TechAngel85

A lot of users think that the Haswell core isn't good for gaming because the clock speeds are lower than previous cores and when purchasing the K versions of the processors (unlocked versions for overclockers) they typically don't overclock as high. What many users fail to realize is that the Haswell cores are more powerful than the previous cores when compared at the same clock speeds. In other words, the Haswell cores will out perform the SandyBridge and IvyBridge cores when running at the same clock speeds. The Haswell cores are able to provide more power at lower clock speeds which translates to more power with less energy meaning they are more energy efficient. These differences in clock speed to power ratio in the new Haswell cores have mislead many users to think they are less powerful and not as good for gaming when that simply isn't true. Check out this benchmark test from Tom's Hardward: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-4770k-haswell-review,3521.html (testing starts on page 11) Ignoring the i7-3930K (SandyBridge-E six-core) and simply comparing the stock SandyBridge, IvyBridge and Haswell cores (all quad-cores) you'll notice that Haswell is the winner of nearly every test between the three stock processors when they are all running at the same clock speed.

Keep in mind that you can upgrade to the card you want now, all the newer cards will work on PCI Express 2.0 but just at the slower 2.0 transfer rate, and upgrade your motherboard and CPU later down the road when your funds permit. The CPU choice would depend on what you're running. Most games don't benefit from hyper-threading and that is one of the main reasons to go with an Intel Core i7 (beside the obsessed need to have the latest and greatest...haha!). The only programs that really benefit from this would be creative programs such as Photoshop and Premiere. So unless you do a lot of encoding and editing I would say an Intel Core i5 is as good as you'll ever need. Go with the latest Haswell core which is a socket 1150 because they are pretty much the same price as the previous generation, IvyBridge, cores and aim for around 3Ghz. As for a motherboard, that is really personal preference. Most of them have the same to similar features but be sure it matches the socket type of your CPU. You can expect to spend anywhere between $300 and $450 on a new CPU/motherboard combo. I believe I answered this in the opening statement. You can purchase any card you wish and it will still work on your motherboard because they are backwards compatible. However, it'll just run slower than its intended speed.

For the GTX 780 you'll want a motherboard that supports PCI Express 3.0. Your motherboard is PCI Express 2.0 and although the GTX 780 will work on your board, you'll be running at slower speeds and will never reap the full potential of the video card. So if you're going with the GTX 780 I would also recommend upgrading your motherboard or it will be your bottleneck on your graphics. However, to do that you're going to run into another issue. Your CPU is a 1366 socket which is an older socket (mainly used for servers so I find it an odd choice for a gaming PC) so the likelihood of finding a 1366 socket motherboard that supports PCI Express 3.0 is slim at best. Meaing...you're going to have up upgrade your processor as well. As for using your old card for a PhysX processor, you are correct. You can certainly do that.

It's not intended. Unfortunately I don't have a computer to fix it right now. Hopefully one of the staff will jump on this.

Thanks for not scraping all that work on the Inspector guide and just moving it over to an Advanced tab! When I wrote the guide I didn't write it to be STEP specific but rather Skyrim specific. Not all options are going to work for all systems is the thing I kept in mind when writing it so I tried to say do this or that for better performance or better quality. That guide was never meant to be a hand-holding tutorial but rather a guide that users would ultimately reference as they are tweaking their cards/settings to their specific systems. This is because the creator's guide is extremely lacking and the information researched when I wrote it came from multiple sources around the net. Some references were Skyrim specific and some just explained what the settings did.

I'm in the same state of mind. I never buy top-of-the-line products as they're usually just overpriced in my opinion. My personal build that is happening soon will most likely have the GTX 660 for around $200 or the GTX 760 for around $250...depending on the cash I have to spend. I'd never pay more than that for a video card.

Posting this here so all can benefit from it. A couple months ago I fixed a couple mods that STEP uses by creating FOMODs for them. I sought out to upload them to Nexus as fixed versions. I made every attempt to contact the authors of these mods and after over a month of no responses, I sought out guidance from the Nexus staff to request permission to upload these mods. Here was the response from Dark0ne: In this I made it known that I was the Release Coordinator for STEP and sought no recongition for the mods. I even made it clear that I would immediately remove the mods if the original author requested it so. There are many "fixed" mods on Nexus that also do this. Dark0ne has made it clear that, without express permission from the author, these types of mods are not allowed...even if the author is MIA and hasn't logged in over a year and there is no hope of contacting that author. The mod according to Nexus, is just dead. The only way around this is to rebuild the mod from the ground up (not copying it) as a new work based on the original mod. Unfortunately, the only way around this for the work I have done is to only upload the FOMOD files with instructions on how to restructure the mods for the FOMODs to work. This defeats the purpose of making the mods more user friendly because users are still having to do some of the work themselves. This seems to be my only choice unless I set out to rebuild the mod completely from scratch....which I am no script artist; however, I might just teach myself to be able to continue upon the work of these "dead" authors/mods. Do you guys think it's worth it to upload only the FOMODs to Nexus or just keep them hosted where they are until I can see if I can reconstruct them?

That is referring to the official STEP:Core and STEP:Extended Patches. They have not been officially released yet; however, they are completed. These patches fix conflicting issues within various STEP mods.

Just reinstall the main texture overhauls. Purple = missing textures. If it's not in the overhauls you've done something to your vanilla textures.

Not at this time.

With no computer to test on, I'm of no use in testing. I'll be putting together a barebones system at the end of this month though I'm not sure I'll be able to test on it either. It'll be running an Intel i3 with the included Intel graphics (4600) until Febuary when I can complete the system as a gaming powerhouse. Hope you enjoy MO, Z!

Unless you have a system that just needs every little bit of power, it's best to just leave programs like this out of the mix. The benefits are usually minimal at best.

@Quitch RWT has already been accepted to replace WATER in STEP. @DC I would assume that is correct.

Patches may need to be placed directly under those corresponding mods. Will have to investigate if Neo does not reply.

I used to live in Georgia! McDonough. About 30min south of Atlanta.

Terrible. LOL. https://wiki.step-project.com/User:DoubleYou/SystemSpecs Ouch... :>

It hasn't stopped snowing here in hours. There is about 6 inches on the ground right now and it's coming down fairly heavily. I love it! ...just not loving the missed work. That will hurt the paycheck next week.... Temp here is currently 20 but with windchill it feels like 6; according to weather.com.

It's officially Winter here in Oklahoma! We do not normally get this amount of snow. Only bad thing is that throughout the night it was freezing rain so there is a layer of ice underneath all that fluff. It's still beautiful though! The forth pic is the current what the roads look like.

The point I was making was the same as Aiyen's regarding low-end and ENBs. I never said it was for "only" low-end systems did I? No, I did not. You're reading between the lines. I specifically said, it is a good alternative to those with low-end systems who can not run ENBs due to performance. This in fact, is promoting RCRN to lower-end users so I'm not seeing why you have an issue with my statement about low-end systems. For high-end systems, users obviously have more of a choice. RCRN is logically and naturally one of those choice if it is also a choice for lower-end systems...as well as would ENBs if they wanted to solely run an ENB without RCRN. Lower-end user wouldn't be able to run ENBs so; therefore, RCRN is a good alternative to those users. There...said it twice in one paragraph :P As for the "Real Life" part, I totally read realism to the real world and not to the Skyrim world. What other meaning does, "Real Life" mean other than real life?...meaning not the digital world. My mistake.

SRO exception is due to Starac (the author) being reasonably okay with the torrent and even telling people himself that if they want it then they can just search for the torrent. He just doesn't support the mod anymore by releasing updates to it (even though he continues to update it for his own game). The rest is simply respecting the author's choices. If the mod is taken down, then it's obvious that the author no longer wishes to share it; therefore, others respect the author's wishes by not sharing it either. If the author/mod was banned from Nexus then we respect Nexus in all their decisions by not share or reuploading the mod elsewhere. If the author reuploads the mods somewhere else, then we'll point to that location.

It's mainly your use of the word perfect and it's derivatives. Nothing is perfect. 98% accuracy is not perfect. As Aiyen pointed out. A lot of that is subjective to the individual. All lighting and weather mods are subjective by nature; ENB presets, CoT, RLO, ELFX, RCRN, etc. They're all subject because where one person may love it another may hate it. Therefore, the constant use of the word perfect/perfectly is a matter of opinion as those statements are... subjective to the user. I think that is mainly where some people are getting hung up. Most of the description is accurate in regards to RCRN itself. However, if I were to suggest any changes it would be to revise the lines that use perfect/perfectly as well as "real life". It simply comes across as gimicky. The real life part may be true but you could say, "Dynamically driven snow weathers with 6 levels of intensity" or "Dynamically driven snow weathers with 6 levels of intensity designed from real life data from snowy regions to provide realism". The first just drops it and sounds okay. The second simply adds some information to remove the gimicky sound of the statement. Take the criticism or leave it. I mean no harm. Just pointing out a view point that your team may not have thought about as others have also confirmed the same view point. I also too think it would be a good idea to provide an optional that is a loose files version regardless of the complexity of RCRN. There are always going to be those that want it. It does no harm in offering it with a note attached stating support will only be offered for the autoinstaller version and to use the loose files version at your own risk. At any rate, I still think RCRN is a good alternative for low-end systems that can't run ENBs. Same as RLO+RLO Weathers or CoT. As long as the compatibility issues can be resolved by the modders with any of these mods.

First let me say that I used to use RCRN and advocated it to a great degree for those with lower-end systems that aren't able to run ENB due to performance. I stopped using it due to compatibility issues that I didn't have the technical know-how to resolve back then. With that said, I agree with what Aiyen is saying. Much of the quotes about RCRN is what I would call "corporate advertising". It sounds like RCRN is giving away bars of gold but in reality your really only getting bars of steel painted gold, as Aiyen has pointed out in the technical details. Much of that description reads in such a manner. Most companies use fancy wording to advertise their products. This is just how RCRN decided to advertise their product. Whether we agree with this advertising or not, it's not really our place to tell them it's wrong. You can point out the actual technical points vs the claims in the wording. But do so in a constructive manner by offering alternative suggested wording. Don't just tell the RCRN team they are wrong. That will always be received in a negative light rather than constructive criticism.

ENB has nothing to do the STEP as we don't officially support any ENB. Thus, I've moved this to a more appropriate thread.