How to set up a live stream

Have you ever wanted to show your friends this new game you bought but you couldn’t bring them all at home for an awesome showoff the same day?

Or did you ever want to show a business product to other businessmen, hoping that they would invest in it, but these conferences were far away and you couldn’t get to them?

Using a live stream can help you deal with this. You can show other people your computer screen, or a camera output, in a live fashion, just as if you were with all your friends or in that conference.

To start streaming, however, we have to register with a stream provider. To actually do the streaming we must use a piece of software specially designed for that: XSplit Broadcaster.

Creating the live stream account is the simplest part. You simply have to go to your streaming service’s websites (in this case, Justin.tv) and register there. For Justin.tv it is very simple. Simply click the “Sign up” button at the top of the page and you will be prompted to register.

XSplit Broadcaster is probably the best software to use when live streaming. It allows you to stream at different resolutions; you can include voice from a microphone, use a webcam and include sound from your system (e.g. Music).

Downloading this piece of software is simple. Just go to their website, http://www.xsplit.com, and from there it’s easy to download. You must register first, however.

Once you have downloaded XSplit Broadcaster, installing it occurs just as any other program. Simply double-click the installation icon. Whenever XSplit finds an update, it will prompt you to update. Every installation of an update is straight-forward and the user does not have to interact in any way with the program to install an update.

Once XSplit has been installed, we must set it up so that it works as best as possible with our internet connection and our computer. If our computer is not too powerful, we will want to reduce the recording area.

For example, if you use a Pentium you will not be able to record in Full HD. However, if your internet connection is very good, you will be able to stream in Full HD.

What this means is that both your computer specs and your internet connection must support the streaming quality. You cannot stream at a high resolution if your processor won’t support it. Likewise, you cannot stream at a high resolution if your internet connect won’t upload quickly enough.

The first thing we must do is select our recording area. If you were streaming to show your potential customers a piece of software you want to sell, then you would set the recording area to that application’s window. If you were streaming a video game you would want the recording area to be the whole screen (in case you played in full screen mode).

Selecting a recording area is quite simple. Just follow the image below and then drag the cursor to select the area.

Then, we must add our channel. This is easy to do. The Broadcast à Edit Channels menu allows us to add new channels to XSplit Broadcaster so we can stream to them easily. Add a new channel, selecting your service provider (only a few supported unfortunately).

After filling in the channel details, you are asked to set up the Video Encoding and Audio Encoding properties. You only want to modify “Max Bitrate” and “Buffer size” in the Video Encoding section.

In the Audio Encoding section you will want to modify the “Format” and “Bitrate”. In “Format” I would suggest using 44.100 KHz, 16-bit stereo. In “Bitrate”, 16000 is enough.

After pressing “OK” – leaving the Video Encoding section’s properties as default – we must select a resolution for broadcasting. To do this we go to Tools → Settings → Resolutions. There we must select the resolutions we would like to stream at. If your screen uses a 16:10 format, then select resolutions which match that. If you use a 4:3 screen format, then select resolutions that match that. Most probably, however, your screen will be in the format 16:9, which is most popular nowadays. In this case, select (768 x 432) and (1280 x 720).

So, what values do we use for the Video Encoding section? We must leave them as default and try our stream. If our stream is choppy or doesn’t work properly, then we must lower these values. This is all trial-and-error, and might take some time. But it is worth it, because then your stream will work flawlessly, with no stutter or choppiness.

To actually start streaming, we must do two things. The first one is select the resolution at which we want to stream. Do you remember that we chose two resolutions? Now we must select the one we actually want to use.

To do this, go to View → Resolution, and there select the one you want to use. Remember, the higher the resolution, the better computer and internet connection you need!

Finally, just go to Broadcast → “Your stream”, and you will start broadcasting!

Quite simple, isn’t it?

We have learnt how to set up XSplit Broadcaster with Justin.tv so that we can live stream from our computer. We know that the higher the resolution, the better computer and internet connection we need, so we have to set the stream up so that it works best with our computer and internet specs.

Hopefully this was useful and you managed to get everything working correctly.