This is for people who have a Nintendo Switch, a capture card, and a 20-series or newer Nvidia GPU (I do not know about the AMD requirements but I think newer cards can do this too. Please reply if you get it working on AMD). I’ve found that if you have all the hardware, this is the best experience:
**TLDR: Install OBS Studio, StreamFX, and NVidia Broadcast Video SDK, use your GPU to upscale 720p docked to higher resolutions**
First you need to install the [NVidia Broadcast Video Effects SDK](https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/broadcasting/broadcast-sdk/resources/) for your GPU. This is used by StreamFX to take advantage of their recently released [Video Super Resolution](https://blogs.nvidia.com/blog/2023/02/28/rtx-video-super-resolution/).
Next install [StreamFX](https://github.com/Xaymar/obs-StreamFX). StreamFX was recently paywalled behind a [Patreon subscription](https://www.patreon.com/Xaymar) but the source is public and you can build it yourself. If you can’t figure this out yourself you’ll need to buy it. Building it yourself will also require [building OBS studio from source alongside StreamFX](https://obsproject.com/wiki/install-instructions),
and you need to make sure that the versions you are building are compatible. If you buy it, you don’t need to build OBS, you can just get the installer.
After you create or buy the installer for StreamFX, install it and go through the instructions. At this point you should also have OBS, either from building or installing it, so open it now. You should very clearly see it working when you open OBS. If you don’t see something immediately hinting it’s working, it’s not working.
Now run the Switch at 720p docked. To do this, go to System Settings -> TV Settings -> TV Resolution. This will give you the higher memory bandwidth of docked mode with the reduced overhead of handheld.
Connect the Switch to a capture card and add it as a source in OBS Studio. I use the Elgato HD60+. Right click the capture card source and choose “Filters”. Add after effect “Upscaling” – I have a 1440p monitor so I upscaled the 720p strong 200%, I don’t know anything about 4k settings. Right click the preview in OBS and choose either fullscreen or windowed projector to make a full size popout window.
This should give you the full compatibility of the Switch with the increased resolution and fidelity from a high-end GPU! There’s a lot more StreamFX can do that I haven’t listed here, and you should be able to add them in if you are using a stable build and have a strong enough GPU.
by skydemon63
7 Comments
Sounds interesting, but I have to wonder about added latency. I will say running the Switch at 720p doesn’t change the resolution the game runs at it only changes the resolution the final output is scaled to.
Switch HDMI-out -> mClassic -> 4k Gamer Pro -> Display = anti-aliased 4k video without the need for a computer sitting between your Switch and your display.
The website says vsr only works for the 30 and 40 series
Upscaling isn’t the same as running a game at a higher resolution. In fact, I’d guess that you’re getting worse graphical fidelity outputting at 720p and upscaling than if you output at 1080p from the Switch natively.
Also, any display upscales images automatically if needed. For instance, I play on a 4k monitor, and so the monitor upscales the 1080p signal from the Switch. Obviously the upscaling algorithm isn’t as good as a modern GPU can do, but it’s better than integer scaling.
There are more modern upscaling techniques that actually do increase graphical fidelity, such as DLSS, but that requires support by the game because it looks at vector data and similar. What you’re describing is purely video upscaling, and it can’t add more data than what the Switch is providing.
Additionally, what you’re recommending requires something like a thousand dollars in hardware (depending on what GPU and capture card you use), and even if you do get very marginal benefit from it, it’s simply not worth the cost unless someone already has that hardware, and even then it’s probably not worth the effort. And anyone who already does have a capture card is probably a streamer who is already routing their Switch output through their capture card, so I’m not really sure that this advice is helpful for those people.
Finally, as someone pointed out, this will definitely add latency to your system. It’s okay if you don’t personally notice, but lots of people are more sensitive to latency, especially for some types of games. I wouldn’t be surprised if this added a few frames of lag, if not more. I’ve never used OBS, but I’ve seen streamers complain that the preview window is so far behind that it’s basically impossible to play off it. Can you clarify what games you’ve been playing this way? Any action games?
Nice idea, but I don’t think this is really practical advice.
I feel like I’d be super sensitive to latency and stuff, switch latency is already kinda funky sometimes
Do you have any videos demonstrating this stuff? I’d like to see a BOTW example or something
I would like to see a video of this in action please