z929669

followers AI in Beth games are pretty lame, and SR has not seen any improvement IMO. They only really work (sort of) in interior cells.

Did lots more reading on DDSopt late last night and looking into the two other options now available (OT & SMCO). Ran the former on vanilla last night, and although I have not tested extensively nor even recorded everything I looked at, I am sparing myself the headach and going with strict DDSopt recommendation, as it has the capabilities of the others with many, many more options and bundled features. If you download the other two, you will see that they essentially use the same Nvidia exe bundled within different 'wrappers', 'proprietary GUI'-- not sure of the appropriate term for this, sorry! Apparently, the base technology of all are the same, but the others, as Ethatron states are simply 'subsets' of DDSopt I can achieve the same results as either using DDSopt and am working next to define mid to high performance-related reductions using the vanilla HD textures as a test case.

Thanks for the insights PP. Since these are the big tex packs, I think it is worth a detailed look to find the best combo of all packs. Using WB, it should be simple to create the ideal(s) and use a BCF to produce the desired output. FYI Use the Compressonator (AMD) for best texture viewing/compare (IMO). This allows view of two textures side x side with diff in middle at all mip levels. I generally look at the first 2-3 mips, since I have sometimes found that top levels can be quite different from lower.

Thanks man :D I will uninstall everything just for kicks to see if that is really the issue (I just love starting over from scratch for some reason.... OCD in me :P)

This is essentially an INI-tweaking GUI, so moved to this thread. Will move back if TC is likely to add it to STEP as a recommended app.

Bat does not work for me, as I have no reg key named "Skyrim" in the registry with "Install Path" value ... not anywhere. Also, dll, dlx & asi logic in WB (Python version) is handled beginning @ line 7337 in bosh.py. I don't have the hours to spare sorting out the code though, but I hope that new releases allow installing these files when not located in SKSE\plugins or Data\Asi ... those are the only package locations that WB will recognize such files.

Based on what I have learned in my conversations with Ethatron, this will be just another implementation of DDSopt-like functionality without the fine-tuning capabilities. Actually there is no doc that I can find in the download, nor are there any options at all really. It just runs on your entire data directory. It also seems to be reducing textures (WRT file size) by about 35-40% overall, which tells me that it is likely stripping off the highest mip levels in addition to optimizing compression. I think that the 64-bit functionality is nice, and it looks like the author is adept at optimizing application performance (if not texture performance). I'll play with it and get back to you :P

Hmm, never spent any time on that thread since I was not a fan. Notice how TC deals with negative posters? He doesn't! So simple and effective

sorry, HD-2k = SRHD-2k (my own acronym)

EDIT: blacksol is correct... my mistake. I have edited the WB Guide to reflect that "BAIN" be added to the package name but before the Nexus ID. ... never use that feature, so I missed it all this time ... thanks!

not I, but I can attest to the excellence of DD and the concept of a dragon that cannot be beaten by

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!". Agreed... seems to be suffering from Giskard syndrome, but removing the mod and not handing it off is beneath even that ailment.

I checked this out pretty carefully, and here is what I can say: EDIT: SRHD = "Skyrim HD" ;) 1. All have no more than a vanilla impact on FPS under the bench conditions, which are pretty good and using a mid range box with a high range ATI 6950 (1 Gb) ..EXCEPT SRHD-2k, which has about a 0.5% drop on average (but more FPS variance) 2. SRO is more true to original vanilla textures, and it is superior to Beth HD IMO. 3. SRHD wood textures are just a bit more realistic in terms of the walls panels (more so than vanilla and all others), which are smaller vertical and seem like bilateral log cuts, and it is very unlikely that the largest single pieces of timber would be used for this purpose, as in vanilla/SRO (one would need to section off longitudinal planes from very large tree trunks). 4. SRO/vanilla rock walls are much more realistic than SRHD (which are realistic looking, but look more like raw granite cut straight from the mountain rock). Reason is that SRO/vanilla are worn stones as one might find in creek/river beds, which are much more plausible. 5. SRO rock wall details are much better than vanilla IMO. 6. SRO road is more true to vanilla than SRHD, and I like it just a bit more. If I had my druthers, I would want SRHD-1k wood walls, but all else 1k-SRO (adding SMIM without any textures).

An obvious starting point I'd say ;) ... missed that, as I do not use NVIDIA

What does your GPU-z log output look like for dedicated and dynamic memory?

This is a very informative link to visual/performance compares. Recommend checking it out for a more comprehensive look. I will post back once I do so.

Good point, I will take a look ...

Thanks for the heads up. I will peruse it. I am working with WN on this now. Have it in Notepad++ and adding some detail as well as some Skyrim-centric points that are still missing ... let me know if you want to review as well and we can address chunks. Fe. BAIN is my main specialty right now. I know quite a bit about mods as well, but I could use some help on that piece.

On the SVN: I am waiting for the "final" WB release that incorporates the "fully functional" BOSS API. SVN will likely have other issues that I cannot address, and the next stable WB release is likely to have some other features that are more Skyrim friendly. RE bash. ini edits... they do belong here, as these are explicitly related to WB behavior... yes, only 3 entries for changing \oblivion to \skyrim

I was curious to try this out, so I took the benchmark area I've been using and did just that. The 30 second benchmark starts on a small hill outside of Riverwood, and I run down the path into the center of town, past the blacksmith. I do see micro-stutter in this area as I start to look around close to entering Riverwood. I ran a vanilla-high test and a test with all of the texture mods from B1 of STEP 2.0.1a. I used only x16 AF forced through CCC, no AA, no lighting/shaders. Here's what I recorded: Vanilla - 78fps (avg), 1364MB dedicated (max), 101mb dynamic (max) STEP - 62fps (avg), 2570MB dedicated (max), 104MB dynamic (max) According to the GPUz logs, it seems like dedicated VRAM is maxed out (2GB cards in Xfire) running STEP, but dynamic is only around 100mb... :| I'm not sure I understand the difference between these two VRAM figures in a way that helps me interpret the results in any actionable way... Any thoughts on this? Your results are consistent with my theory . Your FPS is only mildly affected due to GPU benefits of Xfire, and your VRAM has gone up significantly, but since you are well under 1.5x your max total VRAM (= (2+1)+(2+1) = 6Gb in your case), you do not see any increase in dynamic VRAM. That will spike at final approach to 4 GB dedicated VRAM (VRAM mirror is reported by GPU-z and NOT effective VRAM, which is really 2 GB in your case). So if you had a single card, GPU-z would report just over half of your dedicated VRAM (about 700 Mb and 1300 Mb in your scenarios) and your dynamic (about 65 Mb in your scenarios). All well below 1.5x max, so you should not get any crippling stutteringuntil you double to triple the memory size of your current max STEP. Take a look at my test results for GPU-z (scroll to bottom) using my 2x ATI 6850 (Sapphire) @1Gb each. My stuttering begins with full hi-res STEP 2.0.1a., which maxes to about 2700 Mb VRAM (so low res 1k options for big packs will fit me just fine) I would advise you to go with hi res all the way or at least set up for both to test. You should be good to go for uber-STEP graphics of the future

hold down the Ctrl key just like in Explorer

If you install WB for Skyrim, this will already be configured.

Quick not on merging "green" mods. just be sure to mark as mergeable, and they should show up in the BP just fine.

my misunderstanding then :P I didn't realize that Skyrim HD for ex was not already a page on the wiki that was simply not linked to on the main page somehow. Templates make good sense, sorry for introducing any confusion

Correct. Farlo has not yet set up the base structure it appears ...