How to pack .bsa

[MisterSkilly]

Hello!I've heard that packing texture mods into Skyrim - Textures.bsa could reduce the VRAM usage, so I wanted to try that out myself.Now, I have basically everything setup in a /textures/... folder (original skyrim files overwritten with the texture-packs), (they've worked in the past, as loose files), but when I pack them with Archive.exe or BSAopt, it 'doesn't' work. with Archive.exe it packs the files into a ridiculously big file (approx. the size of the loose files, 11GB) and of course it doesn't work (no textures in Skyrim)When I pack the files with BSAopt (no matter if 0 or 10 compression level, force or not forced.) after a while it tells me "Failed to copy file "textures..." Retry?" When I press retry, the same happens in the second "pack-through" (where it tries to pack the failed files from before).How do I pack the files correct, or how do I see if I made a mistake? (I made it like this: folder textures with original skyrim - textures (unpacking worked fine, I think) and a new textures folder. I put every mod into the new textures folder with the right load order. Then I copied the whole new textures into the textures folder, and overwrote everything.)TIA! :)EDIT: I tried the default Settings of BSAopt, and with every"Skip blahblah" disabled.

And the log file: https://www.mediafire.com/view/e0ezw2882f8rh3v/Skyrim_-_Texutres.log EDIT2: Split the files into 4 folders, trying to pack them manually and use one as master and the other ones as mods. Currently compressing, no problems so far.EDIT3: Alright splitting did the job, I don't see any decrease in VRAM though. Nexus moderator liar! :D

Edited April 27, 2014 by MisterSkilly

[Kelmych]

For the initial version and updates of Skyrim, BSAs created by BSAopt or DDSopt were readable by the Skyrim executable (TESV.exe). Hpwever, there have been reported problems with reading these BSAs with the most recent versions of the Skyrim executable. You can use BSAs created by BSAopt/DDSopt with Mod Organnizer when you let MO unpack them.

[keithinhanoi]

Kelmych, is what you're saying only applicable to copies of the game-supplied .BSAs which have been re-packed in BSAopt/DDSopt (ie., Skyrim - Meshes.bsa, Skyrim - Textures.bsa, etc.)?

 

If not, does than mean all the mod authors providing a .BSA with their main plugin are using Bethedsda's Archive.exe to pack it?

 

I only ask because despite not having tried to re-pack all of the Bethesda-supplied .BSAs, I don't unpack the .BSAs applied by any 3rd party mods, instead letting MO "manage" them and haven't had any problems that I'm aware of to this day.

[MisterSkilly]

Kelmych, is what you're saying only applicable to copies of the game-supplied .BSAs which have been re-packed in BSAopt/DDSopt (ie., Skyrim - Meshes.bsa, Skyrim - Textures.bsa, etc.)?

 

If not, does than mean all the mod authors providing a .BSA with their main plugin are using Bethedsda's Archive.exe to pack it?

 

I only ask because despite not having tried to re-pack all of the Bethesda-supplied .BSAs, I don't unpack the .BSAs applied by any 3rd party mods, instead letting MO "manage" them and haven't had any problems that I'm aware of to this day.

Hello, as I said I managed to pack them, (Skyrim - Textures.bsa too) you just have to look that the compressed file isn't larger than 2.14something GB. Anything larger than that won't work, you'd have to split the files up. I took the first 4 folders, packed them into Skyrim - Textures.bsa, then I took the next 4, packed them into Skyrim - Textures1.bsa and enabled that file via Mod Organizer, and the same step for all the other folders.

[CJ2311]

For packing BSAs, you could use the Archiver.exe file that's bundled with the Creation Kit, I find it easier to use personally.

[Kelmych]

The only reported problems have been with repacked versions of the Bethesda BSAs with BSAopt and DDSopt. I haven't seen enough reports on splitting the contents into multiple BSAs, or repacking with other tools, to know whether this eliminates the problems. We don't know why Skyrim can't currently read the repacked BSAs, early versions of Skyrim did so without any problems.

[MisterSkilly]

#closerequestAs in EDIT 3 stated (maybe not clear enough?) I personally got it working via splitting plus BSAopt and thus don't need any more help. With the splitting I hadn't had any issues.And I'm quite sure you can't compress in Archive.exe? (multiple compression levels and so on)And since Archive.exe is able to create files larger than 2GB I'd rather not use it, since (in my experience) those .bsa files which were larger than 2GB didn't work. And without BSAopt I wouldn't know that, so I would probably still be searching the problem :DBut I have to admit Archive.exe may be easier to use.