33 replies to this topic

[Chrithu]

I've done some testing this afternoon.

If any of both programs drop your FPS by more than 15 on average you are trying to record at a resolution too high for your PCIE-BUS and CPU to handle.

Only solution to this either is to step by step reduce the resolution you play at (which of course impacts your playing experience) or record at "1/2 Frame" in MSI Afterburner repectively "Half Size" in Fraps. This way you get playable FPS and don't sacrifice too much visual quality in the end product.

Apart from that the least performance impact in both is when recording uncompressed. Which is the only option in Fraps anyhow. In MSI Afterburner both internal compression codecs (MJPEG, RTV1) even when set to 100% quality create too much artifacts for the size decrease to be worth it. The best adjustable tradeoff I could find when using VFW Compression and configuring XVid MPEG 4 Codec for a single pass compression using the HighDef/Realtime profiles. You can then calculate the target bitrate by setting a target size for a 10 minute video. I found the bigger the target bitrate/target size the less performance impact. Obviously because less compression is needed. Additionally I set MSI Afterburner to use four of my six cores so that two cores are there only for the game.

Conclusion: Hands down at the moment I will convert over to MSI Afterburner for recording. Much better options. Especially when it is about recording sound. As far as I have overlooked things by the help of "Virtual Audio Cable" and Stereo Mixer it should be possible to record ingame sound and microphone at the same time quite easily which is nice for tutorials. And most improtantly MSI Afterburner comes for free while Fraps has a pretty inflated pricetag nowadays.

Edited by Jason Parker, 02 March 2013 - 09:41 AM.

[Myssi]

Been using fraps for years. Sure, there are other and possibly better options but since I've actually put down money to get it I'm still stuck with it and not willing to purchase \ otherwise get another program.

As people mentioned before it records in raw format and that takes a lot of space. If someone decides to use fraps I would highly recommend using a separate HDD where you record. If your disk has to load game or OS data while it records gigabytes of raw video footage there is going to be problems.
If your video or gameplay gets a huge impact your options are to record in half-size and sort it out with video editor later, change the actual game resolution or getting another program for recording that handles itself better.

Also, since it's raw footage it does take a lot of space for fraps files. One match on MWO takes somewhere between 20 to 30 gigs for me, recorded in 60 FPS 1080p. Of course that will go down too when you drop the FPS you record to lower number, use half size or drop the resolution.
Non-issue for me since I have separate disks where I record, but I doubt most people have separate raid array available for recording, loading the game from another disk and OS from yet another.

[Chrithu]

Myssi, on 02 March 2013 - 10:15 AM, said:

Been using fraps for years. Sure, there are other and possibly better options but since I've actually put down money to get it I'm still stuck with it and not willing to purchase \ otherwise get another program.

Quite understandable. I'm in the same boat. I sure will keep using fraps finding that other tools have the same limitations and performance impacts (as I suspected, there aren't that many different ways to do video capturing without a dedicated hardware card). But MSI Afterburner, as I found out today, is a good and free alternative. And considering there is a free product that does the same and even more I would feel bad for suggesting Fraps to others. Especially because the price tripled since I have bought it and there wasn't much new stuff added in that time. The only big new thing in those 8 or 9 years I've owned and used fraps was that they finally got rid of the 4GB limit. The rest was bug fixes as new Windows versions came out.

[Red Line Pilot]

OBS (Open Broadcast Software) is a good free alternative. It can also record and encode to your HD.

[Aurien Titus]

Jason Parker, on 02 March 2013 - 09:35 AM, said:

Conclusion: Hands down at the moment I will convert over to MSI Afterburner for recording. Much better options. Especially when it is about recording sound. As far as I have overlooked things by the help of "Virtual Audio Cable" and Stereo Mixer it should be possible to record ingame sound and microphone at the same time quite easily which is nice for tutorials. And most improtantly MSI Afterburner comes for free while Fraps has a pretty inflated pricetag nowadays.

Obviously you don't have the latest version of FRAPS or don't know how to set it up. FRAPS quite easily captures the audio from your mic with no other software or special re-encoding needing to be done. Go to Movies > Record External Input > Select microphone > Only capture while pushing [your push to talk button]. Now every time you talk in TeamSpeak FRAPS records it. I'm not sure how much easier it needs to get.

[Chrithu]

Aurien Titus, on 03 March 2013 - 02:58 PM, said:

Obviously you don't have the latest version of FRAPS or don't know how to set it up. FRAPS quite easily captures the audio from your mic with no other software or special re-encoding needing to be done. Go to Movies > Record External Input > Select microphone > Only capture while pushing [your push to talk button]. Now every time you talk in TeamSpeak FRAPS records it. I'm not sure how much easier it needs to get.

The point is: I will not be able to record the gamesound at the same time with fraps contrary to Afterburner where this would be possible telling from it's options. Besides this isn't the only point currently speaking in favor of Afterburner: It also is free and allows for recording directly in compressed format. If you just want to record your gaming sessions without wanting to edit stuff afterwards that's a great thing as it saves a huge amount of disc space.

[Aym]

Phaesphoros, on 02 March 2013 - 04:14 AM, said:

I've also heard someone mentioning MSI Afterburner. It's a free tool and can record as well; with about 720p performance doesn't even drop too much.

@Jason Parker: IMHO only if the tool is crap, disk performance should impact game performance due to recording. Disk activity should increase load times but not, say, fps. All these recording tools should do is to copy the buffer's content from graphics card to RAM, process it (like compression) and store it to disk. As the MSI tool states, the copying process from graphics card to RAM can impact performance since there's a limited bandwidth (depends on some factors, but this is also a problem for GPU computing).

MSI Afterburner is great for screenshots and video!

[Fiachdubh]

I would like to take screenshots but not interested in video, something free, small, unobtrusive that will not effect perfprmance. Anyone care to make a recommendation? Used FRAPS many years ago but since dont need video maybe something more suitable?

[CmdrPoopyPants]

Fiachdubh, on 03 March 2013 - 04:29 PM, said:

I would like to take screenshots but not interested in video, something free, small, unobtrusive that will not effect perfprmance. Anyone care to make a recommendation? Used FRAPS many years ago but since dont need video maybe something more suitable?

I've not seen anything for just screen shots.. but if you play windowed you can just use alt+prnt-scrn.. Otherwise, fraps and msi afterburner and even bandi-cam do screenies and shouldn't hurt anything performance wise if you're not creating vids. Not sure if there's a watermark on bandicam screenies though, but there is on video.

[Aurien Titus]

Jason Parker, on 03 March 2013 - 03:04 PM, said:

The point is: I will not be able to record the gamesound at the same time with fraps contrary to Afterburner where this would be possible telling from it's options. Besides this isn't the only point currently speaking in favor of Afterburner: It also is free and allows for recording directly in compressed format. If you just want to record your gaming sessions without wanting to edit stuff afterwards that's a great thing as it saves a huge amount of disc space.

Once again, you obviously don't have the latest version of FRAPs or don't know how to set it up. Or possibly don't know how to use it. FRAPS can record game sound, TS or other voip, you talking, and music playing as well with no problems. What you're claiming is completely false.

[BrandeX]

(Razer) Game Booster 3.5 is hands down the best that I have tried. Fully free and no limitations. It does everything FRAPS does and more.

[Chrithu]

Aurien Titus, on 03 March 2013 - 08:07 PM, said:

Once again, you obviously don't have the latest version of FRAPs or don't know how to set it up. Or possibly don't know how to use it. FRAPS can record game sound, TS or other voip, you talking, and music playing as well with no problems. What you're claiming is completely false.

Yep sorry. I was completely wrong. Haven't changed settings in a good while. It used to be either record the sound that is played through speakers or record from any external source like a microphone but not both at the same time. Now you can record microphone and the sound you hear at the same time in Fraps aswell. Must be since a good while. Dunno how I have missed it because I always download the newset version right when I get the email notification.

This leaves only the capability to record compressed video and being free in favor of Afterburner.

[Minos Murdoc]

My only issue with fraps is the size of the files it creates. They are bloodly huge, even when recording half sized screens.
Not had the issue of Fraps killing the client at the end of the game.

[Chrithu]

Youngbull1980, on 04 March 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

My only issue with fraps is the size of the files it creates. They are bloodly huge, even when recording half sized screens.

Yep. Though it is desirable if you plan on creating trailers and the like from the recorded footage you want as high a quality as possible for editing and putting pieces together. And recording the raw uncompressed output is the best quality you can get, but comes easily at the cost of several GB per minte recorded. Here's where I see the advantage of tools like Afterburner that can record compressed video and thus safe a lot of space.

Edited by Jason Parker, 04 March 2013 - 04:39 AM.