nitro+ RX 580 GPU, and 16 gigs of RAM. It gets the job done and I've had no issues streaming the remake of Resident Evil 2 and other graphically extensive PC games for the most part, but it's handled by encoding through my CPU in OBS so that my GPU can handle the game itself.

I could do better and if I had the funds? I'd upgrade to something much more current (as shown in my Kit listing here for my dream PC setup.

But I've also done worse given that when I first started streaming I was using just an Asus ROG laptop that could barely handle Overwatch.

So its pretty unlikely you'll need to spend extra to upgrade your PC to stream in some capacity and if needed you may just have to tweak some settings or consider less graphically extensive games that you enjoy playing until you can afford a better GPU, processor, or more RAM (you don't have to get all three at once of course. Isolate which one you feel would help most and focus on one at a time if you have to).

And the two computer build idea? Loads of small channels get along just fine with just one computer to handle the load of everything. Many partners do as well, and not solely because they can afford one beefy PC but its just less complicated to run everything from one place.

As you evolve and grow as a streamer and stick with it, your setup will evolve with you, which of course means you'll have to do more tests based around what equipment you already have for your streams and whatever you add on (webcam, microphone, extra monitors, etc) as well as what you want to do with scenes for your stream software if you have more than one, which you definitely should for at least an intermission/webshow when not gaming but still able to talk to your viewers, and a BRB screen for when you have to step away for a few minutes.

But the extended time spent to learn the ins and outs of your software and hardware will get shorter as you practice at it and will make your time spent on your first and future streaming pursuits much simpler.