Advise on 2nd PC for Streaming or Upgrade Current?

Crosly

Crosly

Crosly

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Joined
11 Aug 2010
Posts
178
Hello
I'm looking to dabble into streaming casually and have tried to on my current PC build. But I don't think it is up to the job and have read that a 2nd PC for streaming will help or to upgrade my current.
But with the current market of GPUs I am wondering if it would be cheaper to build a 2nd PC for streaming only as I here you don't need much.

I believe if I was to upgrade, it would 100% be GPU and I would probably need a bigger PSU too. I've also got my eyes on a 6700 XT or 6800 XT but I just can't justify the prices at the moment.

My current PC specs are:
CPU/Cooler - Ryzen 5 3600 w/ AMD Wraith Prism Cooler
Motherboard - MSI MAG B550M MORTAR WIFI (Using Wired Ethernet Connection)
GPU - Sapphire RX 5500 XT Pulse OC 8GB
RAM - HyperX FURY 16GB (2x 8GB) 3200MHz DDR4
PSU - Cooler Master MWE Gold v2 650W Modular

If it would be more financially better to build a 2nd PC for streaming, what should I look for and would it the better option in the long run until GPU prices "normalise" :confused:

Also I am not a fanboy of either AMD or NVIDIA. It just comes down to cost for me.
 
There are two options to improve your streaming performance.

Firstly get a better cpu with more cores so the encoding can be done on lightly utilised cores. 5900x has 12 cores 24 threads and is dropping in price at the moment and will cost about £450. You would need a bios update most likely and a new cooler for around an extra £50, you do not say what case you have so hard to recommend one. If you can wait a couple of months the new 3D cache AMD chips will be out Q1/Q2 2022 and could have some excellent options for you to choose from. Selling your 3600 will recover some of the costs of this upgrade.

Second choice is to upgrade the gpu to one that has a built in encoder. Nvidia 3000 series cards have a built in dedicated H265 encoder so it can stream and not lose any performance. Upgrading to a 3070 is a sensible option and your psu should be fine for that upgrade.

If I was in your situation I would be going for option 2. A better gpu is a much better investment for your system than a cpu because your cpu is fine whilst your gpu is the weakest component in your pc. The normal advice is to instal the Telegram APP and join the fepartalert channel so you get updates when the Nvidia founders edition cards come into stock. 3060ti for £369 and 3070 for £428 iirc and are by far the best value cards you can get but you have to be fast to have any chance of getting one those cards.
 
Haz123 said:
There are two options to improve your streaming performance.

Firstly get a better cpu with more cores so the encoding can be done on lightly utilised cores. 5900x has 12 cores 24 threads and is dropping in price at the moment and will cost about £450. You would need a bios update most likely and a new cooler for around an extra £50, you do not say what case you have so hard to recommend one. If you can wait a couple of months the new 3D cache AMD chips will be out Q1/Q2 2022 and could have some excellent options for you to choose from. Selling your 3600 will recover some of the costs of this upgrade.

Second choice is to upgrade the gpu to one that has a built in encoder. Nvidia 3000 series cards have a built in dedicated H265 encoder so it can stream and not lose any performance. Upgrading to a 3070 is a sensible option and your psu should be fine for that upgrade.

If I was in your situation I would be going for option 2. A better gpu is a much better investment for your system than a cpu because your cpu is fine whilst your gpu is the weakest component in your pc. The normal advice is to instal the Telegram APP and join the fepartalert channel so you get updates when the Nvidia founders edition cards come into stock. 3060ti for £369 and 3070 for £428 iirc and are by far the best value cards you can get but you have to be fast to have any chance of getting one those cards.
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Out of both your options I agree that option 2 is the better choice because the GPU will be a big step up and it is what I was looking into before being told I could just build a 2nd PC. I mean, what are 5500 XT's going rates at the moment? Ebay is very mixed.
My case is just an Aerocool Atomic, nothing fancy as I was on a budget at the time.

I have installed the Telegram app just like you advised but not sure where or how to find the fepartalert channel.
 
I uninstalled the telegram app so cannot see how to use it I am afraid. So much better to get an NV FE card for MSRP rather than have to pay £900 for a retail 3070.

Nice case, should be able to fit any gpu you want into it and plenty of width for a large cpu heatsink if you needed one, which you do not if you keeping the same cpu.

I looked on the auction site ( not sure you can use the name on these forums so you may want to remove it) and yes the prices for an average card are insane. I think if you did want to sell the 5500xt then you could get over £150 but I am no expert on resale values and lots of scammers on there who get the item and say it is faulty to try and get it for free, is a risky business.

Unfortunately you are in the same situation as a lot of other people and need a newer gpu and for you it is worse because an NV card suits your needs with its built in hardware encoder.
 
Haz123 said:
I uninstalled the telegram app so cannot see how to use it I am afraid. So much better to get an NV FE card for MSRP rather than have to pay £900 for a retail 3070.

Nice case, should be able to fit any gpu you want into it and plenty of width for a large cpu heatsink if you needed one, which you do not if you keeping the same cpu.

I looked on the auction site ( not sure you can use the name on these forums so you may want to remove it) and yes the prices for an average card are insane. I think if you did want to sell the 5500xt then you could get over £150 but I am no expert on resale values and lots of scammers on there who get the item and say it is faulty to try and get it for free, is a risky business.

Unfortunately you are in the same situation as a lot of other people and need a newer gpu and for you it is worse because an NV card suits your needs with its built in hardware encoder.
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Could it then be possibly cheaper to build a 2nd PC for streaming on a budget but more than likely very cheap compared to getting a GPU at these prices?
I've read that if I can get my hands on an APU then I wouldn't need a GPU for that system and I'm assuming I just need a basic Motherboard, 8GB RAM, a small PSU, cheap case and obviously a capture card.
 
Well the first option of upgrading to a 5900x is always available. You would have plenty of available cpu resources to then encode,stream and game.

or alternatively -

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £437.60 (includes shipping: £11.70)​
​

The 10400 chips are often sold out so you need to shop around. You cannot use an F variant Intel chip because that is the version without an igpu , you would need a gpu to make the F chip system into a workable pc.

Or-

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £477.60 (includes shipping: £11.70)​
​

Once again the cpu is often sold out so you have to shop around and unlikely you would find it at that price


Both of the above PCs are very capable in their own right. You would need an OS as well.



Before you actually buy anything you should maybe test what sort of performance you are actually getting with your current system when streaming.
 
Haz123 said:
Well the first option of upgrading to a 5900x is always available. You would have plenty of available cpu resources to then encode,stream and game.

or alternatively -

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £437.60 (includes shipping: £11.70)
​

The 10400 chips are often sold out so you need to shop around. You cannot use an F variant Intel chip because that is the version without an igpu , you would need a gpu to make the F chip system into a workable pc.

Or-

My basket at Overclockers UK:
Total: £477.60 (includes shipping: £11.70)
​

Once again the cpu is often sold out so you have to shop around and unlikely you would find it at that price


Both of the above PCs are very capable in their own right. You would need an OS as well.



Before you actually buy anything you should maybe test what sort of performance you are actually getting with your current system when streaming.
Click to expand...

I can get my hands on the I5-10400 and the Ryzen 5 5600G also.
Would this be ok too if I wanted to keep cost down more? I3-10100 3.6GHZ (COMET LAKE) SOCKET LGA1200 PROCESSOR - RETAIL

You are right, I do need to test my streaming capabilities again on this PC as I don't think I did much. But need to look at how to do that again just in case I was doing it wrong.
 
Crosly said:
Yeah it handles what I want to stream. It's using about 50-70% of the GPU, very little RAM and CPU.
Click to expand...
Time to do some test streaming and monitor usage then you can decide which direction to go.

You may be ok.

Msi afterburner is a good monitoring tool will give you fps as well.
 
mickyflinn said:
Time to do some test streaming and monitor usage then you can decide which direction to go.

You may be ok.

Msi afterburner is a good monitoring tool will give you fps as well.
Click to expand...

I tried a few months back but all I can remember is my friend saying that it was laggy at times but I am an absolute amateur when it came to setting up the stream using OBS.
I'm also wondering if my PC be able to handle streaming and running other tasks like Discord and Twitch chat etc.
 
Crosly said:
I tried a few months back but all I can remember is my friend saying that it was laggy at times but I am an absolute amateur when it came to setting up the stream using OBS.
I'm also wondering if my PC be able to handle streaming and running other tasks like Discord and Twitch chat etc.
Click to expand...
Laggy at times can be numerous things , internet speed , not enough memory, etc, but 6 cores for gaming while streaming should be fine.

Do you have your games on a ssd ?

Just to clarify you wish to stream and game at 1080p, what games ?
 
mickyflinn said:
Laggy at times can be numerous things , internet speed , not enough memory, but 6 cores for gaming while streaming should be fine.

Do you have your games on a ssd ?

Just to clarify you wish to stream and game at 1080p
Click to expand...

I'm thinking it could be my internet speed. I am with BT and the best I can get here is between 40-64mbps. I am wired and it will only be my PC and phone connected to the router at the same time.

Yeah the game is on an M.2 NVME SSD

I'm just looking to play my game happily on medium settings at 1080p which I get 60fps and get a decent quality stream out of it too hopefully.
 
Crosly said:
I'm thinking it could be my internet speed. I am with BT and the best I can get here is between 40-64mbps. I am wired and it will only be my PC and phone connected to the router at the same time.

Yeah the game is on an M.2 NVME SSD

I'm just looking to play my game happily on medium settings at 1080p which I get 60fps and get a decent quality stream out of it too hopefully.
Click to expand...
Check your upload speed.
 
Crosly said:
Speedtest came out with 14.72mbps wired
Google test came out with 14.4mbps wired
BT App (which tests the router) came out with 15mbps
Click to expand...
Good enough.

I would get your mate to come over and see if he can pin point anything before spending if poss.

Run some test .
 
mickyflinn said:
Good enough.

I would get your mate to come over and see if he can pin point anything before spending if poss.

Run some test .
Click to expand...

My friends was just viewing my stream on Twitch to see what the quality was like and I am waiting for him to get home so I can run some tests again.

If I can get a decent quality stream, do you think I can run other applications like Discord, Twitch chat and browse?
 
Crosly said:
My friends was just viewing my stream on Twitch to see what the quality was like and I am waiting for him to get home so I can run some tests again.

If I can get a decent quality stream, do you think I can run other applications like Discord, Twitch chat and browse?
Click to expand...
Maybe yes that's where you have to monitor cpu , memory, etc so you can see if hardware is the issues.

Servers can also lag.
 
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