Avermedia Live Gamer Mini capture card review

Capturing one's own gameplay has always been one of the biggest barriers when it comes to streaming and making content. It used to take a fair amount of money, equipment, and know-how to even have a fairly low quality recording set-up, and which likely only worked for one of your gaming devices. I remember paying hundreds of dollars for a solution that I still had to fight with to get working every time I turned it on. 

It's nice to see how far we've come exemplified with Avermedia's portable little capture card, the Live Gamer Mini (GC311).

As far as capture cards go, the Live Gamer Mini is somewhat lower spec than others on the market, but it has a profile and price point to match. It's not the card you buy if you want the highest resolution possible for game recording or passthrough, as it's limited to a max 1080p at 60 fps for both. But when you consider those are still the settings used by the vast majority of streamers and content creators, it's a card that's still likely worth a lookin' for many purposes. 

Only having 1080p 60 fps passthrough does mean you have to suck it up and play using visuals that might not be up to your usual standard. While I didn't detect any latency, I've been living the 4K, HDR, 120 fps life for a while now, so it did feel like a significant step down for some games. In the case of a twitchy first person shooter it could really affect your ability. 

Interface: USB 2.0 (USB Micro)
Video Input: HDMI
Audio Input: HDMI
Max Passthrough Resolution: 1080p 60
Max record resolution: 1080p 60
Record format: MPEG 4 (H.264+AAC) / supports hardware encoding
Dimensions: 100 x 57 x 18.8 mm (3.93 x 2.24 x 0.74-inches)
Weight: 74.5 g (2.63oz)
Price: $80 | £70 | $116 AUD

Avermedia's Live Gamer Mini isn't designed for that. Instead it's a highly portable and versatile device, a Jack of all as opposed to a master of one.

The box is only slightly larger than a credit card, and weighs only 75 grams—about the same as the lighter gaming mice available at the