Performance Guide for Ultra Graphics settings in Skyrim

[Wallydog2149]

I wrote this guide on Steam and I figured I should share this with PC useres having a hard time running the Ultra settings for Skyrim. The following steps should help improve frame rates while maintaining high quality. If any admins feal like moving this topic somewhere mor appropriate, please provide the link to the new location....

 

 

My system specs are as follows:

I am running on an Intel Core2 Quad q9650 @3GHz, I have an ASUS built nVidia GTX550Ti over-clocked stable to 930MHz for GPU, and 4.204Ghz 1GB GDDR5 RAM, and system ram is 8GB PC2-6400 RAM (400MHz DDR2). I am also running this on Windows Vista 64 Bit Home Premium...which is practically Windows 7 in most respects.

 

My monitor is a Toshiba 42L52000US TV and it is set to game mode...it is connected to my video card via HDMI.

 

My Audio is a RealTek onboard chipset and I am running it through the integrated RCA-type Digital Coaxial cable hooked up top my 5.1 Surround Stereo Reciever (the latter is set to use NEO.DTS6 and Dolby Prologic II).

 

 

Windows Settings:

If you are running Windows Vista or Windows 7....the following will help improve performance tremendously.

 

Go to the exe files located in your Steam\steamapps\common\Skyrim folder and right click on the "TESV.exe" and select "Properties". In the "Compatibility" tab, check the boxes "Run as administrator", "Disable Display Scaling on High DPI settings", "Disable Desktop Composition", and "Disable Visual Themes"..Click the "Apply" button and "OK" button.

 

For the "SkyrimLauncher.exe" file, check the boxes "Run as Administrator", and "Disable Display Scaling at High DPI settings". Click Apply and OK...

 

 

Graphics settings:

It is important that you do not force any driver settings from the nVidia control panel (or for AMD users, the Catalyst Control Center) for Skyrim...just use the default settings...in fact, don't even add it if it isn't there in the nVidia presets...if it is, remove it.

 

In the Skyrim launcher options, click on "Ultra" and set the Antialiasing settings to 4 Multisamples in stead of the 8 that the Ulatra Settings has it set to...and use the screen resolution of 1600x900 for 16x9 monitors or 1600x1024 for 16x10 monitors.

 

In the advanced settings under the "Detail" tab, Uncheck FXAA, set the radial blurr quality to "Medium". Under the "View Distance" tab, set the "Distant Object Detal" setting to "High".

 

 

The High Resolution Texture DLC from Steam (it comes in three seperate mods):

If you do not know how to set mods up from the launcher, it is rather easy....just click on Data and the menu is pretty self-explanitory..the check boxes of the DLC content or mods you wish to load...

 

For the love of all that is holy....if you have an older computer like mine...do not load all three parts of the high resolution mod at once...I prefer t"HighResTexturePack2.esm" personally..but the choice is up to you which one or two you want to try...Using all three at once requires a nVidia GTX680 or better...

 

I have gotten the best frame rates out of the DLC texture pack off of steam using Texture pack 2 alone from it...races and crittters are high resolution as well as terrain and other surfaces. Texture pack 1 is for foliage, and texture pack 3 is for water and lighting...you really do not need 1 or 3...

 

Another factor is that textures are swaped for LOD purposes. This means that unless you have the game stored on an SSD...it is more advisable to use one DLC texture pack at a time.

[Novem99]

Windows Settings:

If you are running Windows Vista or Windows 7....the following will help improve performance tremendously.

 

Go to the exe files located in your Steam\steamapps\common\Skyrim folder and right click on the "TESV.exe" and select "Properties". In the "Compatibility" tab, check the boxes "Run as administrator", "Disable Display Scaling on High DPI settings", "Disable Desktop Composition", and "Disable Visual Themes"..Click the "Apply" button and "OK" button.

 

For the "SkyrimLauncher.exe" file, check the boxes "Run as Administrator", and "Disable Display Scaling at High DPI settings". Click Apply and OK...

 

Could you explain how this can improve the performance?

[Wallydog2149]

 

Windows Settings:

If you are running Windows Vista or Windows 7....the following will help improve performance tremendously.

 

Go to the exe files located in your Steam\steamapps\common\Skyrim folder and right click on the "TESV.exe" and select "Properties". In the "Compatibility" tab, check the boxes "Run as administrator", "Disable Display Scaling on High DPI settings", "Disable Desktop Composition", and "Disable Visual Themes"..Click the "Apply" button and "OK" button.

 

For the "SkyrimLauncher.exe" file, check the boxes "Run as Administrator", and "Disable Display Scaling at High DPI settings". Click Apply and OK...

 

Could you explain how this can improve the performance?

I'm not really sure how. I just notice a frame rate increase by using those settings. My only guess is that disabling visual themes and desktop composition allows the processor more resources to calculate the various Depth of Field and lighting effect shaders as needed. Windows Aero is a visual theme...

Edited November 29, 2014 by Wallydog2149

[Amyr]

Well... For older low end machines that might make a difference but I doubt that it will have any effect on current mid or high end systems at all. Not even 0.1 difference I might say.

[Wallydog2149]

Well... For older low end machines that might make a difference but I doubt that it will have any effect on current mid or high end systems at all. Not even 0.1 difference I might say.

You never know until you give it a try.

[dennis20014]

Disabling Aero will completely disable Vsync too. I prefer to have Vsync on personally but if others are having problems getting it to turn off, this is the best solution.