Link bandwidth estimation and manual settings

[Sistason]

Hello,

I am testing IHS over the internet (OpenVPN) and had good results (Host 100/100 Mbit/s, Client 16/1 Mbit/s), although a few bugs/problems persist. One time, I had little lag, but huge spikes (10-15s without video, but sound/controls/internet persisted).
Yesterday, I had nothing but lag, caused by my link bandwidth being estimated wrongly. It was estimated at ~26Mbit/s (it was 16 Mbit/s), so the link was constantly getting congested, ergo hard stuttering.
Whatever I do, the bandwidth estimation keeps "overriding" my attempts to counteract. Bandwidth Limits in the client? Ignored. Downscale to 720p and low quality? The Video bitrate goes up to 10-20Mbit/s, so the link is congested again.
The streaming_log.txt shows the bandwidth-limits are set, but seem to have no effect.

[2015-09-09 19:10:09] =====================================================================
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] Game: Dota 2 (570)
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] Recording system audio
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] Changing record window: 0088054C
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] Recording on device: VoiceMeeter Input (VB-Audio VoiceMeeter VAIO)
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] Audio client mix format:
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	format: 65534
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	channels: 2
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	samples/sec: 44100
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	bytes/sec: 352800
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	alignment: 8
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	bits/sample: 32
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	channel mask: 0x3
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] 	data format: {00000003-0000-0010-8000-00AA00389B71}
[2015-09-09 19:10:09] Initializing audio with 2 channels and 44100 samples/sec
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CDesktopCaptureNV: Unsupported device or driver
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] >>> Switching video stream from NONE to Desktop_MovieStream
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] >>> Capture method set to Desktop DWM NVIFR H264
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] >>> Capture resolution set to 1366x768
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CLIENT: Video size: 1366x768, output size: 1366x768
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CLIENT: CVAAPIAccel: vaInitialize() failed: unknown libva error
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CLIENT: VDPAU init failed: GL_NV_vdpau_interop not available on current context
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CLIENT: libavcodec software decoding with 4 threads
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] >>> Client video decoder set to libavcodec software decoding with 4 threads
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CLIENT: Video size: 1366x768, output size: 1366x768
[2015-09-09 19:10:10] CLIENT: Marking frame 1 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedLate
[2015-09-09 19:10:13] CLIENT: Targeting 59.75 FPS
[2015-09-09 19:10:13] CLIENT: Targeting 59.75 FPS
[2015-09-09 19:10:16] CLIENT: Marking frame 372 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedLate
[2015-09-09 19:10:19] CLIENT: Marking frame 552 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedLate
[2015-09-09 19:10:20] CLIENT: Marking frame 582 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedLate
[2015-09-09 19:10:20] CLIENT: Marking frame 583 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedLate
[2015-09-09 19:10:24] CLIENT: Video overflow (100.42ms queued), requesting keyframe synchronization
[2015-09-09 19:10:24] CLIENT: Video overflow (100.45ms queued), requesting keyframe synchronization
[2015-09-09 19:10:24] CLIENT: Marking frame 831 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedNetworkLost
[2015-09-09 19:10:24] CLIENT: Marking frame 832 complete with status k_EStreamFrameResultDroppedNetworkLost


... following are 1000s of EStreamFrameResultDroppedNetworkLost  or DroppedLate...

[2015-09-09 20:11:03] "SessionStats"
{
	"GameNameID"		"Dota 2"
	"TimeSubmitted"		"1441822263"
	"ResolutionX"		"1366"
	"ResolutionY"		"768"
	"CaptureDescriptionID"		"Game D3D9 Delayed RGB + libyuv + libx264 main (2 threads)"
	"DecoderDescriptionID"		"libavcodec software decoding with 4 threads"
	"BandwidthLimit"		"15000"
	"FramerateLimit"		"0"
	"SlowGamePercent"		"0"
	"SlowCapturePercent"		"0"
	"SlowConvertPercent"		"0"
	"SlowEncodePercent"		"0"
	"SlowNetworkPercent"		"95.128593444824219"
	"SlowDecodePercent"		"4.8293342590332031"
	"SlowDisplayPercent"		"0"
	"AvgClientBitrate"		"130.27009582519531"
	"StdDevClientBitrate"		"56.777713775634766"
	"AvgServerBitrate"		"13825.9580078125"
	"StdDevServerBitrate"		"3596.158935546875"
	"AvgLinkBandwidth"		"24730.39453125"
	"AvgPingMS"		"33.614383697509766"
	"StdDevPingMS"		"2.5589196681976318"
	"AvgCaptureMS"		"0.72489237785339355"
	"StdDevCaptureMS"		"0.13978055119514465"
	"AvgConvertMS"		"1.1188238859176636"
	"StdDevConvertMS"		"0.41863542795181274"
	"AvgEncodeMS"		"6.6754698753356934"
	"StdDevEncodeMS"		"1.3954253196716309"
	"AvgNetworkMS"		"56.861637115478516"
	"StdDevNetworkMS"		"29.409822463989258"
	"AvgDecodeMS"		"10.364087104797363"
	"StdDevDecodeMS"		"84.123527526855469"
	"AvgDisplayMS"		"4.3698959350585938"
	"StdDevDisplayMS"		"3.9190635681152344"
	"AvgFrameMS"		"86.419197082519531"
	"StdDevFrameMS"		"32.400604248046875"
	"AvgFPS"		"60.532516479492188"
	"StdDevFPS"		"36.082450866699219"
	"BigPicture"		"0"
	"KeyboardMouseInput"		"1"
	"GameControllerInput"		"0"
	"SteamControllerInput"		"0"

Encoding/Decoding are very fast, the network speed is the problem... which is because the host drives the bitrate way too high :(
One thing I noticed is that the incoming bitrate was way higher than the video bitrate (7k vs. 4k). Shouldn't these 2 values be quite similar? Video+Audio bitrate = incoming bitrate, right? Could this therefore point to an audio issue?

1. Did anyone of you had similar problems?
2. Are there manual settings for IHS besides encoding on/off, bandwidth-limit, quality and downscale? Specifically a video bitrate target/limit?

Thanks for any help/pointers


(edit: streaming_log)

[kreiselhoschi]

What you forgot is overhead and delays caused by the internet connection, OpenVPN, etc. That´s why it´s calles InHome-Streaming and not InSomewhat-Streaming. ;)

[Sistason]

So that's why no one is able to watch twitch.tv over the internet, or via VPN, now it makes sense... /s

My problem is not the Internet, as I wrote I am already using IHS successfully via the internet (e.g. playing ranked comfortably), but sometimes it wrongly autodetects settings which don't work via the respective Internet connection. On other days / other houses, different problems occur.

So: Can I manually set some settings to setup IHS the way I want, not the way IT wants? :)
And: Has someone also had a wrong link bandwidth estimation?

[kreiselhoschi]

Twitch is a totally other service. It justs streams, but doesn´t need to snyc controller input, etc. And it streams with lower bitrate... ;)
Did you set bandwidth to unlimited in client streaming options? This usually results in lag spikes like you described... add some lag from other sources and here you go.

[Sistason]

oh sry, I did not write it in my post, the bandwidth is limited, as the streaming_log.txt shows. Did forget to mention that. In that particular case, the bandwidth-limit did nothing, despite multiple steam-restarts.
Another day, the bandwidth-limit was followed by steam. Very strange.

Still, are there ways/configs to set specific values for InHome Streaming, like exact bandwidth (not auto/3M/5M10M, but for example 4.567M)?

As it seems to drift away from my questions about tweaking my settings:
"I am already running InHome-Streaming SUCCESSFULLY via the internet!" - This means I can play games on my laptop anywhere sufficient bandwidth is available. Normally, I can stream on anything more than 10Mbit/s Downspeed. (5Mbit/s DL Limit). Controller-inputs etc. do need about 100kbit/s, which is negligible with regards to network bandwidth. With that in mind, IHS is comparable to twitch, as it generates a h264-stream, but with more bitrate and less input lag.

[76561198127254485]

Use neorouter(work much better for me) in place of openvpn and use @streamclientargs http://steamcommunity.com/groups/homestream/discussions/0/521643320352671723/ , use bitrate , framerate (30fps send less kb) and captureres for resolution.

[Sistason]

I made some progress with regards to manual settings:

You can set options as command-line options for the streaming_client in your steam directory (~/.steam/ubuntu_32 for linux). Example:

$STEAM_DIR/steam-runtime/run.sh $STEAM_DIR/streaming_client --gameid 570 --server $SERVER_IP:27031 --quality 2 --bitrate 4000 --captureres 0x0

You need the run.sh for environment variables. With this, you can be a bit more specific about the settings, especially for the bitrate. The rest of the options are basically the steam_settings.

I made progress, but not there yet, as the streaming client is not everything you need to run. It just timeouts, as the server needs to start the streaming itself, I guess. Will return back, when I find that solution.

Other idea: With the --server option, you can maybe stream without both machines "seeing" themselves in steam, e.g. you only need a route, not the whole same-subnet-discovery-procedure.