UltraStudio Recorder 12G?

Hi, this is just a brainstorming. Sure I‘d like buy the parts if the solution is promising.

I was looking for a 12G pendant of UltraStudio Recorder 3G since I‘d like to capture 4K/60p video and then encode to NDI. I thought I could use a LattePanda 3 Delta and combine with a capture device (preferable one with SDI-Input).

Three questions:

1. Do you have experience, how to find out if a CPU is capable to encode 4K/60p videos. Maybe the LattePanda 3 Delta is too weak for that because it lacks of „dedicated“ GPU. Latte Panda 3 Delta has a Celeron N5105.
2. Does BMD not offer a small 12G capture device (except the UltraStudio 4K Mini)?
3. UltraStudio devices use Thunderbolt. Are they compatible with USB-C (respective USB 3.2)?

Before you ask me, why not just buy an UltraStudio 4K Mini? Well, I‘m looking for a cheaper solution (if possible, max 500€ including the portable PC) and keep the device universal so I can use it for other usage like broadcast encoder with OBS for example. And keep it small so its portable.
Why max 500€? Because then I could just buy a BirdDog NDI-Encoder.

So… is my thought too ambitious for that budget?

Maybe better try different like:
Decklink with Enclosure But then it cost more, but maybe not a bad idea because I could use with multiple SDI-Connection together, so more cost would be ok for me. Just my thoughts…

Best regards
Floh

1. I believe NDI encoding (full version not NDI | HX) is typically done on the CPU rather than the GPU. But you do need a fairly capable processor to do NDI encoding of 2160p60 video. This link from NewTek indicates that a modern Intel Core i7 processor is able to do 1080p NDI encoding at up to 250 fps on a single core:
https://support.newtek.com/hc/en-us/art ... g-Decoding

Since 2160p is 4x the resolution of 1080p, that would be around 62.5 fps for 4K (2160p). So a lower end Celeron processor could struggle with this (although it may depend on the number of cores and how parallelizable the encoding is). You also need to be mindful of the number of PCIe lanes available in some of the lower end CPUs and chipsets as you need to have sufficient bandwidth all the way through the system (from the capture device through the CPU and eventually out to the network).

Note that recent versions of NDI | HX do support hardware accelerated H.264 encoding using NVidia GPUs (NVENC). If you go this route you may not need as powerful of a CPU as in that case the GPU is doing most of the encoding work. The past couple of architectures of NVidia GPUs are capable of 2160p60 H.264 encoding (although the exact performance will depend on the model).

2. The UltraStudio 4K Mini is the smallest 2160p60 external capture device Blackmagic offers. I would guess that the technology isn't quite there yet to do a fanless 2160p60 capture device like the 1080p60 UltraStudio Recorder 3G devices. All of the 2160p60 capable DeckLink capture cards have fans (and larger circuit boards) than the UltraStudio Recorder 3G.

3. The current UltraStudio models (including the UltraStudio 4K Mini, UltraStudio 4K Extreme, UltraStudio HD Mini, UltraStudio Recorder 3G) are all Thunderbolt 3 capture devices. They are not compatible with USB 3.2. Note that for the 12G SDI (12Gbps) capable devices the 10 Gbps bandwidth of USB 3.2 may be insufficient depending on the capture format.

4. The DeckLink 8K Pro is probably one of the least expensive 12G SDI capable video capture cards on the market. There are certainly other 12G SDI capture cards from other manufacturers (AJA, Magewell, Deltacast, etc.), but most of these are more expensive. The only option that might work out less expensive is using a 4K 60 capable gaming oriented capture card (like the Elgato Game Capture 4K60 Pro or Live Gamer 4K) in conjunction with a Micro Converter 12G SDI to HDMI. Of course you'd still need a PCIe enclosure for the internal cards. AVerMedia also has a Thunderbolt 4K 60 HDMI capture device (AVerMedia the Live Gamer Bolt) which could probably be used in conjunction with a Micro Converter as well, although I don't have any experience with it.

5. For a lot of situations though, I think you are better off using one of the existing hardware NDI encoders, from BirdDog, Magewell, KiloView, or NewTek's own Spark devices. It's much more of a turnkey solution, you don't have to worry about computer hardware performance, they typically have low power consumption and a small form factor. It's mostly if you have a lot of special requirements when I might not use the off-the-shelf option.

Hi Dave,

Thank you very much for your thoughts and explanation. You‘re right. I totally forgot about the bandwidth of the USB 3.2 specs. So LattePanda is not suitable.

Sure I prefer Hardware solutions as I don‘t like software solutions (driver issue, windows issues, …). I actually use hardware solutions (for example I ordered BirdDog Play as decoder, using Web Presenter 4K as Streaming Encoder, etc …).

I don‘t want to build an all-purpose-device to replace my hardwares, but I need a portable swiss-army-knife in case I didn‘t bring everything to an event and a customer asks me „Oh by the way, we also need…“ … or if something gets broken and I need to replace it quickly.

I think I should look for a barebone PC with 8-lane PCIe slot for Decklink 8K Pro (I have 2 of them).

Best regards
Floh