Newer videos look worse on better PC

[Indialien]

I've been making gaming videos for a few years now. I notice that my older videos are of a better quality, and I'm not sure why. I used to record on a worse pc, yet the quality of the recordings is better overall.

My current PC has an i9 9900K and an Nvidia RTX 2080Ti GPU. My old PC had an i7 6700K and an AMD R9 200 series GPU. I'm using Shadowplay to record video. I use Sony Vegas 16 to edit and render the video. I noticed that my recent videos have pixelation in them, whereas my old videos look crystal clear. I mainly record Minecraft videos for my YouTube channel. The pixelation is very easy to notice in Minecraft videos beings the graphics are quite simple.

What could be causing this change in quality?


My Shadowplay settings:

Resolution = 1440pHD
Frame rate = 60
Bit rate = 50 mbps

Sony Vegas settings:

Project properties:
Width/Height = 2560x1440
Frame rate = 60
Pixel format = 8-bit
Full resolution rendering quality = Best
Motion blur type = Gaussian
Deinterlace method = None
Resample mode = Disable resample

Render Settings:
Mainconcept AVC/AAC
Frame size = Custom (2560x1440)
Profile = High
Frame rate = 60
Field order = None
Pixel aspect ratio = 1
Number of reference frames = 2
Variable Bit rate = Maximum (240,000,000) Average (135,000,000)
Number of slices = 4
Under the "project" tab, Video rendering quality = Best

Any input would be greatly appreciated. If you need more information, I'm happy to provide it.

Thank you

[poisondeathray]

Probably youtube's fault. Probably nothing to do with your computer

Do they look ok exporting from vegas, before uploading to youtube ?

Maybe they are using lower bitrates, lower quality settings, using more distributing encoding nodes (lower quality)

Try comparing the AVC version to old AVC version and compare the VP9 version as well. Sometimes one is significantly better

[Indialien]

Thanks for the quick response.

The issue I'm noticing is in the rendered video from Vegas, before being uploaded. Once I upload them to YouTube, compression typically destroys them even more.

[poisondeathray]

What about the recorded video, before vegas - how does that look?

[Indialien]

The raw video before being rendered in Vegas looks slightly better.

Another thing I should mention is that I used to record in 1080p, and it looked flawless. Now, I have to record in 1440p just to get somewhere near what it used to look like. I'm pretty stumped.

It's probably not very noticeable to most people, but I notice it and it bothers me that it isn't as good as I know it can be. I have a small channel, only just over 200 subs, so it's not the end of the world that my videos don't look as good as I'd like them to. I'm sort of a perfectionist when it comes to things like this. I know I was able to get it looking great at one point in time, and somewhere along the line, the quality has become worse. I would imagine, with a new pc with better hardware, that it would look the same or better. I'm not sure what factor is different in the equation.

I've tried using OBS for recording, and the videos never come out looking good. It's always choppy or pixelated, no matter the settings. I've even tried using Fraps again for the first time in forever today, hoping that would maybe lead me to a solution, but it causes a hit to the performance of the game while I'm playing and causing some noticeable choppiness. I'm almost certain that I used Fraps on the old videos that I mentioned, the ones that look much better.

[poisondeathray]

"Slightly better" suggests it's still not that great. If it's deteriorated before vegas, you have to improve the recording to get better results.

IIRC Shadowplay is capped at 50Mb/s ? Or is there a hack or some way around that? If you can increase the bitrate, it will improve the recording

Fraps has lossless and lossy modes, but you're right, a huge hit in gameplay performance.

In the end, youtube is going to turn it to mush anyways, no matter what you do . (But I guess your goal is "not as bad" mush...)

Some people add motion blur, either in game or in post, that can help compression and make it look less bad, slightly smoother on youtube

[Indialien]

If you set the resolution in Shadowplay to "In-Game", you can bump it up to 130mbps. I tried this as well, doesn't look any better than when I record in 1440p at 50mbps. It actually looks a bit worse.

I compare my videos to other Minecraft videos on YouTube, and it's quite a noticeable difference. Their videos don't look like "mush" at all; they look dang near perfect.

I get the vp09 codec when I upload in 1440p, and it still doesn't look as good as theirs. I feel like it's not preferable to have to resort to recording and uploading 1440p videos as most people are watching on their phones or on computers that can't display 1440p. I'd like it if I could record and upload in 1080p, and get the same clear quality that I see so many others getting.

[poisondeathray]

If you set the resolution in Shadowplay to "In-Game", you can bump it up to 130mbps. I tried this as well, doesn't look any better than when I record in 1440p at 50mbps. It actually looks a bit worse.

But it's actually 50, right ? It used to be maxed out at 50

Their videos don't look like "mush" at all; they look dang near perfect.

That's not really possible for youtube. You probably mean it looks as good as it can for youtube. But if you compared what they uploaded vs. what youtube re-encoded there is a massive difference

[Indialien]

But it's actually 50, right ? It used to be maxed out at 50

I don't think it's 50? It gives me the option to move the slider up to a max of 130 when the resolution is set to "In-game". If it's set to 1440p, 50mbps is the max the slider will go up to.

That's not really possible for youtube. You probably mean it looks as good as it can for youtube. But if you compared what they uploaded vs. what youtube re-encoded there is a massive difference

I'm just telling you what it looks like from where I'm sitting. I'm sure their rendered video, before it's uploaded to YouTube, looks incredible because their videos on YouTube look incredible. I can't even imagine what the raw video looks like.

I'm just unsure what to do at this point. After having a go at it myself for countless hours over the past several months, I ended up trying tutorials for "best settings". I've gone through several, and none of them have produced the sweet spot I stumbled onto with my old PC. Are there "best settings" for my particular hardware? How do people get the YouTube videos I watch that look "near perfect" to me to come out so well? It can't be my hardware. I've tried all sorts of settings. What could it possibly be? Do I need a HDD with a higher read/write speed or something?

[poisondeathray]

But it's actually 50, right ? It used to be maxed out at 50

I don't think it's 50? It gives me the option to move the slider up to a max of 130 when the resolution is set to "In-game". If it's set to 1440p, 50mbps is the max the slider will go up to.

Does the actual recorded video bitrate increase ? Check it with mediainfo for example

I'm just unsure what to do at this point. After having a go at it myself for countless hours over the past several months, I ended up trying tutorials for "best settings". I've gone through several, and none of them have produced the sweet spot I stumbled onto with my old PC. Are there "best settings" for my particular hardware? How do people get the YouTube videos I watch that look "near perfect" to me to come out so well? It can't be my hardware. I've tried all sorts of settings. What could it possibly be? Do I need a HDD with a higher read/write speed or something?

It's not your hardware , Faster HDD or SSD does not affect video quality, unless it's damaged, and you're dropping frames because of that

"Best settings" can actually make it slightly worse on youtube , because it's more difficult to compress . One way to "trick" youtube is to make things easier to compress. Motion blur is one of them

If the recording is only "slightly better" than the vegas export . And the vegas export is already not that great, the problem is your recording. There is a saying "garbage in = garbage out" . Quality only goes downhill

Are their videos any different, more action that sort of thing? You can ask them what they are doing differently. e.g. motion blur

[sophisticles]

Try recording using OBS+NVENC, with that Turing based card you have people are raving all over the place about the quality and ability to record while playing.

[babygdav]

https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/discover/288902/shadowplay-pixelation/
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/geforce-experience/14/287570/my-shadowplay...elated-and-lo/
https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/forums/geforce-experience/14/273157/my-showplay-r...-pixelationco/
https://www.reddit.com/r/GeForceExperience/comments/a1jjgk/fix_shadowplay_recordings_b...xelated_buggy/
Bad drivers? Try the last one.

[Indialien]

I experience similar issues with OBS. I've tried every setting under the sun in OBS and watched countless tutorials; nothing works.

All drivers are up to date.

If I post a video so you can see it for yourself, would that help at all? I've been struggling with this for over a year now. I'm so discouraged and out of options that I honestly feel like just giving up. I spent 3000 dollars on a brand new PC so that I wouldn't have to keep fighting with this, and I'm still in the same boat. I'm desperate for help. I wish I could have someone come to my house and take a look at it for themselves. I don't know if anyone in my area offers that type of service, but I'd pay someone to do that for me if they did.

[lordsmurf]

All drivers are up to date.

That's not necessarily a good thing. Sometimes driver updates are worse.
For example, that is true of ATI AIW cards, some of the final drivers were horrible.