XSplit Broadcaster did not shut down properly

If XSplit Broadcaster was shut down improperly or unexpectedly, you can use the Select Presentation window for some basic troubleshooting. If the shut down occurred after adding a new source to a scene, it is recommended to load a backed up presentation, a previously saved presentation, or to create a new presentation. 

If the error occurs after adding the source another time, please make sure to document any error messages and immediately seek out assistance from our support team at support.xsplit.com.

Recommendation for Primary Monitor Setup

On desktop machines which has a monitor connected to both Nvidia/AMD discrete graphics and Intel on board Graphics card, it is recommended to always connect the Primary monitor directly to the Discrete GPU.

To review which GPU is currently connected to the primary monitor (Win 8.1 or Win 10), right-click desktop and select “Screen Resolution”. View which monitor is the primary by looking at which screen has the added icon group. You will also find a text telling if the selected display is your main monitor. Check to see if that monitor is connected to the Nvidia/AMD GPU, if not then you can change this in two ways:

1. If you wish to keep the position of the actual monitor assigned as the primary monitor, then go ahead and simply change the wiring so that the DVI or HDMI input on that screen is connected to the Nvidia GPU.
2. Alternatively, you can click on the secondary monitor, make that primary by checking the checkbox to make it your main display and ‘apply’ settings. But doing it in this way will switch your main view monitor.

XSplit Broadcaster Software Information

Your stream or recording was limited by performance or affected by network issues. This following sections will help you understand what and how to change to ensure your stream is uninterrupted and set to the best possible quality.

We are currently working on gathering baseline data to establish the guidelines. This page will be updated regularly – please check back soon.

The XSplit Team

Introducing Adaptive CBR in XSplit Broadcaster V2

This blog post will introduce you to the newest XSplit Broadcaster V2 feature, adaptive bitrate!

Adaptive Bitrate is a new feature in XSplit Broadcaster 2.4+ available for CBR streams (currently only for x264 codec). If enabled, the bitrate will automatically change when network conditions fluctuate. For example if your upstream bandwidth changes midstream, XSplit Broadcaster will try to match the current available upstream bandwidth to prevent constant frame drops, and if more bandwidth becomes available later, then the system will readjust to target your set CBR bitrate.

Hopefully this feature will be able to address bandwidth fluctuation problems often experienced by user on ADSL connections.

What does it mean to “drop frames”?

When the bitrate output by the encoder is higher than your actual upstream bandwidth, frame dropping is a common known technique to temporarily lower the bitrate and avoid building up a long queue/delay. In technical terms we often talk about dropping frames before or after the encoder. If CBR bitrate settings is applied to the encoder then dropping frames before the encoder does not help much, so instead we drop frames by dropping parts of the encoded bitstream in the RTMP send/output queue. By doing it in this way we also ensure that local recordings of a live broadcast remain intact.

Hence, if your CBR bitrate settings is higher than your actual upstream bandwidth at any time, then we will allow the send queue to grow, but will eventually cut part of the bitstream corresponding to a full GOP (group of pictures) – this is the time when you will see dropped frames (in bulk) corresponding to the number of frames that we cut.

This process will continue until your upstream bandwidth can again keep up, but unfortunately there may be prolonged periods where frame drops will continue. The experience for viewers will look like small stop/resume with pieces of your stream missing. Depending on the streaming service/server and how ingest and buffering is handled, you may never see the actual stops, but there will still be small pieces missing, – gaps if you will.

What is adaptive CBR?

Adaptive CBR is one of our newest features in XSplit Broadcaster 2.4+ that we hope will improve and streamline your streaming experience. Previously, you were allowed to change your bitrate manually while streaming if you saw you were dropping too many frames and suspected that your bandwidth had decreased. Since this can be hard to monitor and even harder to change during intense broadcasting sessions, we have developed adaptive bitrate to deal with this issue before you suffer  stream drops at an inopportune moment.

What does adaptive CBR do?

Adaptive CBR monitors the delay of the send queue and if the queue grows above a certain threshold then the adaptive CBR function will decrease the bitrate to slightly below the last known bitrate. Once the stable bitrate is found, adaptive CBR will continuously check to see if the bitrate can be increased back closer to the original setting or if the bitrate need to be further lowered. This loop function continues during your broadcasting and will help to ensure that you do not experience dropped frames.

Needless to say that lowering the bitrate also lowers the quality, and large changes in upstream bandwidth over short periods of time can still result in dropped frames or very decreased quality of your stream. Magic can only take you so far -:), so your internet provider need to take you the rest of the way.

How to enable Adaptive Bitrate

  1. Go to your Broadcast Plugin. For example Twitch, head to Twitch Properties.
  2. Under Video Encoding Section, click on the Gear Icon to open Video Encoding Setup WindowXSplit Broadcaster Twitch Properties
  3. Make sure to enable ‘Strict CBR’ first and then check on Adaptive CBR.XSplit Broadcaster Video Encoding Setup
  4. Click OK to save the Settings.

Now you can broadcast without having to restart your stream or manually having to reconfigure settings when the going gets tough.

It’s still an experimental feature but please give us your feedback in the comments below!

Deleting faulty DirectShowSpy registry key

Some users that use a 3rd party tool called DirectShowSpy may encounter errors when logging in to XSplit.

This can be caused by a fault registry key that is introduced when DirectShowSpy is registered to intercept Filter Graph initialisation — Filter Graph is used by XSplit. The faulty DirectShowSpy registry key is usually caused by DirectShowSpy program begin relocated after registration.

To workaround this situation, XSplit1 detects the presence of HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{E436EBB3-524F-11CE-9F53-0020AF0BA770}\TreatAs registry key2 when it fails to initialise Filter Graph and exits when it is found. In this case, user must manually correct the DirectShowSpy registration or delete3 the registry key. Only after either is done can XSplit be restarted.


  1. Implemented in XSplit Broadcaster v2.2. In XSplit Gamecaster, this workaround will be implemented in v2.3.
  2. For 64 bit Windows, the registry key is HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Wow6432Node\CLSID{E436EBB3-524F-11CE-9F53-0020AF0BA770}\TreatAs
  3. Deleting this registry may require special/full permissions. Read here on how to do it.

XSplit Broadcaster Memory Usage

XSplit Broadcaster is currently only available as a 32 bit application, but on both 32 and 64 bit Windows 7+ operating systems. We do have a 64 bit version in the pipeline, but before we publish this, we want to make sure that it is compatible with all 3rd party integrations. For example, several capture cards’ integrations lack 64 bit support and we are working with manufacturers to extend 64 bit support. One of the limitations of 32 bit applications is the amount of OS memory that each 32 bit process can use. If LARGEADDRESS space aware manifest is not used, then the limit for an application is 2GB. If LARGEADDRESS space aware manifest is used, then the limit is extended to 3GB on a 32 bit OS and 4GB on a 64 bit OS.

The default configuration of XSplit Broadcaster (as of version 2.2) is to only address up to 2 GB (please note this is different than the memory usage reported by task manager). This can cause issues for users who have very complex presentations. If you are encountering such issues, then it is advisable to reconfigure XSplit Broadcaster to run with the LARGEADDRESS space aware manifest is used, or the 3GB-aware version of XSplit Broadcaster. The following guide will direct you on how to set this up.   
To run XSplit Broadcaster using the 3GB-aware exe, please follow the instructions below:
 
1. Open the XSplit Broadcaster application folder. This is normally located in C:\Program Files (x86)\SplitmediaLabs\XSplit Broadcaster\
2.  Backup XSplit.Core.exe by renaming it to XSplit.Core.exe.bak
3. Go to the folder labeled “3GB-aware” and move the XSplit.Core exe into the main program folder.
4. Run XSplit.Core.exe.
Starting with XSplit Broadcaster 2.3, LARGEADDRESS space configuration will be the default and users will no longer have to perform the above workaround. So far we have found no problem in using LARGEADDRESS space configuration, but it is still considered experimental so please report any issues you encounter to xsplit.com/support

Eric Baudour & Garrett Hunter Interview Part 2

Welcome to the second part of our interview with Mega64. If you haven’t already, make sure to check out Part One here. In this segment we find out a little about how the guys use XSplit and working with some of gaming’s biggest names:

Eric Baudour and Garrett Hunter

Were there any interesting lessons you picked up from working alongside publishers, events and notable figures in the gaming industry?

Eric: Yeah, you know what – I think the biggest lesson that I walked away with is “hey, these are just normal dudes”. Treat everyone like they’re your buddy, when you meet someone face-to-face in person, that impression of “hey man hows it going?” and just having that conversation puts them at ease and from there you can get whatever kind of footage you want

Garrett: I think one of the first guys, to help us realize that was Tommy Tallarico (Composer)

Eric: Oh, for sure.

Garrett: He kind of ran into us a long time ago, early when we started doing this stuff and became really good friends with us and has helped us film stuff and has just taught us that these guys you look up to, these creators and these pioneers of the gaming industry, they’re just like regular dudes who like playing games like we do. They can be just as nerdy and just as cool in whichever setting.

Eric: I don’t know if we have ever really talked about this, but a moment I always think of where we’re just hanging out is during a comic-con one year, after we filmed with Hideo Kojima. He and his kind of like crew or buddies that he goes around with wanted to get lunch with us. So we went out to a pizza place where we just got a couple of slices in the back of this little run down pizzeria and when we were sitting there, they all started fawning over Garrett’s tattoos

Garrett bursts out laughing

Eric: And we realised that this is just like hanging out with regular guys, who are just going “oh, look at these cool tattoos” or “oh, this is good pizza”

Garrett: Yeah, they really are like super down to earth, the entourage that was there just for the experience of being able to say “yo, we’re in america we wanna go get some badass pizza and hang out”  It was just a lot of fun.

Eric: I think my advice from working with all these people would be; don’t be so wary when you meet these people that you’ve grown to respect and revere because honestly they’re just dudes at the end of the day. They like video games the way you do, so just talk to them like normal people.

Now that the barrier of entry for streaming and broadcasting is lower than ever before, do you think it will be harder for up-and-comers to make a name for themselves given the influx in competition?

Eric: I do. You can really really liken it to YouTube. When YouTube started there were a lot of people that came in and made waves and there were personalities and they were interesting, and those kinds of people fade away and new people come in and now its gotten to a point where its all quantity versus quality. People are putting out the most because, the internet, if we’re looking at it as this one large amalgamation of people, is so hungry and ready for more that your quality stuff is kind of getting lost.

Garrett: Thats true.

Eric: So if you’re a streamer and you’re going “man, no one is really watching my stuff” find your hook and really have a voice and do something that’s gonna be different than what your run of the mill type stuff is. I know that the run of the mill type stuff and your “Starcraft people!” and the “heyyy! we play League of Legends people” gets big viewership and a lot of people really live on that stuff, but I think if you have a unique voice and I think that if you put out quality content and just kind of keep at it, you’ll make a name for yourself. It might not be the biggest thing in the world, but you’ll get followers because you’re doing something that you’re passionate about

Garrett: Yeah, I agree 100% and I think that there is that niche out there that you can carve out for yourself if you have a creativity that’s gonna set you aside from what everyone else is doing. That’s the thing, the barrier of entry is so low everyone is doing it, so you’ve gotta do something that sets yourself aside from everything else.

Eric: You just have to be passionate about it, you can’t go into it and go “well, today I’m gonna get a hundred viewers”. You can’t ever have the mentality and set goals that rely on other people that way. What you have to go on is “I’m gonna make the best show I can and here are the things I’m gonna do and I’m really going to try and promote it and make this something I really enjoy”.

I think if you start making content you really like, people will latch onto it because thats all we are doing with Mega64 – we’re sitting in our room trying to make each other laugh and when something happens naturally we’re like “alright, let’s do it, let’s film that”

Garrett:  And I feel like that’s something our fanbase shares, they are of the same sense of humor that we are, so that us sitting in a room trying to make each other laugh is just by proxy something that people will connect with. I think that definitely is how we have carved out our niche, by having a live action show and not really a video game stream

After initially discovering XSplit, what made you decide to use this product for your live streams?

Eric:  I noticed that our podcast had kind of, I don’t want to say plateaued but I don’t know if there’s a better word for it. Our viewership had kind of reached a level and remained consistent for a while. We were live streaming and I went to the guys and said, “hey, let me try and take this over and let me see what I can do to make it more dynamic”, because all I thought was, do I wanna watch this? It’s a single camera pointed at four people and I just think that for an hour of no cuts, no nothing and yeah maybe they get wacky but just on a flat surface it gets boring, visually, its boring.

So I actually went and researched programs that Twitch recommended or went on forums to see what people were saying, I tried a few different programs. I probably tried like 3 or 4 different programs and landed on XSplit and really kept coming back to it even after trying other alternatives. XSplit gives me the ability to have reset scenes like we have for camera one, camera two and our little webcam for camera three. Our fourth scene is our Podcast theme song and our sixth scene is our videos and our ninth scene is our Will.I.Am little intro thing for when we make fun of him.

Garrett: And its all one click away

Eric: Exactly! Having that ability is really enticing. I have a degree in radio, tv and film and have worked within that broadcast television industry so I was looking for something that was going to be as close as a regular switcher that I can use for our show. Something where I can imagine myself going “ok ready camera two, take two”. If I can picture myself doing that with a program, I was ready to use it and XSplit was ready to be that thing for me that its perfect. Now with the advent of preview windows I can always see what other cameras are doing so I can cut to it. Having those kinds of features, and being able to have everything preloaded really drew me into to XSplit just for our live podcast and I know Garrett has started using it for his own stream also

Garrett: Based off the research Eric did and what we were already using on the podcast and the way Twitch has a tutorial to stream, helped me learn about how to do it. After watching YouTube videos, XSplit was just unanimously popular and the most stable program to use.

Eric: I think its head and shoulders above everything else I’ve tried

Garrett: I did use one program before on the Mac operating system and I can’t even remember what it was, but it was really limited to where I didn’t have all of the multiple scenes I could click on, because I like to cut between stuff. Typically because I make a mistake.

Both the guys burst out laughing   

Our readers are always interested in learning about the set-ups used by well known broadcasters, Do you mind walking us through your hardware and software setup?

Eric: Sure! For the Mega64 podcast we’re running with two prosumer grade cameras that we used to use for our actual skits and everything. We have those running through firewire to our PC and those are taken straight into XSplit, those are the only two cameras. Other than that its pre-edited videos that are set to scenes like our theme song and our videos, different things like that. We have pre-edited videos I keep within a folder and have them already to go and we prep before we go live by saying “hey, what are the things you think we’re gonna hit” and then I put them all up in our pre-loaded scenes. So we’re running two cameras; a Sony and a Panasonic through Firewire and then a little USB Logitech camera that’s on our computer for a third camera for me.

Garrett: That’s for when we cut to Eric to show him mastering the stream.

Eric: Really, its gotten so easy to get all of these things into one program and to have them all sorted so I’m ready to use them.

Garrett: The only real complexity is that we’ve upgraded the audio on the set a few times but it’s always analog equipment going through a mixer with a single 35mm headphone jack input into the PC we stream with.

Eric: We use an external sound card to cut out on any kind of external fuzz, and we have a regular mixing board.

Garrett: Do you remember what PC we use? It was one of our old editing PCs right?

Eric: Yeah, and thats one of the great things, XSplit doesn’t need something to crazy to run. As Garrett was saying, our audio is all analog going through a mixing board and then a compressor running to a single 35mm into a little external sound card for our audio.

Our audio setup is just two booms and two shotgun mics hanging above the set to capture all of the audio and then I have one little dynamic microphone thats sitting on my desk if we ever need to cut to me. What about your stream Garrett? You’re actually playing video games on your “Poorly Played Stream”

Garrett: Yeah that’s right, so I’m actually using the program in more of a traditional way, where I have a game that’s being captured on a old Hauppauge with the composite inputs, the old big green and grey box. So I capture the video game through that and then I have a little picture in picture window. I have a couple of different scenes where I will cut to a quad cam with multiple things showing all run through an onboard laptop camera. We use a 17 inch Razer Blade, one off the first generation ones. The other camera is a Logitech mounted on a Mic stand. So I’ll cut between different shots and I also have a lot of audio equipment  in a rack to my left and I like to play a lot of sound effects and samples and music and stuff. So I will route all of that audio through little mixers and such and then I just play it through speakers that my vocal mic picks up. I have one of those Yeti’s, the blue microphone that’s pretty badass. It picks up my voice and any other voice in the room and the music and all of the sound effects and stuff.

Finally, any cool projects coming up this year you would like to share with our readers?

Eric: Right after we’re done with E3 we have a Split Squad fourth of July weekend convention extravaganza

Garrett: Thats what we’re calling it.

Eric: Yep thats what we’re calling it, all of the words that I just said, so I hope we remember them tomorrow. Half of the crew being Rocco Botte, Garrett Hunter, Bryan Abou Charcra and Frank Howley they’re gonna be at the Anime Expo, you guys can check them out fourth of July weekend, we’re gonna have a panel there – hey guess what? A special guest: Derrick Acosta!

Garrett: Boom!

Eric: He’ll be there also! But wait, there’s more! A Split Squad Hype Split Squad at RTX Convention on the same weekend! you can come out and meet the one and only Shawn Chatfield, myself Eric Baudour, Kevin Bushong and also what!? Split Squad special guest Derrick Acosta, he’s double time, double team supreme – he’s going coast to coast (we’re counting the gulf coast as a coast)

Garrett: Austin, Texas and Los Angeles, California, we’re gonna be in two places at once baby!

Eric: If you love skinny jeans you’re gonna love this weekend of conventions that Mega64 is gonna have! It may be hot outside this summer but its gonna be a cool cool convention time indoors.

(telephone rings in the background)

Eric: Whose phone was that!? WHOSE PHONE INTERRUPTED!?

Garrett: We’re doing this for a text interview, no one is gonna hear this! …but yeah, that’s our next plan.

Eric: Yep and we are confirmed for PAX (Prime), that will be a Single Squad of the no limit soldiers, all of us will be at PAX.

But hey, maybe conventions aren’t for you, and I understand that because they’re not for me either. I go there so I can meet you guys. You know what you should do if you’re a Mega64 fan? you should come to the Mega64 Game Days Weekend November 1st and 2nd at where!? Disneyland! Have you even ever been to Disneyland!? We’re gonna have a fun filled extravaganza November 1st, where? Lovely Anaheim!  We’re gonna have a meet and greet and have some fun panels and guests. This is the fourth year in a row!

We’re here to say, it’s ok to be a gamer! You can be a gamer and you can go to Disneyland and hopefully we will see you there at Mega64 Game Days.

That was the end of the interview, or at least the final point where things were still coherent. The closing minutes of our conversation included Eric proclaiming the triumphs of Master P’s “Make em say Uhh” and how after our conversation they were going to “get Mexican food and do kickflips on our skateboards”

Twitch: www.twitch.tv/mega64podcast

YouTube: www.youtube.com/mega64

Website: www.mega64.com

Improved Stream Delay in XSplit Broadcaster 2.0

If you are setting up an ambush in Counter-Strike or just drew a potentially game changing card in Hearthstone, then you don’t want your opponent to know what is coming next.

That is why it is useful to set a stream delay, and with XSplit Broadcaster 2.0 we’ve made it easier than ever! Please note that stream delay is only available to Premium license holders.

Stream delay can be configured from within your broadcast plugin window (and no longer requires the use of Java). Simply mark the check box and enter your delay time in seconds as shown below.

XSplit Broadcaster Enable Stream Delay

We hope you enjoy this simplified stream delay setup. Please note that this stream delay setting does not determine the exact delay of those viewing your broadcast. Viewers will also experience delay from transcoding, transportation delay,etc that the stream delay set in XSplit adds to. You can find the latest XSplit Broadcaster 2.0 beta version here and we hope to see your feedback in the comments.