Tips & Tricks Finding the best recording software for gameplay recording

[Jonathan]

Hello all,

I this guide I'll be going over several recording programs that you can use to record gameplay and list the ups and downs of using them so you can find the best one to use for your videos. First I'm going to cover the two groups of recording software. The first being more CPU bound, which record gameplay using screen capture with the downside of reduced performance. The second being more GPU bound, which records the frames from the GPU and gives little to no performance difference from normal gaming. While GPU recording is better its not available to all, you need a reasonably good graphics card to have access to the feature (see more below).

CPU Based Recording

• FRAPS - This is a reasonably good recording software which produces very good quality video files, however these files are very large (anywhere from 10-70GB per hour of footage), you only get 30 seconds of recording with the free version but you can..... get the full version elsewhere......though I don't encourage this at all.
• OBS - This is one of the most popular applications for recording as you can use it for streaming, voice recording and more. It does allow more customisation with settings but video quality can vary and isn't as consistent as other programs. file size varies based on your settings.

There are several others but I personally can't say if they are good or not. If none of the above work then do some research into other options.
​

GPU Based Recording

• Shadowplay - This is the Nvidia software for recording games and from what I've heard is very good. I don't have a Nvidia GPU to tell you but its works pretty much the same as the AMD counterpart.

"GeForce 600 series and higher GPUs. For optimal experience, a GeForce GTX 650 or higher is required. "

• Plays.tv - This is a third party GPU recording software that I personally use, This is what I use and it works well, The file size is a good size of around 1-3GB per hour of footage (@ 1080p).

"VCE is included in AMD’s Radeon HD 7700 series and newer. (Some laptop-class HD 7000 series might not be compatible)
If your video card is made by Nvidia, it must feature NVIDIA’s Video Encoder (NVENC). NVENC is included in NVIDIA GeForce GTX 600 series and newer. (Some laptop-class GT 600 series might not be compatible) "

This tends to be the best option for recording if you can use it, as it offers good quality recording with little performance drops.
​

Other Tips
There are some other minor things you can do to improve recording performance like:

• Setting the file export to a different hard drive from the OS, it seems to help most with CPU based recording from my experience and can make a good performance boost in game.
• Close any other applications in the background that you don't need to record.

I hope this guide helps, I'll be updating it now and then when info becomes outdated

 

[Tom Cryer]

Hello all,

I this guide I'll be going over several recording programs that you can use to record gameplay and list the ups and downs of using them so you can find the best one to use for your videos. First I'm going to cover the two groups of recording software. The first being more CPU bound, which record gameplay using screen capture with the downside of reduced performance. The second being more GPU bound, which records the frames from the GPU and gives little to no performance difference from normal gaming. While GPU recording is better its not available to all, you need a reasonably good graphics card to have access to the feature (see more below).

CPU Based Recording

• FRAPS - This is a reasonably good recording software which produces very good quality video files, however these files are very large (anywhere from 10-70GB per hour of footage), you only get 30 seconds of recording with the free version but you can..... get the full version elsewhere......though I don't encourage this at all.
• OBS - This is one of the most popular applications for recording as you can use it for streaming, voice recording and more. It does allow more customisation with settings but video quality can vary and isn't as consistent as other programs. file size varies based on your settings.

There are several others but I personally can't say if they are good or not. If none of the above work then do some research into other options.
​

GPU Based Recording

• Shadowplay - This is the Nvidia software for recording games and from what I've heard is very good. I don't have a Nvidia GPU to tell you but its works pretty much the same as the AMD counterpart.

"GeForce 600 series and higher GPUs. For optimal experience, a GeForce GTX 650 or higher is required. "

• Plays.tv - This is a third party GPU recording software that I personally use, This is what I use and it works well, The file size is a good size of around 1-3GB per hour of footage (@ 1080p).

"VCE is included in AMD’s Radeon HD 7700 series and newer. (Some laptop-class HD 7000 series might not be compatible)
If your video card is made by Nvidia, it must feature NVIDIA’s Video Encoder (NVENC). NVENC is included in NVIDIA GeForce GTX 600 series and newer. (Some laptop-class GT 600 series might not be compatible) "

This tends to be the best option for recording if you can use it, as it offers good quality recording with little performance drops.
​

Other Tips
There are some other minor things you can do to improve recording performance like:

• Setting the file export to a different hard drive from the OS, it seems to help most with CPU based recording from my experience and can make a good performance boost in game.
• Close any other applications in the background that you don't need to record.

I hope this guide helps, I'll be updating it now and then when info becomes outdated

This did actually help me, as I forgot about shadowplay, as I knew about it before I got my GPU, but forgot after. thanks

 

[Traf Plays]

dxtory should be on this list. although it isnt free.
and i might be wrong but GeForce 600 series is lower than a gt730 which is what i have, shadow play isnt available for gt730 so i doubt it will be for lower, although you can trick GeForce Experience for it, but yeah

 

[Jonathan]

dxtory should be on this list. although it isnt free.
and i might be wrong but GeForce 600 series is lower than a gt730 which is what i have, shadow play isnt available for gt730 so i doubt it will be for lower, although you can trick GeForce Experience for it, but yeah

yea, I only really put free ones on here as most prefer not to pay unless they have too. the shadow play requirements came from the Nvidia site, plus the GT730 is more of a display adaptor card unlike say at GTX680 which would properly be able to do it.