Steam’s built-in, free, in-home streaming utilises some sort of dark magic. Provided you have a compliant network, you can stream your games from your powerful desktop, to a not-so-powerful HTPC or laptop connected to your TV and have them perfectly playable on the big screen. Up until now, the service has favoured Nvidia-based solutions. But that’s changed.
If you own AMD hardware, you really ought top opt-in to Steam’s beta clients – because the latest one improves in-home streaming using AMD hardware.
The latest version of the client now supports VCE hardware encoding of Direct 3D Games on AMD hardware – provided you have one of the following cards and the very latest set of drivers: Radeon HD 79xx, Radeon HD 78xx, Radeon HD 77xx, R9 295x, R9 290x/290, R9 280x/280, R9 270x/270, R7 265, R7 260x/260, R7 250x.
It should make a significant difference to the maximum resolution and frame rate you’ll be able to stream at. The other big change to in-home streaming is that you can now use a Linux PC as your host. With Borderlands 2 very recently ported to run natively on the OS, that’s a good thing – and the first step to removing Windows as the necessary middleware for PC gaming.
You can now also remotely use Nvidia’s video-capturing Shadowplay feature – which makes for a more comfortable way of making Let’s Play videos. Nice. There’s a full feature list here.
If you haven’t dabbled with in-home streaming, you really should – even if it is the evil work of demons, and you could be inviting all manner of evil in to your home. All you need to use this devil’s work is to have a powerful desktop pc and a less powerful one to receive its stream, both connected to the same network and both logged in to the same Steam account.
Last Updated: September 5, 2014
Alien Emperor Trevor
September 5, 2014 at 08:40
DAMN IT GEOFF, DON’T CROSS THE STREAMS.
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 08:58
hahahahahahahahaha. Comment of the week right on the last day of the week. Well played
Admiral Chief Assassin
September 5, 2014 at 08:41
Nice
MakeItLegal
September 5, 2014 at 08:54
i ve done it a few tiomes now , to play max payne 3 , (keeps pausing on my desktop ) any ways works fine , if u basically in the same room , anything more than 4m from modem and u get loads of stutter and missed button inputs . i wonder if its this brick and mortar walls we have thats letting me down ?> anybody tried using a Ethernet connection yet ? like direct desktop to laptop to stream ?
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 08:58
Ethernet connectivity works like a charm but I think your wifi needs some help. Is your wifi fully N capable? Both on modem and receiving device?
MakeItLegal
September 5, 2014 at 09:12
It’s a brand new net gear modem from telkom , I think it has to do with the wifi trya get through 2 walls , office to bedroom like …. I will purchase a 20m cable and put it through the roof ino my bedroom ! Now all I need is gta v
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:15
That could work as well. Can I give you a suggestion? A wifi router in the roof is better than a wifi router in a room. The signal gain to various rooms is far better.
FoxOneZA
September 5, 2014 at 09:00
What speed Wi-Fi you using?
Mossel
September 5, 2014 at 09:00
This my main concern as well. There are about two walls between my desktop and TV. Also would like to know how Ethernet holds up? And how about input lag?
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:01
Input lag is negligable as long as your wifi is good. On Ethernet it’s pretty much 0. Your latency on a local network is after all < 1ms.
With wifi you just need to make sure you have a high speed/range wifi unit.
Sith JJ
September 5, 2014 at 09:01
Same here. My desktop is already barely getting decent wifi from my kitchen where the router is.
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:03
Why not get a wifi booster? You can get a few really good ones sub R1000 that have great range and throughput. Then you don’t need to use your modem’s built in wifi?
Sith JJ
September 5, 2014 at 09:07
That’s not a bad idea. My desktop just runs from a USB wifi dongle. First one literally burned out.
Don’t have connection issues, yet, but the signal could be better.
Exalted Overlord Geoffrey Tim
September 5, 2014 at 09:12
Why not look at Ethernet over power? You get a kit, plug these things in to your wall – and the network signal is transferred over your power lines. Average standard kit gets you a 200MB/s connection.
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:14
I’ve seen these things as well. I have no idea how well they work. The idea is very intriguing. Would love to see some tests on these. Heck would like to test them myself. They are a bit pricey though aren’t they?
Exalted Overlord Geoffrey Tim
September 5, 2014 at 09:24
You can pick up a kit now for like, R600. They work pretty damned well /depending on your home electrical wiring/
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:28
Yeah I am reading up on that now. I am very interested getting myself a kit now so that I can move my PC away from the TV and use the laptop for streaming my games
HvR
September 5, 2014 at 09:30
Just watch if there are any fridges near or in between the two points (basically on the same rail) you might get issues. The compressors switch on/off introduce a crap load of noise on the electrical wire that will disrupt the signal.
Sith JJ
September 5, 2014 at 09:16
Oh. I honestly don’t have the technical savvy when it comes to this, but this sounds like a pretty damn nice option.
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:21
It doesn’t need a lot of technical know how. You pretty much just need to know how to plug things in to a power socket 😛
http://www.dbg.co.za/product_info.php?products_id=897
Sith JJ
September 5, 2014 at 09:23
Ooo!
Aries
September 5, 2014 at 09:37
think im going to try that out
Mossel
September 5, 2014 at 12:39
I didn’t even know such magic existed! O_O
MakeItLegal
September 5, 2014 at 12:58
what ?
Kromas of City17
September 5, 2014 at 13:02
Get ready for hardware replacements galore. Due to our current power stability issues I can confirm that these devices last round about 3 months before replacement is needed.
Alternative you can install a voltage stabilizer in your house to remove those issues.
I personally would suggest an inverter backup battery system as it also resolves any brownout issues.
Alternative live close to a high ranking ANC member as this resolves any and all power issues including load shedding. 😛
MakeItLegal
September 5, 2014 at 09:13
Haven’t tried Ethernet yet , but other people say it is legit , I think with South African walls one needs to be carefull of wifi set up
Willem Swanepoel
September 5, 2014 at 15:51
Get Ethernet Over Power .. works wonders for streaming but do not buy the cheapies … rather spend the cash and get the proper ones.
Just remember, you can only use it on the same circuit layout
Kromas of City17
September 5, 2014 at 09:25
Gigabit connection with a netbook Wolfenstein on TV works like a dream.
Still prefer my pc though.
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 09:30
I found a way to stream my full desktop. Create a steam shortcut to a non steam game…. Notepad….
It streams notepad and therefore your full desktop…..
Kromas of City17
September 5, 2014 at 12:22
Yes. In home streaming uses a very modded version of RDP. (remote desktop protocol)
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 12:51
And it works so well. No need for crazy hardware or anything. I like things that just work
Kromas of City17
September 5, 2014 at 12:58
I felt a bit strange when I noticed the protocol running for the first time testing out home streaming. I am not really judging but for Valve to publicly renounce Microsoft and then use a Microsoft designed protocol for one of Steams main features felt to me a bit hypocritical.
Still it is really neat.
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 13:00
It is rather ironic
Sir Rants A Lot: On Pandora
September 5, 2014 at 08:57
I’ve tried it. Streamed to my not so stellar work laptop with no dedicated GFX. Worked like a charm even over wifi.
This is really an awesome bit of tech.
Sith JJ
September 5, 2014 at 08:58
Still need to try this