Fallout 3 FPS Issues

[danbucks123]

Hey guys,

 

First time poster here and newbie to modding Fallout; I've been playing Fallout 3 but I can't seem to get it to run smoothly. I know there's posts here already about similar things but I've spent, and I'm not even kidding, two days now searching around and have been unable to find a fix. I've tried better performance mods, stutter remover, fiddling with ini files and all sorts to no avail. I don't know a lot about computers in general so it might even be my laptop, but surely not? It's not super old and runs a lot of newer games with no issues.

 

I don't know a lot about specs and stuff but here's the info from my system information tab:

CPU

Intel® Core i5-8265U CPU @ 1.60GHz

Base speed: 1.80 GHz

Sockets: 1

Cores: 4

Logical processors: 8

Virtualisation: Enabled

L1 cache: 256 KB

L2 cache: 1.0 MB

L3 cache: 6.0 MB

Intel UHD Graphics 620

8GB of RAM. Solid state hard drive (I think that's relevant? Lol). Windows 10. I don't know if there's anything else you'd need to know but if there is just let me know. Sorry, I'm a noob at all this lol.

I also considered if the mods I've installed could be the issue, however the game still runs poorly with them all disabled, and even on low low quality I don't get a smooth FPS, or anything above 50ish. Mods I've tried to fix the issue include: "Unofficial Fallout Patch.esm", "BetterGamePerformance.esp" and "Stutter Fixer" (or something along those lines).

Thanks in advance for any help; I'm desperate at this point lol.

Edit: I also downloaded the "WinXP-7-8-10 Multicore Threading 4GB LAA with 4GB FOSE Setup", but still the problem is the same. On the lowest possible graphics settings it runs at 60FPS until combat, then it'll drop to around 45.

Edited May 11, 2020 by danbucks123

[FiftyTifty]

Forget running Fallout 3. Instead, use Tale of Two Wastelands to run Fallout New Vegas with Fallout 3's content merged into it: https://taleoftwowastelands.com/

[danbucks123]

Forget running Fallout 3. Instead, use Tale of Two Wastelands to run Fallout New Vegas with Fallout 3's content merged into it: https://taleoftwowastelands.com/

 

That does look pretty cool haha, don't know how I missed that. I'm guess that means you can't use certain Fallout 3 mods though, like the Wander's Edition, MMM, etc?

[M48A5]

Your equipment does not meet the minimum requirements for the game. Be thankful that the game runs and you can get 45fps in combat.

[danbucks123]

Your equipment does not meet the minimum requirements for the game. Be thankful that the game runs and you can get 45fps in combat.

 

Can you elaborate on that at all? Because apparently the recommended requirements are an Intel Core 2 Duo U7600 and 2GB of RAM? And according to sites like systemrequirementslab & pcgamebenchmark my PC is above both the minimum and the recommended? Also when I auto-detect the hardware on the Fallout launcher it recommends very high?

Edited May 11, 2020 by danbucks123

[M48A5]

Quoted from Bethesda.net: "Processor: 2.4 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor. Memory: 1 GB (XP)/ 2 GB (Vista) Hard disk space: 7 GB. Video: Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 256MB RAM (NVIDIA 6800 orbetter/ATI X850 or better)Jan 20, 2020"

[danbucks123]

Quoted from Bethesda.net: "Processor: 2.4 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor. Memory: 1 GB (XP)/ 2 GB (Vista) Hard disk space: 7 GB. Video: Direct X 9.0c compliant video card with 256MB RAM (NVIDIA 6800 orbetter/ATI X850 or better)Jan 20, 2020"

Again, I don't understand a lot of this so bare with me lol, but are you saying my problem is the Processor? Isn't my processor better than the one mentioned, as shown here?

 

https://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Pentium-4-240GHz-vs-Intel-Core-i5-8250U/m5589vsm338266

Edited May 11, 2020 by danbucks123

[M48A5]

The processing speed of your processor is 1.8GHz per second. The game requires a speed of 2.4GHz per second. No, your processor does not meet the minimum.

 

The specifications for the game are for a dedicated video card, such as a NVidia or ATI video card, not an integrated video chip. No, your graphics processing unit does not meet the minimum.

 

Your central processing unit has 3 cores. Fallout 3 was designed for a CPU with 2 cores and has a problem when a CPU has more than 2.

 

Fallout 3 was designed to run on a gaming console or desktop computer.

 

Again, be thankful that you can get 45FPS when in combat. If you add more things to be processed, you FPS will drop.

[FiftyTifty]

Do not ever equate processor speed with performance. That is the number one of anything to do with computers. You don't know what you're talking about. Do not ever give tech advice when you can only offer made up nonsense that's nothing more than an ironic meme from the 90s.

 

Any intel iGPU better than an HD 2000, the same iGPU paired with Nehalem and Westmere i3's, will be able to handle Fallout 3 and Fallout New Vegas. His Coffee Lake CPU is many times faster in every metric than a Pentium 4. We're talking an order of magnitude for just a single core, never mind multi-core usage.

 

@danbucks Fallout 3 Is just broken to hell. There's really no reason to not run Tale of Two Wastelands instead. All you need to do is the following:

 

1. Temporarily install Fallout 3 somewhere, as you just need the game files

2. Install Fallout New Vegas

3. Run the TTW installer, along with the supplied patches after the initial install

4. Download NVSE: http://nvse.silverlock.org/

5. Download NVTF: https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/66537

6. Download New Vegas Anti-Crash: https://www.nexusmods.com/newvegas/mods/53635

 

This will substantially increase performance in every regard.

 

Recommendations:

 

Set New Vegas' texture quality to minimum, as your iGPU will use your laptop's RAM as texture memory, which is very slow. So less memory used = more performance.

 

Set your laptop's power plan to max performance

 

Turn off any unnecessary services. Press the windows key + r, type in msconfig, press OK. Look for any services that are currently running that are useless. Such as the Xbox services, and OneDrive.

 

Set the in-game resolution to the minimum you can bare. Again, your system RAM is used as storage for the rendered frames, which is slow.

 

You can turn up object and NPC draw distances, polygon count is not the problem for your iGPU. Basically, reduce all resolution, texture quality, and shadow resolution settings for max performance.

 

Limit your FPS through a tool such as MSI Afterburner. Unfortunately, Intel's drivers don't allow you to limit the FPS outright, unlike AMD's Radeon Chill and NVidia Inspector's settings. So you need to use a third party tool to do that.