ENB Anxiety

[grandpauj1]

Hi all, Recently built my first from the ground up system. Have always wanted to run ENB but afraid that A) My computer did not have the ability to run it and have the game play smooth and B) That I would just screw stuff up and not have it run at all.

I know there a ton's of videos/tutorials out there, but is there one that some one who doesn't know what all the "just drag the ... to the .... and add123 to the .ini, then move the .... from the......" you know, like to install ENB for dummies type of thing? Not to say I'm an idiot, just not afraid to admit when I don't know. ;-)

The spec's for my computer are

Mother board: Asus Z170-A

CPU: I5 6500 3.2 ghz

CPU Cooler: Hyper 212 EVO

GPU: 2X Evga GTX 960 sc 4b SLI

Storage

C: 240 gb SSD (OS and it's required parts and pieces)

E: 1 TB HDD (Misc. programs and general storage)

G: 500 gb SSD M.2 ( Games, NMM,CPUZ and stuff like that)

RAM: Corsair Vengeance DDR4 32gb 8X4 (overkill I know)

Power supply: Thermaltake Smart 650w

So here is the question, I am pretty sure I should have the system to run it at least medium maybe high......right?

and second if I go to my G: drive, and copy the entire Skyrim folder (Backup, Data Directx10 etc.) to another folder like on my E: drive, if I screw it up can I just some how replace the screwed up one with the copied one and be back where I started. I know that sounds kinda lame brain, but if I never ask the question, I will never know the answer :happy:

Any advice will be appreciated and as always thanks in advance.

[icecubetray]

Skyrim is a relatively old game. Ultra settings at vanilla should be no problem for your setup. But, since you want to use ENB, your mileage may vary depending on which preset you use and whatever other mods you use. I have a single GTX 680 2gb which is somewhat close to a single GTX 960 in performance and generally I'm fine running most ENB presets. Two 960 4gb in sli should perform pretty well. Also, if you want to avoid screwing up your Skyrim install, you could use Mod Organizer which keeps mods in a virtual directory so you don't clutter or put anything into the Data folder directly. As far as I can tell, it doesn't really have an impact on performance but makes uninstalling and managing conflicts a lot easier. The downside though is that it is a little bit more complicated to use than NMM especially when using other utilities such as the Creation Kit or TESVedit. Another tool I use is ENB FXAA SweetFX Manager and Remover which as the name suggests allows you to manage and remove different ENB presets.

 

Regarding copying your Skyrim directory, I don't see why not. What I would do though is also make a copy of the Data directory and keep that somewhere safe. Then, you could delete your old Data folder and replace it with the copy to regain a vanilla install. If you use Mod Organizer exclusively, then you don't need to do that. If you want to get rid of ENB mods, then yeah, you might need to copy the whole Skyrim directory which is why I use an ENB manager. But yes, you can copy your vanilla Skyrim, delete the broken install and paste the copy. Your save games are located in your Documents library so you shouldn't have an issue unless you had something other than graphic or visual mods.

As for guides to installing an ENB, well I struggled trying to find one initially when I started modding Skyrim. I mostly figured it out through lots of trial and error. Usually the page for the ENB preset you are downloading has instructions but I suspect you want more detailed notes.

 

What I usually do is go download an ENB preset and then download one of the ENB binaries from enbdev.com. Here is the download page for Skyrim ENBs since navigating the site can be a bit confusing at times. At the bottom of that page, there is a list of different ENB versions. Choose one based on the ENB preset you decide on and at the bottom of that page, there is the download button (below all the changelogs and notes).

 

If you don't have software to open archives, 7zip is a good, free and open source utility though there are plenty of other options out there as well. You will want to unzip both archives.

 

From the enbseries package, open the wrapper version. You will want to copy d3d9.dll and enbhost.exe to your Skyrim directory (where Skyrim is installed, the one with TESV.exe and SkyrimLauncher.exe, you can find it at "(Drive_Letter):\........\steamapps\common\skyrim" ).

 

Then, depending on what preset you use, you can copy over the files from the preset to the Skyrim directory. If it has a Data directory, you could have Mod Organizer to install it separately.

Sometimes, ENB presets have different presets within them for better quality or performance. If it does, usually it is in the form of an enblocal.ini file. You can use Windows Notepad or Notepad++ to view and edit .ini files.

 

Typically, you will have to either overwrite the one you just placed into the Skyrim directory or copy and replace the .ini setting into the existing enblocal.ini file, depending on how the author set it up.

 

Don't forget to set the memory size in "VideoMemorySizeMb=x" and "ReservedMemorySizeMb=x" Set "x" to your preferred setting.

There are different guidelines out there for those two settings but some of the more common ones are to set "VideoMemorySizeMb" to the amount of VRAM plus system RAM combined and minus 2048. In your case, it would be 4096 + 32768 - 2048 = 30720 .

 

For "ReservedMemorySizeMb", you could go in increments of 128 until you find the game no longer stutters. I have mine set at 512.

If you have done everything correctly, you should see a message in yellow at the top left corner of the screen when loading Skyrim. By holding shift and pressing enter, you can change some of the ENB settings, though some settings aren't able to be modified ingame.

 

One last thing...(yes, bear with me), you need to go and edit SkyrimPrefs.ini (which is in C:/...path_to_mydocuments.../Documents/My Games/Skyrim ) The edit you need to do is to change under the section: [Display]

Make sure that bFloatPointRenderTarget=1 and if bFloatPointRenderTarget doesn't exist, add it under the [Display] section. A lot of ENB presets also require turning off the Skyrim anti aliasing and anisotropic filtering to let ENB handle it. You can change those in the Skyrim Launcher.

 

Also, if you didn't know, you can press ctrl f in notepad to find those .ini settings.

I hope this helps.

 

If it doesn't, well maybe this video might: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7B_YBRkdsjw

This website is also pretty good: http://wiki.step-project.com/Guide:ENB

[ironbender800]

You arent gonna screw your game up with ENB. If ENB doesnt work out you can just delete the files.

 

Performance wise your system should be just fine.

 

And definitely use MO for installing mods. (ENB and SKSE files tho are still installed to the skyrim directory)

[hgodlhunter1]

Hey this helped a bunch

[grandpauj1]

Thanks for the reply's, first at ironbender800, it just seems like every time I do that, it's like I missed one or something because things just never seem to be right after. I did down load the MO this morning (taking both of your advice) but will this create a problem if I already have my other mods on NMM? Have played a bit this morning and it all seems to be working fine.

@ icecubetray WOW thanks for the lengthy and detailed response. I have 64 mods installed, 20 armors, couple of player houses, 2 followers....stuff like that. don't usually install the High res one's cause still kinda leery of bogging down the game :confused:. I might start using them after I get this whole ENB thing figured out because I love to take screenshots and would really like to have them come out as nice as some of the ones I see on the Nexus.

now for the next question. Before I posted this I already decided (kind of) I was going to give this a try. I downloaded Realvision, Enhanced lights and FX, Lightning during thunder storms, Climates of tamriel and like 5 more mods with NMM. None of which have be activated yet and none of them show up on MO (I'm assuming be cause they have not been activated) so should I NOT activate them with NMM??? I have satellite internet which means SLOW ASS download speed and limited bandwidth. so would be a real pain to re-download them, but I will if I have to. Is there away to move them from NMM to MO? Will research this in hopes of not having to re download it all again.

Going to try working on this soon as I can. Right now I am on the backside of a partial Achilles tendon rupture and back and forth to help my ailing 84 year old Dad, so if you reply and I don't answer right back, don't think I do not appreciate it because I do :dance:

As always, thanks a bunch!!You guy's rock

[ironbender800]

If you are already using NMM just stick with it. In order to switch over to MO its best to start from scratch. Meaning completely deleting everything and reinstalling.

 

If you ever do decide to do that tho....MO is where its at.

 

Watch GamerPoets on YouTube for great tutorial videos on everything modding skyrim.

[grandpauj1]

Well made the time to get this thing done. I installed the following mods as per the author's instructions and help from you guys, here is what I have

Mod Organizer

RealVision ENB

Climates Of Tamriel

Supreme Storms

Climates Of Tamriel_Weather Patch

True Storms-Thunder and Rain Redone

Minty Lightning Mod

COT 31 Patch

Enhanced Lights and FX

in that order. Interior is not so bad, but the exterior is just a bit on the dark side. I went thru and turned some of them off one by one to see if it made a difference and it seems to be Enhanced light and FX. Went to the page I downloaded it from, it has like 10,000 post. So going to try a Google search to see if there is a way to adjust it. When it is day time it looks great, but at night impossible to see. Here are two Screenshots I took same location same time. Again Thanks a bunch

 

[ironbender800]

I dont use COT anymore (vivid weathers is better) but in the installer it has options for night and interior brightness.

 

Vivid weathers has an in game MCM that allows you to adjust it in game as well as saturation.

[grandpauj1]

Might give that a try. I tried to lower the fGamma to .8000 (was at 1.2400 as per S.T.E.P instructions) like a video said to do as it should help with the darkness but it didn't. Going with Realistic lighting overhaul first because already have it downloaded. IMO so far it doesn't look quite as nice as COT but at least I'm not running into rocks and falling off cliffs in the pitch black. :o)

Thanks again

[icecubetray]

Sorry for the late reply but one way you could change the ambient lighting is to edit enbseries.ini in your Skyrim directory. If you change the value of "AmbientLightingIntensityNight" under the "Environment section" to a higher number, it should make nights brighter. You also edit it ingame by holding shift then enter to bring up the ENB configuration menu.

 

Also, the reason your mods installed by Nexus Mod Manager isn't being shown in Mod Organizer is because Mod Organizer uses a different system to manage mods. If you want to use Mod Organizer, you will have to install your mods again in Mod Organizer. You don't necessarily have to download the files again though. Nexus Mod Manager copies the archives to \Path_to_NMM\Nexus Mod Manager\Mods\Skyrim\moddata\ so you can just install them again from there. Of course, Mod Organizer is merely an option, you don't need to switch over from Nexus Mod Manager if you are fine with it.