This week has been filled with talk about new CPU and GPU developments that could impact
video game streamers and the like using standard PC broadcast setups.
But I've spent this week instead playing with this little box right here, which is its own
streaming system, in a nice, compact, newbie-friendly package - but at a high price.
This is the new Pearl Nano from Epiphan - a company I've covered off and on over the years
for their quick and easy to use capture and streaming products, including their HDMI and
SDI capture cards I still use off and on even today.
I'm EposVox, the Stream Professor, and I've previously covered the original Epiphan Pearl
- back when I had far less experience, mind you - and they've since released the Pearl
2 and Pearl Mini.
The Nano, on the other hand, rounds off their lineup with an entry-level product that is
more limited in capabilities, but also a tad
more accessible.
Taking a quick physical overview, this metal chassis is small and lightweight.
It's about the size of a book, a little heavier.
On the front you have a 3.5mm headphone jack, SD card slot, tiny little LCD display, navigation
buttons, and dedicated stream and record buttons.
The back features lots of I/O goodness - a locking 12V DC power connector - it is able
to be powered by Power Over Ethernet +, too, by the way.
A kensington lock, USB 3.0 type A port, HDMI out for the monitoring and control interface
if you want to use it directly with a keyboard and mouse, gigabit ethernet, which supports
POE+ as mentioned, SDI input, HDMI input and passthrough for that input, RCA audio input,
and a pair of XLR inputs.
The bottom features a removable cover to access the M.2 SATA SSD drive slot.
It won't accept NVMe SSDs, but will take SATA.
Keep in mind that using a SSD here disables the SD card slot on the front, which I find
to be a silly sacrifice, personally, but you can load it up with a big 1 or 2TB drive to
keep a running archive of all the shows or lectures made with this thing for a long time.
There's also mounting threads on the bottom so you can rig this up just about anywhere.
Currently, the HDMI and SDI inputs max out a 1080p60 - but Epiphan's original marketing
says these can be upgraded to 4K with an update later on.
I, personally, get annoyed at the lack of 4K support on new devices coming out in 2021,
but in the real world most people aren't trying 4K broadcasts, and even BlackMagic's ATEM
Mini Pro line is all 1080p.
The USB port supports USB hubs and connecting multiple devices such as a keyboard and mouse
to use directly as a stream computer, or even USB microphones, too!
It does NOT work with UVC capture cards or webcams over USB, however, unfortunately.
The XLR inputs run at Line Level, so it won't work for connecting microphones directly,
it's designed to accept a final mix out of a recorder or mixer at normal line level.
Testing the HDMI inputs with the Time Sleuth to measure latency, the HDMI passthrough does,
in fact, appear to stay real-time, adding no additional lag to the HDMI feed, while
the main HDMI out for the final mix appears to add a frame of lag, which is to be expected.
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This box is great for creating interviews or podcasts.
You know where those interviews do best?
My own streaming service called Nebula.
I've built this with my creator friends to house the extended cuts of videos that wouldn't
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There is the nearly TWO HOUR extended cut of my interview with MrGregles from this week,
too!
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I'm going to go order me a pizza right now.
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It's crazy.
Just do it.
*[end ad]*
In terms of streaming, this box supports RTMP, HLS - which you can now send to YouTube, by
the way - and even SRT both in and out.
So while obviously you can use this box as an end point - even with a HDMI video switcher
like the original ATEM Mini - to broadcast up to YouTube, Facebook, Twitch, or any other
video site, but you can send to other stream setups too with SRT, Secure Reliable Transport.
This is a secure way to package up high quality video and audio to add in to other streams,
kinda like NDI.
With SRT, you can send the Nano's feed to another big Pearl, or to a whole streaming
PC, etc.
It's not something you'd really use to just beam up to a video platform, just between
nodes in a greater broadcast setup.
That's where the value proposition for the Nano really shines.
This box can power all kinds of broadcasts that you'd never even think about.
With its cloud management capabilities, you could package it up with camera and audio
and mail off to interview guests or remote teachers to fairly easily just plug it in
and you control the broadcast from there.
It's fairly idiot-proof, other than audio.
You might need someone to pop in and sort out the audio setup, but that's detached from
this box.
Well, until you attach it.
Plus, it can power any number of custom streaming solutions.
They support Panopto and Kaltura right out of the box (even with automated scheduled
streaming) which are used for corporate broadcasts, education, and so on, and they have an API
where you can seamlessly integrate this to stream to just about any website, with an
easy low-upkeep total custom solution here.
They also have support for Crestron AV Systems for businesses, too.
This kind of total integration into whatever solution you wish to build out is where the
Nano stands above slapping a laptop, some capture cards, and OBS together - especially
when it comes to support.
Basic training or on-site instructions can keep a education or corporate setup using
one of these running for a very long time with minimal support, whereas throwing an
OBS PC together is something you'll be playing tech support for all the time.
Plus you can either connect remotely via UPNP if the network you send it to supports it,
or via the cloud service, so it's pretty fool-proof overall.
That being said, there are limitations to the allowed workflow for this device.
You can only configure one stream layout, or channel as they call it, to be used at
a time.
This is a huge limitation that even just having 2 would alleviate pain points for screencasts,
lectures, conference presentations, etc. may run into.
Again, you can upgrade to the Pearl Mini or 2 for this, but ehhhh.
To change layouts, you have to completely swap everything over and that can't be done
while recording or streaming.
You also have limited capabilities in terms of configuring the layout.
Graphics and picture-in-picture modes are supported via the different video inputs or
even by bringing in outside RTSP or SRT streams - but you don't get the granular transform
tools or placement that you would on the Pearl 2, for example.
Size of sources is determined by scaling them to a lower resolution.
You can still crop and adjust position, but not dynamically scale - which makes it difficult
or impossible to use finely tuned layout visuals versus just a basic background and lower-third.
There's also no chroma key support as far as I can tell.
You do get the flexibility to mix inputs across HDMI, SDI, and RTSP or SRT streams, as well
as audio from HDMI, SDI, RCA or XLR, and USB - which is neat.
USB microphone support will save some of the setup hassle for mailing this off to an interviewee,
as well.
Recordings can be managed quite competently.
You either record directly to the SD card or the SSD, but both cannot be used at the
same time.
From there, you can configure automatic file uploads to a network storage location or Epiphan
Cloud.
You can manage directly uploading to Kaltura or Panopto.
You can copy files over to a USB drive, or access the Nano via FTP.
Plus, you can directly download the files through your web browser from the admin dashboard.
The streams and recordings themselves are saved in the same quality - so you cannot
run a high bitrate local recording with a low-bitrate web stream, unfortunately - but
you can pass either of the HDMI outputs to a dedicated video recorder.
The streams rely on the included hardware H264 encoder with basic configuration options
such as encoder Profile - which you almost always want set to High - resolution, keyframe
interval, framerate, and bitrate.
Along with AAC, PCM, or MP3 audio support and bitrate for that, as well.
Quality-wise, it's a hardware H264 encoder, so it won't keep up with the current game
streaming expectations of X264 Slow or Turing NVENC, but it's passable for what it is.
While high-action content such as 60FPS gaming may end up a little blocky, slower-paced lectures,
screencasts, conferences, or interviews will still look awesome with this thing.
Heck, with the SDI input, I can configure my Ursa Mini Pro cinema camera to run to this
thing for a sick little interview setup.
By the way, if you notice a weird jitter to my webcam in some of these tests, I was experimenting
with sending the webcam from my PC via OBS with SRT to the Nano.
It had a frame desync issue of some sort.
SRT support is still quite young in OBS, so I'm going to blame it somehow.
While the Pearl Nano is a tad pricey in the enthusiast game streamer category, for the
more professional market it's aimed at, it's not all that expensive and I think will enable
some really cool broadcast performance, most of which you will never see because it'll
be so hidden and integrated into their sites.
For more streaming tech reviews like this one, get subscribed and join me on Discord
at Discord.gg/eposvox.
We'll meet again.