Correct Enblocal Settings

[prizner]

So I was installing SkyRealism using the enb guide and I noticed the site https://www.iparadigm.org/pages/pnenb/ENBoost.html used for getting parameters for the memory section of enblocal no longer works. After some digging I found there were some formulas to come up with the needed information but as I am still unsure if I fully understand them I was wondering if anyone here could help? I have gtx 680 4GB and 12GB of ram with a i7 980x. Thanks!

[CovertSlinky]

just my 2 cents but on an AMD 6970 2GB. I've tested it many times and there is no really answer for reserved and for video memory i found when you leave it under the VRAM size enb will free memory automatically. thus gives me these values.

[MEMORY]

ExpandSystemMemoryX64=true because its worth it

ReduceSystemMemoryUsage=true because same

DisableDriverMemoryManager=true because AMD. so reduced stutter

DisablePreloadToVRAM=false because I want to alt tab

EnableUnsafeMemoryHacks=false because I have a 64 bit OS

ReservedMemorySizeMb=128 because if youre maxing VRAM-> reduce or if you have some to spare increase

VideoMemorySizeMb=1920 because once VRAM goes high it seem to clear it and improve frames

EnableCompression=false because the stutter is horrible

AutodetectVideoMemorySize=false because itll ignore the set Videomemorysize. It put mine at 6144 when I used it.

Ummm the reservememory has a max value of 1024 and it doesn't really matter what you have it set at because ReduceSystemMemoryUsage=false so that doesnt use any of the values you set

From my readings and repeatitive tests, I am 99.99% sure that statement to be wrong. ReduceSystemMemoryUsage, according to Boris means that memory manager is set. For me, this is false, which means that enb is not taking direct control of memory function. However with ExpandSystemMemory64 as true, enb is defragmenting my memory, if both the options are on together, ExpandSytemMemory64 is practically rendered useless. So it is my firm belief that in order for enb to use that one option correctly, indicating video memory size still becomes relevant. But, nonetheless I am ready to stand corrected if someone presents a better understanding.

[Nearox]

Ok then. 

(Laptop)

GeForce GTX 760m 2GB VRAM

8GB RAM

i7-4702MQ 2.2 GHz 2.8 in Turbo.

My HDD is sadly 5400 RPM.

[MEMORY]

ExpandSystemMemoryX64=true

ReduceSystemMemoryUsage=true

DisableDriverMemoryManager=false

DisablePreloadToVRAM=false

EnableUnsafeMemoryHacks=false

ReservedMemorySizeMb=128 (this is the value Boris uses for his 2gb gpu. I use it as well. Works great for me.)

VideoMemorySizeMb=4096 (see formulas below. I put 4096 as I found that value works well as in reduced stutter and increased stability)

// less than 8GB Formula: (VRAM + RAM - 2048) , max value: 10240

// more than 8GB Formula: (VRAM + RAM - 2048 / 2) , max value: 10240

EnableCompression=false (setting this to true will create stutter when you are nearing your vram limit).

AutodetectVideoMemorySize=false 

 

Try those out. My GPU's VRAM is idential to your. Although you have a laptop so stutter might be unavoidable... Either way, hope it helps. 

[Halde]

I'll try that, thanks! I need to be done with some installs so will probably not report before tomorrow:)

Edited August 8, 2014 by Halde

[DoubleYou]

My system crashes with VRAM + RAM - 2048. I just use a "sensible" value based on my amount of GPU VRAM and RAM through educated guessing. From what I've seen, no one value fits all.

[Aiyen]

It wont... since everyone have different systems with different chips and overall bandwidth. 

for example a laptop can have 2Gb memory.. but a really low bandwidth hence you will most likely not be able to get away with what a desktop based 2Gb card can do anyways. Hence when you push the values to the limit you will run into massive stuttering issues CTD´s etc. 

[camaro_69_327]

Since i haven't seen Boris's actual post on the matter, thought i would place it here for discussion....This is from the Day Boris released the feature. 

 

Posted: 23 Aug 2013, 20:17 ...Source

Graphic mod / patch ENBSeries 0.209

This version based on 0.207, but added VideoMemorySizeMb variable instead of automatic detection, so everybody with performance issues, freezing and stuttering,tweak it properly and don't bother me without reason, all bugs are on your side. This parameter mean how much memory used as vram for my memory manager, if very low, then frequent reallocations will happen, so lower performance, but more stable against not loading saved games (DisablePreloadToVRAM too). Value above size of physical video memory is allowed, but you have risk to get errors because of drivers and other software (but this must not happen if system is clean and user is smart), useful to try for 64-bit systems with more than 4 gb system memory installed and not much vram, performance must be better. Don't set it bigger than VRAM+RAM-2048. This value do not add any memory usage to the game process (but ReservedMemorySizeMb do).

 

 

So reading that from Boris is a bit difficult , So a system with little VRAM can still benefit ,as the process is moved into system RAM.

Using the above formula i would have a setting of 10240 (3 +16 -2 =17GB)   BUT if i let ENB set the memory, it gives me 10880<<over that said max.

Stuttering was reduced by setting "reserved memory" to 1024..Again MAX.

 

ENB set Memory to 10880 using Auto Detect.

I normally see an Extreame amount of both Physical and System commit memory in use.

 

Skyrim before tweaking ENB  ...8 GB system commit

Skyrim After ENB tweaks.........15.1 GB system commit. and same graph showing the Physical RAM in use, @ 8.2 GB<<good thing i have more then 8...that would have crashed.

GPU loaded as far as i am comfortable with...lol...2.9 out of 3...close enough.

All 8 Threads busy busy..

 

This will crash most computers , point is you can configure an ENB to give you what you need. Tweak away.

[Aiyen]

I believe that the physical used is the only one that really matters.. since as I understood it then that is what the game + enbhost is actively using at any one point. I have never seen a use higher then this on my system (16Gb RAM, 2Gb VRAM ).... I have seen that the game and ENB reserve more (Your system commit), but I assume this is simply buffer which just helps speed up loading. (Which is in fact what I see... once the game is loaded up into memory it will start up a whole lot faster then when loading the first time.). Which also makes sense.. if there is plenty of free physical memory available then there is no need to clear up memory for new data. 

 

Hence I have never seen a need to go higher then 8192 in memoryreserved.. since that is the max used ever... even when the value was set higher. I have not been able to go much higher since then I get into the area where the VRAM becomes the limiting factor and loading on more 4k textures start to really increase load time and eventually just CTD the game. 

 

But yeah ENB can give you much... assuming you have hardware with the bandwidth to support it. 

[keithinhanoi]

So reading that from Boris is a bit difficult , So a system with little VRAM can still benefit ,as the process is moved into system RAM.

Using the above formula i would have a setting of 10240 (3 +16 -2 =17GB)   BUT if i let ENB set the memory, it gives me 10880<<over that said max.

Stuttering was reduced by setting "reserved memory" to 1024..Again MAX.

 

ENB set Memory to 10880 using Auto Detect.

I normally see an Extreame amount of both Physical and System commit memory in use.

 

Skyrim before tweaking ENB  ...8 GB system commit

Skyrim After ENB tweaks.........15.1 GB system commit. and same graph showing the Physical RAM in use, @ 8.2 GB<<good thing i have more then 8...that would have crashed.

GPU loaded as far as i am comfortable with...lol...2.9 out of 3...close enough.

All 8 Threads busy busy..

 

This will crash most computers, point is you can configure an ENB to give you what you need. Tweak away.

Since I've only just recently upgrade from a machine with a 1GB ATI to a new rig with a 4GB Nvidia card, I've not yet had a chance to see what happens with higher VideoMemorySizeMb combined with higher res textures (which I assume you're using.)

 

What I did notice previously is that even with VideoMemorySizeMb set to 15-17GB (on my older system with 32GB,) my physical RAM / system commit value never went much above 4-5GB.

 

If you're seeing Physical RAM usage at 8.2GB, then in theory there should be 2 or three instances of the enblocal.exe running (handling 4GB of system RAM each). Is that what you were seeing?

 

As for the quote from Boris' announcement of VideoMemorySizeMb, although a lot of things have changed, I'll translate it to "regular" English:

 

VideoMemorySizeMb sets the amount of system memory which will be available as additional VRAM for the ENB memory manager.

 

If VideoMemorySizeMb is set to a very low value, then the ENB memory manager will have to make frequent memory re-allocations, which will negatively affect performance, but make it possible to load save games that may otherwise crash (if DisablePreloadToVRAM is also enabled.)

 

It is possible to set VideoMemorySizeMb to a value higher than the amount of physical VRAM on your video card, but then you may experience errors as the ENB memory manager attempts to "fight" with other software and drivers for available system memory. This can be avoided if there is enough "headroom" of system memory and by not running unnecessary drivers / software when running Skyrim. 

 

Also, setting VideoMemorySizeMb higher than the size of VRAM may help to improve performance on 64-bit systems with more than 4GB of physical RAM and a video card with a smaller amount of VRAM (NB: he's probably talking about 512MB / 1GB of VRAM here.)

 

Don't set VideoMemorySizeMb higher than VRAM + physical RAM - 2048 to allow for memory used by the system.

 

Finally, note that the value of VideoMemorySizeMb will not affect memory usage of skyrim.exe, while ReservedMemorySizeMB will. 

 

That last sentence is a really important one, because setting ReservedMemorySizeMB higher can potentially take skyrim.exe usage closer to the 3.1GB cap, while increasing VideoMemorySizeMb just means more instances of enbhost.exe will be started - assuming the ENB memory manager requests more memory.

[camaro_69_327]

Next long play session, (later today) i will have a look to see how many "Enbhost" processes are in use. have never looked for that just assumed that is what was going on.

 

And yes...many many High rez texture's, had to back off on few i wanted as my 580's are starting to complain..:)

 

**side note need to start a post or figure out why i have some Armor with (0) rating. 

[viper37]

Just to add my own comments here.

As I most likely made mistakes during install and didn't start from a fresh install, I flushed everything and started fresh.

Following STEP Extended guidelines closely, I was still plagued by CTDs while using 2k textures (I used 1k textures prior to that and was still crashing).  I tried following advices here&there, but the game was crashing with 5 minutes of gameplay, if I was lucky.

 

What I did was reverting back to Skyrim.ini and Skyrimprefs.ini original versions and I made only the changes suggested by the STEP guide for these two files + SKSE.ini + ENBlocal.ini

But I was still crashing.

 

I then made some changes to ENBlocal.ini and the crash are a thing of the past.  Not once in many hours of playtime.

This is what my ENBLocal.in memory section looks like now:

[MEMORY]ExpandSystemMemoryX64=trueReduceSystemMemoryUsage=trueDisableDriverMemoryManager=falseDisablePreloadToVRAM=falseEnableUnsafeMemoryHacks=falseReservedMemorySizeMb=768VideoMemorySizeMb=EnableCompression=trueAutodetectVideoMemorySize=true

 

 

It gives me very good performance (60fps) and extreme stability.

 

If anyone is still having CTDs, I'd encourage them doing what I did, reverting to baseline INIs + these tweaks to ENBlocal and see from there how it goes.

 

 

My config is in my sig.  I have Skyrim STEP:Extended (2k or highest resolution possible below that) + a few other mods installed.  No performance problem, no CTDs.  Any other setting in ENBlocal gave me CTDs.

Edited September 3, 2014 by viper37

[keithinhanoi]

 

I then made some changes to ENBlocal.ini and the crash are a thing of the past.  Not once in many hours of playtime.

This is what my ENBLocal.in memory section looks like now:

 

[MEMORY]

ExpandSystemMemoryX64=true

ReduceSystemMemoryUsage=true

DisableDriverMemoryManager=false

DisablePreloadToVRAM=false

EnableUnsafeMemoryHacks=false

ReservedMemorySizeMb=768

VideoMemorySizeMb=

EnableCompression=true

AutodetectVideoMemorySize=true

 

Thanks for sharing your findings, and it's great that you've managed to find stability. Just remember that what works for you is with your particular system, and it may not work for everyone.

 

That said, to help with more input to the discussion here, I'm wondering if you could share two things from your experience:

• What were your enblocal.ini settings before you decided on the settings you posted here?
• Since you have AutodetectVideoMemorySize enabled, it would be good to know what ENB has decided to allocate for Video Memory size. You can find this in the ENB GUI (default shift+enter while in-game) and looking in the Statistics section in the enblocal.ini window.

Also, I'm really curious why you decided to "give up" 4GB of system RAM just to hold save games on a RAM-disk. Did you find the save / load times to be that much faster than having the save games on your SSD?

[viper37]

Thanks for sharing your findings, and it's great that you've managed to find stability. Just remember that what works for you is with your particular system, and it may not work for everyone.

 

That said, to help with more input to the discussion here, I'm wondering if you could share two things from your experience:

• What were your enblocal.ini settings before you decided on the settings you posted here?
• Since you have AutodetectVideoMemorySize enabled, it would be good to know what ENB has decided to allocate for Video Memory size. You can find this in the ENB GUI (default shift+enter while in-game) and looking in the Statistics section in the enblocal.ini window.

Also, I'm really curious why you decided to "give up" 4GB of system RAM just to hold save games on a RAM-disk. Did you find the save / load times to be that much faster than having the save games on your SSD?

 

I know it differs from one system to another, wich is why I posed my config, so people can compare what works for them or not.

 

enblocal.ini settings

For Enblocal.ini, I tried two diferents settings.  #1 was this:

[MEMORY]

ExpandSystemMemoryX64=true

ReduceSystemMemoryUsage=false

DisableDriverMemoryManager=false

DisablePreloadToVRAM=false

EnableUnsafeMemoryHacks=false

ReservedMemorySizeMb=512

VideoMemorySizeMb=

EnableCompression=false

AutodetectVideoMemorySize=true

 

And #2:

[MEMORY]

ExpandSystemMemoryX64=false

ReduceSystemMemoryUsage=true

DisableDriverMemoryManager=false

DisablePreloadToVRAM=false

EnableUnsafeMemoryHacks=false

ReservedMemorySizeMb=64

VideoMemorySizeMb=

EnableCompression=true

AutodetectVideoMemorySize=true

 

Wich, unless I'm mistaken, should be the default ini file from Boris' site, included in the v.262 download + the STEP wiki recommendations

https://wiki.step-project.com/ENBoost#Recommendations

 

 

All other things being equal (meaning no other tweaking of SKSE.ini, skyrim.ini or skyrimprefs.ini and changing the load order) I tried playing with different settings, one at a time, but the ones I posted are the only ones that behaved correctly, without crashes.  This across two different video cards (7950 as of two weeks ago).

 

I should also add that I have the lastest non beta drivers from AMD (14.4).

 

 

Allocated video memory size

SHIFT+ENTER doesn't do anything for me.

My global settings are:

[GLOBAL]

UsePatchSpeedhackWithoutGraphics=true

UseDefferedRendering=false

IgnoreCreationKit=true

ForceFakeVideocard=false

 

doesn't the first line interfere with ENB's console?  I thought I read this somewhere...

 

 

Anyway, I have my Skyrim performance logs, in case it is of any use.

VRAM is reported as:

min: 237mb

avg: 2284

max: 3245

 

 

RAMdisk

With my motherboard, I have an utility called ROGRamdisk wich creates a RAmdisk and a junction point.

 

By default, all my games are installed on D: drive, wich is the Caviar Black.

All my date (My documents) are also on the D: Drive.  I have no idea how to change it from the HDD to the SDD for specific saved games, only the global folder, wich then takes too much place on the SSD.

I use Steam Mover to move games back and forth between the HDD and the SSD, but it only works with stuff in Steamappscommon folder

 

For other games, like Rome 2 Total War, it made a huge difference.  I figured it would also help with Skyrim, but I have found over the week that it isn't that much faster.  Faster yes, certainly.  Maybe twice or even thrice as fast, but it's already pretty fast.  Really, going from 9 seconds to 4 seconds loading time isn't a huge drawback for me.

 

Why do I keep it?  Bah.  I play one game at a time, and it takes me a while to play.  I never noticed any drawbacks in the games I've used it, only faster loading time for some games, not all of them. So, why not? :)  The sacrifice isn't huge, most games don't use that much memory.  I'm running Skyrim with decent graphics and no slowdown problems, so I guess I could afford that sacrifice.

 

 

Hope that helps for now.  If you find another way for me to access the ENB console and see the used video memory in game, I'm always willing to help :)

 

 

EDIT:

some typo and added clarification.

Edited September 4, 2014 by viper37

[keithinhanoi]

 

Allocated video memory size

SHIFT+ENTER doesn't do anything for me.

My global settings are:[GLOBAL]UsePatchSpeedhackWithoutGraphics=trueUseDefferedRendering=falseIgnoreCreationKit=trueForceFakeVideocard=false 

doesn't the first line interfere with ENB's console?  I thought I read this somewhere...

 

 

Anyway, I have my Skyrim performance logs, in case it is of any use.

VRAM is reported as:

min: 237mb

avg: 2284

max: 3245 

 

Ah... with UsePatchSpeedhackWithoutGraphics=true, you've turned off all ENB graphical effects, so you're just using the ENBoost features, and that's why you can't access the ENB GUI interface.

 

The thing about looking at VRAM usage only, though is that you don't know how much system RAM ENB has set aside and it actually using as "extended" (shared) video memory. That's where the copies of enbhost.exe come in. If you use Skyrim Performance Monitor, you could turn on the feature that combines Skyrim + enbhost.exe usage to get an idea of that, but when you use the AutodetectVideoMemorySize setting, the only place you can find out how much memory ENB "thinks" it can use is in the GUI, which requires UsePatchSpeedhackWithoutGraphics=false.

 

Here's why it's good to know how much memory ENB thinks it can use as Video Memory: In your situation, since you've got a 4GB video card, and you've effectively got about 9-10GB of system RAM to play with (16GB minus 2 or 3GB for the system, and minus another 4Gb for your RAM-drive), it is possible that due to the the AutodetectVideoMemorySize setting, ENB may set its Video Memory size too large. It's not a problem until ENB tries to use system RAM beyond what is actually available, and it may never happen for you, depending on how many higher resolution textures you use, and some other factors, such as other software you leave running in the background while playing Skyrim.

 

Anyhow, you may want to temporarily turn on the ENB graphics to find out what it has set for Video Memory using the auto detect feature, and if that's too high, turn of the auto detect feature and manually set VideoMemorySizeMb with a "safer" value.

 

 

RAMdisk

With my motherboard, I have an utility called ROGRamdisk wich creates a RAmdisk and a junction point.

 

By default, all my games are installed on D: drive, wich is the Caviar Black.

All my date (My documents) are also on the D: Drive.  I have no idea how to change it from the HDD to the SDD for specific saved games, only the global folder, wich then takes too much place on the SSD.

I use Steam Mover to move games back and forth between the HDD and the SSD, but it only works with stuff in Steamappscommon folder

 

For other games, like Rome 2 Total War, it made a huge difference.  I figured it would also help with Skyrim, but I have found over the week that it isn't that much faster.  Faster yes, certainly.  Maybe twice or even thrice as fast, but it's already pretty fast.  Really, going from 9 seconds to 4 seconds loading time isn't a huge drawback for me.

 

Why do I keep it?  Bah.  I play one game at a time, and it takes me a while to play.  I never noticed any drawbacks in the games I've used it, only faster loading time for some games, not all of them. So, why not? :)  The sacrifice isn't huge, most games don't use that much memory.  I'm running Skyrim with decent graphics and no slowdown problems, so I guess I could afford that sacrifice.

 

Since you say your Skyrim saves are in ...Documentsmy gamesskyrimsaves I assume you are using NMM and not Mod Organizer, right? So in this case, a junction point (or symbolic link) is actually exactly what you could use to "move" your whole Documents folder to your Caviar HDD, thus saving space on your SSD. Then, if you wanted to keep just the Skyrim save games on your SSD, you could make a symbolic link for just that folder, pointing from the HDD back to the SSD.

[viper37]

I'm sorry, I tried, but I can't get the console to work.

 

I press the tilde key to have the console open, then SHIFT+ENTER to see the console, but my cursor is then doubled, a regular Skyrim cursor and an hourglass.

 

Nothing works, i tried highliting the memory section, pressing ENTER or +, didn't work.  Trying to click it with any of the cursor only makes my sword wing.

 

I tried launching Skyrim without SKSE but I have the same result.  I tried changing:

ForceBorderless=trueForceBorderlessFullscreen=trueto false, didn't work either.  In fact, my game refused to load with SKSE disabled and these to false.

 

I searched on ENB forum, and apparently it's a bug with Windows 8.1 and Boris has no desire to fix this. (sorry, I forgot to mention my OS the first time)

https://enbseries.enbdev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=2379

I tried their work-around, but I still have the same problem.

 

If you think of something, let me know.  If you need anything else, let me know.  I'm sorry I couldn't help further for now.

 

 

 

Since you say your Skyrim saves are in ...Documentsmy gamesskyrimsaves I assume you are using NMM and not Mod Organizer, right? So in this case, a junction point (or symbolic link) is actually exactly what you could use to "move" your whole Documents folder to your Caviar HDD, thus saving space on your SSD. Then, if you wanted to keep just the Skyrim save games on your SSD, you could make a symbolic link for just that folder, pointing from the HDD back to the SSD.

I am using M.O.  I ditched NMM when I started using STEP, mid game.

 

The Ramdisk utility provided by ASUS makes the shortcut from my HDD to the ramdisk.  I have no idea how to do this myself.  When I move stuff from my HDD to my SSD, I use Steammover, wich again, makes the necessary shortcuts.  Honestly, moving my saved games and having SKyrim look for them in the right directory... I have no idea how to do that.  :)

Doesn't really matter, for now it works.  If I have problems, I'll delete the junction and revert back to loading on the HDD.

Edited September 5, 2014 by viper37

[afonik]

I'm also on Windows 8.1 with a similar setup (780ti instead) and i have no issues with the Gui.

Please ensure you have UsePatchSpeedhackWithoutGraphics=false and check your UAC settings. If it doesn't work try running the .exes in Windows 7 compatible mode.