Jenrai

Try rebuilding your .ini if you are using anything but an utterly basic mouse too. Sometimes, Oblivion just doesn't like specific hardware. Plus an .ini reconstruct can fix problems it (and you) didn't even know you had, and problems that it really shouldn't fix at all. Good luck matey. Jenrai

Wrye Bash is also capable of fixing the A-bomb. And I agree with Tom. Defo sounds like it. Just navigate to the save in the bash saves window and it should be pretty straight forward from there. Good Luck. Jenrai

Tom - BOSSlog = Load Order. Same thing, different name. However, I suspect the OP didn't download or at least didn't use the newest masterlist for BOSS. Because I'm pretty damn sure Shield on back is on there. Another thing he wants to look at is Streamline. That'll throttle higher end systems, rather than help. On that computer I'd loose that completely. I'd also take a long, hard look at tweakguides.com. Not specifically just for Oblivion, but if you ever want to run it even almost stable with that lot installed, you're gonna need some tweaking here and there. Other mods to watch out for that I noticed on there - Screen control and motion blur can also choke FPS (global changes are good at that). As can OOO Waterfish, but obviously that one only applies to cells with or adjacent to water. Basically Tek, reinstall, and start rebuilding your game mate. Play test thoroughly and keep in mind that 30FPS is actually faster than a Hollywood movie. You're not seeing low FPS. You're seeing transition periods between FPS rates and stuttering. BTW - reason your FPS was capped was likely streamline mate - By default it caps FPS at 30. Also - Halo 3 runs Capped permanently at 30 FPS. If you've ever played it you'll know that that's likely as fast as any game needs to run. Yes, you can go faster, which is usually only done for bragging rights and nothing more. Your games actually LOOSE functionality when you go much higher than that 60 FPS mark. There's only so much information a monitor can display at that rate, even the newer ones, and also only so much stuff your brain will take in. Oh, and make sure you remember to wipe your .ini if you reinstall. Remember not to install to the default directory on any operating system newer than windows XP. The UAC polices everything in the Program Files folder like no ones business. Also remember that where possible, graphics settings should be altered with your gpu's own control system, and not through the game menus. Good luck mate. Hope you get to where you want it. Jenrai

Is your game modded? Simple solution if you have no problems with anything else is that its not a system problem. Its almost certainly not a hardware problem anyways. And AC97 audio, for what it was, was actually damn good. ;) That out of the way, if your game is modded you likely have a sound file that's missing. One that's specific to books that level skills and attributes. Whilst missing sound files generally just cause a momentary stutter, if they are part of a script, or are linked to multiple events, they can cause game, and even catastrophic system crashes because your comp is having an absolute hissy fit looking for something that just isn't there. Disabling all sounds in the .ini WOULD fix this, because contrary to popular belief doing that doesn't just turn volume right down, but it stops Oblivion from even attempting to play any sounds (which is why you will occasionally see a minor performance boost when you do this on weak systems). Did basically rebuilding your .ini not fix it? I know its really obvious and I'm not saying you're a n00b, what I'm saying is people often overlook this step because they assume it can't help that, when in fact it fixes hundreds of things, including a helluva lot that it really shouldn't fix. If that doesn't help, Lets shoot for the conflict angle first as yours seems to be quite a rare and specific issue:: Do you use any levelling/book/ or skill/attribute specific mods, in particular ones that change vanilla attributes/skills and what they do? Next I'd look at UI mods as they can change a whole host of things. Good Luck. Jenrai

What operating system are you using and where have you installed Oblivion/OBMM? Windows Vista/7's UAC can do some real fun things to mods and moddable games, particularly when they are installed to the program files (default) directory. Just running things installed in there as an admin won't cut it either, the UAC would actually need to be disabled. Which is very, very bad and highly unadvised. If that's not your problem we'll need more info - How d'ya know the mods aren't working, which mods are they, how do you know the OMODs are working, etc etc etc. Good Luck. Jenrai

Unfortunately, uploading the default files from the game is akin to Piracy, and so (quite rightly) won't happen on the Nexus. Fortunately, if you want the original animations back, you've still got them, they're in your BSA's. All reactivating those takes is removing the new animations/plugin files and updating your archive invalidation. If you want the new ones from the mod and you didn't keep the original mod file you d/led, re-download it and just copy the new file's animations over the ones you've changed. Good Luck. Jenrai

Name of you character: Jenrai Venom Weapon or Weapons of your character: Jenrai's Vicious Hearts Shortswords (Pair - modified from Gizmodian's wicked Vicious Heart weapon mod to a pure Ebony Black with blood red trim (at least that was the idea. Looks a bit funked at the moment. Work in progress) Head Slot: Varies. Usually rather dark, though. Upper Body Slot: As above. Hand Slot: As above. Lower Body Slot: As above. Back Slot (Cape): Cape of Shadows. Modified from the excellent Hem's capes for FCOM. Feet Slot: Usually nothing, as it happens. Occasionally Mithril or Black Leather boots. He's a sneaky critter, inspite of being rather powerful. And regardless of how lightfooted one is, sneaking around in a 60lb pair of plate steel boots is highly unrealistic. That said, I suppose portraying an Ancient Elven Sorcerer Male Vampire in a world overran by Daedra and nutjub Paladins is realistic anyway? Nope... didn't think so. Amulet Slot: Cape. Because I modded an amulet slot one instead of a tail slot one because I'm a nugget. Class: Demon Knight - Created by the Ayelids to guard a "prison realm" of sorts. Long story. Also a mod that I'm working on but not real likely to ever see the light of day (hey, I never claimed I was good at this stuff) Birthsign: You know, I don't think I can remember... ho hum. Thief, probably. My toons usually are. Race: Ancient Elven Sorcerer. Male. Somewhat Vampiric - helps him survive in the, to coin a phrase, "void of the real". The person they worship: The Ayelids as they were his creators. And he kinda hates every living thing in the realm of Tamriel as a result of their disappearance. But he hates the Daedra more - "They're leathery as cow, look like hell and taste like burnt mudcrab! how many times do I have to tell you idiots I don't eat BLOODY DAEDRA! ... go find me a nice wood elf to chew on or something..." Happy Hunting. Jenrai

MOBS is the Medieval Oblivion Balancing System, or something similar, which was used to balance vanilla Oblivion weapons with Frans (someone stop me if I'm wrong here :P ) However, FCOM uses and introduces stacks of new weapons on top of Frans additions, and makes other substantial changes to combat too, hence the creation of OMOBs - the extra O standing for Overhaul. At least that's how I've always interpreted it, and I've never had any issues. In short, when using FCOM, use OMOBs. Seems to work just dandy for me. PS: Why haven't you got Loth's & Bobs? In the words of that bloody annoying cartoon tiger... They're Greeaaatt!, and the plugins from FCOM balance them straightaway with it, removing any worry of conflicts/overpowering. Happy hunting. Jenrai

Where the .nif file is your mesh, in this case, "mycup.nif", the .dds (I'm presuming that .bbs was a typo ;) ) is the texture file of your mesh. Think of the nif as the bones and the dds as the skin. If both have changed, you need to plant that modified .dds from your cup in your textures folder, and make sure that both the internal texture in the .nif and the texture of the cup in your mod point to your new texture. If not, you'll still be using the default Oblivion texture and if your nif isn't looking at that .dds file it'll be a missing texture (solid blue/black/purple skinned item) Usually though, you can still pick those items up if you have made them so they can be taken in the CS (one of the pages for the base item has a little check box for this in it if I remember correctly) Oh, make sure you check the one to add the games physics to the item too or it'll float around the place when you try to put it down. And unless you've made an icon for it, make sure its not the icon .dds file you're changing (they're usually stored in the icons subfolder of the textures folder) Happy modding. :) Jenrai

I'm guessing this is a new problem by the way you word your post, and that until recently you've been running Beth's games just fine and dandy. Its unlikely that multiple (you say games, so I'd hazard a guess that you have more than 1) games settings files can corrupt together, but its not impossible, so start by deleting those .ini files and letting your games build new ones. Simply because its an easy step and doesn't take long, and can solve all sorts of problems that it really shouldn't. If that doesn't help, and you've not recently been on a modding rush, its something you've changed elsewhere in your computer, though my first suspicion would be that you've been modding your games. Unfortunately, as great as these highly moddable games are, its a double edged sword, dramatically increasing the demands on your system and software, and as such, all modded games, regardless of what it says on the back of the box, should be treated as brand new games as they pretty much demand a damn high spec system. If you've heavily modded your beth games lately it might be solvable by simply cutting down the number of mods you're using. It could also be that your simply shooting too high with your graphics system. Lower the settings to test the game's playability (if you did the above and rebuilt your .ini then you will have had it set pretty low for a while anyways unless you changed the settings back up before you started the games) If that is not the case you should start by thinking about ALL the software you've installed between the games running fine and you noticing this slow down. Simply running too many programs in the background and therefore denying your games valuable resources can do this. Minor program conflicts can do this as your computer struggles to free up resources that Beth games are already using. The UAC can cause all kinds of funky issues, particularly when moddable games are installed to the program files directory. And just because you've got the latest drivers doesn't mean they are perfect. If you noticed this problem after a driver update the chances are its a driver problem - either they don't like Beths games or maybe your download/install was corrupt. Did you fully uninstall the old drivers before installing the new? Can you roll back to the older drivers to playtest with them? Start with things that you know will effect your games specifically( mods, graphics, other files in the same directory) and work your way out from there. Good look matey. Jenrai

Jimmy; Not really mate. Whilst it is true that the more problems you have the more likely it is that you have a hardware problem, its not always definately the case. Think missing or corrupted essential software first. Drivers for your graphics or sounds set up, missing DLL files, or maybe even a corrupt file system, so that whilst the files you need are there, your computer can't find them. Honestly, there could be a hundred and one excuses for this kinda behaviour. Troubleshooting: Uninstall your graphics card and run a registry cleaner. CCleaner is a good one, with a couple of other handy utilities thrown in. Then reboot your comp and install only the newest drivers. That should get rid of any traces of corrupted drivers. Rinse and repeat for your sounds set up. If you're still haviing the same issues you might need to repair your windows install. Repairing your install doesn't remove any of your files (but back up just in case, as you always should), stick the Windows Dvd in the drive and follow the on-screen prompts to repair. Reason I'm saying all this is because I know dozens of people who've gone out and spent £100's on new hardware only to find out that they still have the same problems or that they've just bought themselves worse ones. You should always check everything you can before buying new hardware, as sticking new parts in a faulty comp will usually break more than it fixes. OBMJ; Sorry matey, I think you might be out of luck. I just can't see beyond that card. I don't think its got the oomph required to run Oblivion. You could try sticking more RAM in your machine to ensure Oblivion has access to the full 2G it likes using but if I'm really honest, I can't see that solving anything. There's a link to a good testing site that I unfortunately don't have to hand on this computer, but if you browse the tech support threads you'll come across the link posted by either myself or BBen, which will allow you to check if your computer is going to be able to handle running the game. Its not flawless, but hey, its wot we got. Good luck guys. Jenrai

In that case you had missed an install. Check your meshes folder. Does it have another meshes folder inside it? Thats one of the most common errors, so instead of the path being Oblivion/data/meshes/modfiles its Oblivion/data/meshes/meshes/modfiles so the mods can't fiind their meshes. Jenrai

1.2.0416 or whatever is the most recent "official" version of the game, so no worries there. Not hugely inspired with the graphics card though. If I'm reading your Dxdiag right (and I might not be. My eyes are still bleeding from the last one of those I studied. :O ) its either an x1300 or an x1550, 256MB version. The problem isn't so much the age of the card as the 256 bit. Thats real poor for dedicated graphics memory these days. And off the top of my head I would say it only just hits the minimum recommended for Oblivion. Try running it with every graphics option set to lowest. If you don't crash or get a noticable boost in performance, thats your problemo. The next thing I would think of would be perhaps a RAM fault. I know you have 2GB but that kinda crash can be synonymous with the RAM not emptying correctly or Oblivion, for one reason or another, not having access to as much of it as it needs, especially if the crashing is after roughly the same amount of time each time. Try htting the console command "PCB" (stands for purge cell buffers) periodically, and look on tyhe UESP wiki for other commands that'll help clear the memory (there are several but I don't remember the,) andthat should help at least a little. If its exactly the same, its likely something else, and if its none of the above, I'll need to go headbut a wall for a while and see what else leaks outta my head. Lemme know if you have any luck. Jenrai

You never did tell us what card you were using in the first place mate. That info would have likely helped solve this a long time ago. Basically, any modern chipset card will support Oblivion. But that doesn't mean go out and get the cheapest one you can because you will likely still get naff performance, especially on the higher settings. Also, always bare in mind that whilst Oblivion is a rather aged game (well...sort of... 4 years) any game thats modded should be treat as new... The rest of your system specs (RAM, Processor, mainboard) will likely help someone suggest a good compatible video card, personal suggestions would be anything that uses a recent chipset from the "big 2" - AMD or Nvidia. MSI (third party developer) do some great videocards that use very recent chipsets from both for around your price range. Their N9500s (older but very capable of supporting Vista/Oblivion) will set you back about $85 I think. Good Luck. Jenrai

I'm not sure how FM would affect Bliss, or your saves, however you should always bare in mind that just deactivating mods doesn't remove them from your game (unless you installed via BAIN or OMOD) It sounds as though something broke in Bliss around the time you did the Flame quest, hence in that save, the city is corrupt. Try loading an earlier save and racing through the quest (as I recall its not a particularly strenuous one, nor a very long one. You can always roll down to easiest difficult and use a center on target command to get it done faster) and then try entering Bliss and check on Wild Eye, just to see if the two problems are related in some way to the quest. If they are I would guess its a mod clashing with the quest, or with Wild Eye himself, though that wouldn't explain the city crashing. Also check your saves with OBMM or Wrye Bash and make sure the save you're loading doesn't have a dependancy on a mod file you're no longer using. If it does, use your utility of choice to remove or change that dependancy. Good Luck. Jenrai.

Well... much apologies mate, but I can't get near your issue. I've tried with ultramon installed, without it using dual view (god thats horrid. :|) with one card deactivated and both monitors connected through VGA, with both monitors connected through HDMI, with the TV as primary, with the teeny lil normal one (15" if I remember rightly) as primary... infact I'm typing this on the TV and Oblivion start up screen is beside me on the smaller one. Sorry matey. I'm honestly plum outta ideas. :( Jenrai

The High Ordinator Helm, as far as I know, is the one I was on about. It requires the Bonemold Helmet to be installed too, I think. I might be wrong but I know the FCOM armour plug in I mentioned requires both the armour and the helmet, and I'm almost positive that I remember something about that being because the original mod did. Good Luck. Jenrai

I'd shoot for just using the Cheat Guide on the FCOM Homepage first time around. Thats not to say the guide you're using isn't good, and nor is it a dig at the author - I've never seen it. But I know the Cheat Sheet works, and don't have time to read through all the other one atm I'm afraid. Good luck. Jenrai

You're welcome mate. For the RAM, I would say it wouldn't change much, and if it did it would change it for the worse. You'll likely get better performance running 3g at 667 than you will running 2g at 800. If everything else was running smoothly, you probably wouldn't even notice the difference with 3g running at 800. Thats not to say there isn't a difference, its just it'd be a very minor one. If Oblivion has an FPS cap... I honestly don't know. lol. I probably should. I know streamline and the like can enforce one, but really, your computer is powerful enough to run Oblivion on medium to high settings with a good number of mods anyways. Plus, like mentioned already, its across multiple games, so neither Streamline, Oblivion Stutter Remover (which I would have suggested if it was just Oblivion) nor any of the other performance enhancing mods are really not going to help, they'd only maybe hide the issue for a while. I hope you get it sorted mate, good luck. Jenrai

If you have OBMM installed, just double click the OMOD icon. That should launch OBMM to install the mod. Alternately, choose load on the OBMM UI, and navigate to the mod's location in the pop up, and select it. This will copy that mod to your OMOD's folder, so the original can safely be stashed away with the rest of your zips, if you save them. Which you should. Always. ;) Jenrai

Oh boy... You've got a lot of installation errors there mate. Read your Boss log. "FCOM INSTALLATION ERROR!"s all over the shop. Doesn't matter if these esps are active or not, if they are in your data folder they can (and usually will) affect your game. Now for the specific issues you mentioned. Missing Meshes; I'm willing to be this is a Fran's BSA error (the seperate 350mb download). Either you've not got it or you have and its not registered properly. Go to your data folder and find the BSA. Its franewitems.BSA unless I'm very much mistaken... but I might be. So find it anyway. Make a note of the name EXACTLY as it appears. Now open your Oblivion .ini (the one in my documents>>my games>>Oblivion) and search for the word "Archive"... that should take you to the BSA section. Frans, unlike most mods, doesn't load its BSA by using a plug in of the same name, but through BSA registration. Look for the name of the file you just wrote down on there. If it is there, I'm willing to be that theres a comma and a full stop after the last default BSA - off the top of my head, Oblivion-Music.BSA, but I might be wrong - delete the full stop. Shouldn't be there. Completely redundant. If the file name isn't there, add it. But make sure theres no full stops in that section of your .ini, except the ones between the filenames and BSA. They should all be commas. Crashing on Sewer Exit; Could be caused by the above, or by having those conflicting esps in your data folder. Get rid, then try again. If it doesn't work, try exiting without editing your toon at the gate (I know this has caused CTDs for more than just me.) If it STILL doesn't work, it could be a Wrye Bash cell merge issue. Rebuild your Bashed Patch, WITHOUT checking the option to merge cells. Seen this one before too. Its actually doing it because of a mod conflict between two of the mods merged into that section, I think, but I've never figured out anything beyond that. Oh yeah - Good call on installing Harvest Containers... but loose the .esp. You only needed the meshes and textures. Errrrm... I'll add more as I think of em. You add any problems that pop up too, and eventually we'll get it sorted. FCOM's a pain in the ass to install (especially when you don't read the home page. *wicked grin*) but its well worth it. Good Luck. Jenrai *Edit* Loose Morrowind ingredients and Tamrielic Ingredients too. Not only have just installed the same mod twice (Morrowind is the old version of TI) but neither are compatable with COBL. *Edit to the edit* Loose one of your versions of War Cry - You've got both English and German versions installed. Also, loose the "Cheat bobs armoury" plug in. FCOM-Bobs armoury needs the normal plug in and you can only use either the normal one or the cheat one at any one time.

Ah, yeah. Thats more like what I expected pre-boss. I think what might have been causing it was Streamline being too far up your load order then, at least for you. Just like most other mods, anything that loads after it and alters similar stuff will attempt to overwrite the changes. Most of the time that just screws mods up, rips the land apart, stuff like that, but with Streamline, because it changes so much and is changing it all the time, it can be a little more serious. Glad you got it sorted anyways mate. =] Jenrai

Ya know, until I read that I thought Ultramon was for supporting 2 monitors on seperate Graphics cards, pre Nvidia SLI/ATI Xfiretechnology. Shows how much attention I pay to stuff beyond my own little world, doesn't it? :D I'll have a look tonight if I've time before I go out mate, though I'm running a pair of MSI 9600GT's. I have no idea why because I've not noticed a massive performance boost. heh heh. Disabling one is a peice of cake, but the control panel tells me its working when I connect the other so I guess it must be. I don't know if connecting the second monitor through VGA when the TV is connected through DVI will make a difference either. Ah well. Should be fun finding out anyways... I'll be in touch. Jenrai

Thank you for the link. Thats a useful one to add to my growing collection that I'd managed to miss somehow. ^^ As it states, most modern First Person Shooters tend to be locked at 30fps. This is not only to keep performance as near to standardized as it can be across varying systems, but also because aiming much higher than that detracts from what else the game can do at the time, therefore negatively impacting gameplay in other ways. Going much beyond that is, as again stated in your article, quite possible, but usually only for bragging rights. I'm thinking what you are actually noticing is not specifically low FPS, which would give the appearance of your game running in slow motion (unless it was below about 10 FPS, which would give a fast slide-show style look) but frequent "see-sawing" between different FPS rates, resulting in a rather choppy look. By the way - all your RAM is probably running at 667Mhz. That second gig at 667 will likely bottleneck your RAM's access speed. A computer is only as fast as its slowest component. Even so, thats not gonna be crippling you. Ensure you are using Catalyst to set the major settings (AA, AS, HDR) and everything else for each of your games where possible. Now the bad news - If this is across multiple games, and you followed tweakguides recommendations for your system, your card and your individual games, you have a computer problem. Assuming you did follow tweak guides recommendations to the letter, there's not much else I can suggest, as those guides are exceptionally detailed and cover pretty much every base there is. I frequently use tweakguides myself to check individual system recommendations if theres something in there that I'm not used to handling, or if something just seems like its not quite working as well as I would expect. General troubleshooting wise, the first thing I would suggest is removing (disabling works too) your graphics card, making your computer revert to the onboard, and then removing every trace of your current driver build and control system for it. Then reinstalling it from scratch. If you've ever had a slightly dodgy driver download, or some malware has had a nibble at something, any problems that arose from that will likely still be present. PS - Nice cards, aren't they? ;) Hope you get to the bottom of it matey. Good luck. Jenrai **Edit** before I forget - if you do remove your control system & graphics drivers, make sure you clean the registry and reboot your computer before reinstalling them.

Nosisab is right about install order being significant matey. Doubly so with patches and updates. If a patch to something is installed before whatever the patch is actually for, installing the original over it will then effectively delete the patch. Anyways. Reason I'm posting. You mentioned one of your mods being deactivated so it can't be affecting your game. This is only correct if the deactivated mod was installed via Bash or OBMM and the Bain Package or OMOD itself has been deactivated. Anything inside your data folder has the potential to still affect your game, wether the esp is active or not. Additionally, with any mods that alter a cell directly, the changes can remain even after the mod is gone, courtesy of your saves. Whenever you remove a mod, always make a clean save (head somewhere you know the mod didn't affect - preferably an interior location but NOT in a city) and resave your game. The testinghall is probably the best place to head for making clean saves. I know you've solved this issue, but this little lot might help you later. Jenrai