Victor CIobanu

Back-end Developer

Front-end Developer

Programmer

Internet of Things

Victor CIobanu

Back-end Developer

Front-end Developer

Programmer

Internet of Things

Blog Post

How to Stream your desktop live with free software

June 14, 2012 diy

In this small tutorial you will find all the information and software you need to stream your desktop live in full 1080p high quality, to any of the streaming services out there; either Twitch tv, Livestream, U stream or Justin Tv. All the software used in this tutorial is free, low bandwidth and low cpu usage.

Time you need for this : 60 minutes

This article will teach you everything you need to know about live streaming. I use this setup so i can stream Diablo 3 live from my pc if full HD and without losing any frames in game.
Streaming live diablo

If you already know everything there is to know about streaming, just skip to the end of the article to get the software and settings.

If you would like to understand how live streaming works please keep reading.

Basically what you are trying to achieve is add a new “device” to your computer, a device that the streaming site (Twitch tv, Livestream, U stream or Justin Tv) thinks it’s a webcam !
This “device” in fact is a screen capturing piece of software. So lets get into it, here are the steps you need to take :

Setting up the server side part
1. Register to a streaming site/platform, for this example i will use Justin.tv (same as twitch.tv)
2. Log into your account and find out what your “KEY” is. For justin.tv go to www.twitch.tv/broadcast twitch
3. Save your Key in a text file, you will need it later.
4. Don’t download anything form that page is either junk (media encoder 3.0) or you need to buy the software. (XSplit)

Setting up the screen capture “device”

1. The best software you can use for this is SCFH DSF. Get the software from Here
2. Unzip it in a folder , and leave it alone , don’t run anything ! (you probably don’t have the Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package ).
3. Get the Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package :) For 32 bit OS use this one. For a 64 bit OS use this one.
4. Close any kind of software that might be using a webcam (skype,ym, MSN Messenger, Windows Live Messenger…etc)
5. Run the Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package.
6. Go to the folder you unziped SCFH DSF into (step 2) and run either Install.bat for 32 bit or Intall64.bat for 64 bit (depending on your Operating system)
7. Don know if your Os is 32 or 64 bit ? Google it man, this tutorial is about streaming not Bill Gates’s empire :)
8. If all is good you should get a message saying “DllRegisterServer in scfh.ax succeeded” click Ok and close that dialog.
9. In the same folder (step 2) there is a file called SCFH.exe run the file and leave it open don’t click on anything, we will come back to it.

Setting up the Media encoder

1. In my experience the best media encoder you can use is Adobe flash media encoder verson 2.5 NOT 3.0 (with 3.0 you will lose half of your frame-rate)
2. Download Adobe Flash media encoder from here
3. Install the media and encoder and run it and Leave it Alone, we will come back to it.

Linking the screen capture part to the media encoder

1. Go back to SCFH.exe that you should have running (step 9), click on refresh and select Flash media encoder and press Ok.
2. You should get this window scfh setup
3. Go back to the Adobe flash media encoder and select under device SCFH DSF then click on the wrench thing next to device-scfh sdf and under setting put your screen resolution (mine is 1920×1080) and framerate 15.000
4. In the main Adobe flash media encoder program put Format : VP6 bitrare 1000kbps (lower if you experience lag) size 1920X1080 , 15 fps, auto adjust. In the end you should have something like this :
adobe streaming media encoder
5. Go back to SCFH DSF program and under size specify you screen resolution (my example is for 1920X1080)(use picture at step 2 as a guide). Click on both Apply.
6. Go back to Adobe FM encoder and un-check input and output video and setup the Audio part (in my case i use an external usb mic, you will have to select you sound card either mic or wave)

GOING LIVE !

1. Remember that key you got from twitch.tv (same as twitch.tv) you put in a notepad ? well in adobe flash meadia encoder under pannel, select stream to flash media server.
2. Under FMS URL , put : rtmp://live.justin.tv/app (this info should be provided by your streaming site, my example is only for justin.tv and twitch.tv)
3. Under Stream : put the key (should look like live_12345_12346789abcdef….)
4. Go to your www.justin.tv/YOUR USER NAME and leave that page open
5. In Adobe FM encoder click start and your stream should be live in 5-10 seconds !

Final thoughts, you can change the frame rate and bandwidth according to the “encoding log” you have live while you stream. If you get lots of drops or use to much bandwidth, try to lower the values.

If you want to stream games, lets say for example Diablo 3, you will have to go to the options tab you have in the game, and set up the resolution to 1920X1080 and “full screen window mode”.
If you don’t do that and you use the default D3d engine Diablo has, the video will be choppy. Remember that SCFH DSF uses either DirectDraw of Software.

For other streaming sites, try to find out the FMS URS and your unique Stream Key and put them into Adobe Flash Media Encoder. If the site offers you an option to download a profile.xml , open that xml file with notepad and search for url>rtmp://generic adress/other stuff /url> and streamYour unique key /stream

Software you need for streaming :
1. Microsoft Visual C++ 2008 Redistributable Package 32 bit Here for 64 bit Here
2. SCFH DSF Here
3. Adobe Flash Media Encoder Here

Hope this helps ! remember to like and share this article if it was usefull.

15 Comments
  • chris 7:39 pm October 14, 2012

    Thank you so much. I am going to use this to stream things for Extra Life 2012. I’m not good at computers at all, and i was able to follow all your instructions easily.

    • Victor Ciobanu 9:56 am October 15, 2012

      glad i could help :)

  • Ben 8:26 am December 20, 2012

    Great guide. My only problem is that there is between 10 and 20 seconds of lag between when i do something and when it shows up on the stream. Is there any way to eliminate this through changes in settings? or do i just need some upgrades to my computer to make it run better?

    • Victor Ciobanu 2:39 pm December 20, 2012

      You are a smart guy :) (not being ironic !) Yes, lag issues are related to pc hardware and to bandwidth (upstream) availability. I would suggest turning down the resolution to something lower than 1080p and experimenting with the codec settings (lowering the bit rate and changing autoajust/max buffer times). At all times expect a minimum delay of 4 seconds, since justin.tv also has to render your information.
      ALSO MAKE SURE you are not saving the file to your pc.

      • Ben 5:28 am December 21, 2012

        I was about to get it down under 10 sec delay. However, the quality of the stream suffered a lot. What kind of hardware upgrades would make this all run better?

        • Ben 5:42 am December 21, 2012

          able* not about

          • Ben 6:06 am December 21, 2012

            Also, whenever i actually try to stream a game, all hope is completely lost for it showing up on the stream in any reasonable amount of time. and it becomes terribly laggy in general.

  • Strike 6:06 am January 6, 2013

    Hey, this tutorial is great and the quality is perfect! I just have one simple problem, the only audio device i can detect is my microphone and i’m trying to stream things from a VLC player. The audio comes through but very silently and only if i mute my microphone. In short, is there any way to improve the audio quality?

    Thank you for taking your time to read this and i realize this is a very old article so if i don’t get a response for a couple of months its understandable.

    • Victor Ciobanu 9:43 am January 6, 2013

      Hehe :) sounds like you are trying to have a tiny tv station :) I can safely say (having done that in the past- running a tv shows streaming website tvpug.com) this is not the right approach for you. keep in mind that your information (the video file) already exists, so there’s no need for you to decode it (show it on screen) and then encode it (capure the screen) and send it to justin.tv or other party. I would suggest heading over to liquidsilver.org website and searching for the article on i know the article is there since i remember reading it back in 2011.

      • Strike 1:41 am January 7, 2013

        Alright i’ll go check it out, thanks for the information and quick reply.

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