Bealdwine

I have a holiday coming up so I'm wondering whether to contact the OP to see if he would be willing to share his test methodology/tools so I could run a set for med/low spec PC. However there is that issue I had of not seeing significant FPS changes in-game during mod addition (due to CPU bottle-neck possibly?). But a reinstall with the minimal mod setup he used might allow for catching the small (but significant) variances to allow a comparrison.

Could I request edit permissions please. :)

[Note] Above mod/app name changed to SMCO (Skyrim Mods Complex Optimizer) now on version 1.2 including nif meshes optimization.

Thanks zMan I'll be interested to hear your opinion. The modder does state that there are deliberately no optionals to apply in the program as (he believes) the default settings are the best optimization v. quality trade off. I'm beginning to think that with a more limited PC rig a loss of 'top end' quality on dlc and mod textures is worth the price of being able to apply the improved textures and retain a playable game. The graphical improvements, while not as stunning as they could be, are still significant.

An excellent resource, but a great pity he couldn't add a performance element. Even if not relevant to your own specific PC kit the comparative results could have been useful. I have returned to using RLwC for performance reasons, although I'm wondering how Immersive Environment might match up with that.

I'm not sure the follower mods would strictly fit into the STEP 'vision' (although that is for TC to decide). However they may well have a place in one of the 'content packs' that are being considered, possibly as part of a Role Play extension to the base STEP configuration. Certainly the ability of followers to ride horses with you would be a major plus for immersion.

Agreed, but my first thought when I saw it was "will it play nice with Better Bows?" which is an excellent lore friendly mod.

Hate to raise the whole 'optimization' thing again ;) but every FPS is special... I missed the post about yet another optimizer until I tripped over it in the Wiki. I have now run (but not yet game tested) SMCO and assume the same caveats apply as for Optimizer Textures? However it is incredibly fast and has the advantage of working with BSA files. What is your opinion zMan? [Addition] I've now tested in-game and there is a slight but definate degradation to the textures, they are very slightly less 'crisp'... however I did gain about 3 FPS overall (not much but when you are hovering around 14-16 FPS outdoors every little counts) and increasing my contrast setting alleviated this effect a little. More importantly the load times are noticably reduced and there is a negligable stutter and much smoother feel to movement. A trade-off I may have to accept for my limited PC rig.

Skyrim Configurator is a small program offering a GUI method to alter settings in the Skyrim.ini and Skyrimprefs.ini files for those unhappy with finding/altering these manually through a text editor. As far as I can see all the major options for tweaking are included but I feel the instructions are a bit lacking. That said the app does offer some popup info as you hover over selections (tick boxes) and could aid the less technically inclined with a simple and foolproof way to add in recommended settings.

Lol, don't feel dumb it's hard to keep up these days. I'm running 296.10 WHQL driver atm, although there is probably a beta out there as well.

I think a clash with Deadly Dragons would keep me away from this... I don't find DD lore breaking in the Lite version and it adds an aspect that Bethesda should have included (truly challenging dragon fights). Having said that I may try DD Lite with UFO as afaik the Lite version shouldn't be affecting the NPCs to the degree the full DD version does. Anyone else running Lite DD?

I can understand his sentiments, but if he had reached at least one stable release it's a shame he felt the neccessity to delete the download... a touch of the "it's my ball and I'm going home!".

Doh! I did say... ;) Just check which mods use ScriptDragon and disable them and remove SD until it gets updated. Tbh if it wasn't for iHUD I wouldn't use SD at all.

Disappointing... especially as i just downloaded the 1024 version to test :P

Ok this is tricky, although the solution will probably be simple if we can find it! :P I have to work tonight so can only offer limited help right now but just to clarify the issue: "I then deleted the SKSE file in data..." ?What file would this be? I'm not aware of an SKSE file in the Data folder. What version of Skyrim are you patched to? 1.5.26.x is the latest I know of. check that the SKSE version matches == skse_1_5_26.dll. Also right click TESV.exe in the /Skyrim directory and select 'properties' check the 'Details' tab for the file version. If you have tried to run the game with skse_loader.exe there should be 3 .log files in /Skyrim directory, it might be worth looking at these for any clues as to where the problem hit. Do you use ScriptDragon (eg. for the iHUD plugin)? - the latest version of that only supports Skyrim 1.5.24.x at the moment so another potential problem there. If you get back with this info I'll try to wrack my brains :)

*Warning* I just loaded Skyrim and Steam installed an update (not the one I did Wednesday) to 1.5.25.05 (iirc). I double checked and DID have Unplugged set to Disable :( [edit] Worse yet if i attempt to start with SKSE (so that it launches Steam) I get to the Skyrim Launcher and it wants to "Detect Graphics.." again. This resets the launcher settings and overwrites my SkyrimPrefs.ini losing all my careful tweaks If I run Steam FIRST, then SKSE launcher, it misses out the game launcher and all is well.

Just a note on the WYSIWYG editor - in IE9 I can use it perfectly well but when I preview post my [return/new line]s are missing (and it has switched back to the old editor). If I then use the old editor to reinsert the [return/new line]s they show correctly in preview and when posted. Not really an issue for me but thought you might want to know. Using the STEP Blue theme if that matters.

It's been a strange afternoon Now that BOSS is finally back with us I decided to bite the bullet, update to 1.5 patch and get a fresh reinstall sorted. It's primarily STEP, although not the full list, with some additions I've been hoarding ready to try. I might bore you with a full listing at the end if you're unlucky :p So off I trundle happily pruning things back and downloading from Steam until I had an 'almost' vanilla setup (BOSS, SKSE, SD, SkyUI and Immersive_HUD included as essentials). Unfortunately I forgot at that point to check my FPS but ho hum. Then as usual I added in my Skyrim_HR DDSopt'd 7zip and popped in for an FPS count. Disappointingly but not really surprisingly I was getting about 10-15 FPS I added in the non-texture mods, Unofficial Patch, etc and tried again, 10-15 FPS ...okaaay lets go for it. So in went WATER as it's one of my favorites and Vurt's ditto, plus Lush Grass... retest = 10-15 FPS. Hmmm. Right, getting bored now and I can always deactivate with WB if I have to do some in-depth scrutiny so I joyfully dump all the rest in expecting to finally grind to a halt and... 10-15 FPS. Wut!?!? Now that's including RCRN which I couldn't resist trying (although I needed to tone down the contrast a bit with Imaginator) and all the texture mods I use (admtedly mostly lite versions except things like WATER, Realistic Smoke and Embers, Vurt's). It puzzles me to say the least - of course by the time I get a good rain storm and/or into the heart of Whiterun that figure will doubtless drop to 5-10 :P but it has left me with doubts about all the effort I put in to care and attention for performance sake if I can't even pinpoint specific mods as resource/VRAM hogs. As an aside, I also tried running Game Booster 3 on the full install and the result for that was... nothing, nada, zilch: 10-15 FPS Bain Packages as threatened ;) :

Good to see you onboard at last Graph I'm sure you'll have plenty of input for us :)

Good catch. I actually redirected it back to my Skyrim directory but it hadn't occured to me that it could cause a problem (as I don't use MO). I haven't installed it yet. Does it not give you an option for installation directory? Hopefully it can be moved to a new location without affecting anything else. If it writes its location in the registry, should be simple to change. Sorry i shouldn't have used the term 'redirected'. I meant that I installed to Skrim directory using the option to change installation location.

Good catch. I actually redirected it back to my Skyrim directory but it hadn't occured to me that it could cause a problem (as I don't use MO).

Excellent - and saved me suggesting changing the text ;)

Short answer is 'Yes' Using the ideal DDSopt settings, there should be benefit to processing 4x textures and higher as well, as compression will be optimized, redundancies will be deleted, and mip levels will be optimized. The key is not to reduce by constraining resolution (always leave at 8192x8192)... Ideal DDSopt settings, confirmed by Ethatron Thanks for the link, saved it to my DDSopt folder for ref. Surprised he uses the 'lossy' options but he's way ahead of me in understanding texture compression.

Lol, yes IE9 unfortunately. Was using Chrome and likely to go back - the speed boost for IE x64 is minimal at best :P