Is Skyrim utilizing the 4GBs?

[billyro]

Hi all. I've got myself a brand new laptop which runs Skyrim excellently on High graphics, though I guess I expected somewhat more.

 

I looked into why Skyrim didn't run like butter and it seems to me that my computer thinks Skyrim is a 32-bit program and isn't making use of 4GB.

My laptop is an Alienware M14x upgraded from 6GB to 8GB RAM, and due to the other good-as specs I figured Skyrim would be fine. However when I open the Task Manager while Skyrim is running, in the Processes tab Skyrim.exe has a *32 besides it, and plus my Physical Memory only goes up by about 25% (which would be 2GB).

 

I have all updates for my computer installed, drivers up to date, Skyrim at the latest version, and yeah.

 

The game does run at 50fps+ most of the time on High with anti-aliasing on x2, but I think it could do better.

 

 

 

Can someone please correct me if I'm wrong or whatever, and thank you in advance! :)

[acidzebra]

it seems to me that my computer thinks Skyrim is a 32-bit program

 

Because it is.

 

Also, the latest patches are large address aware meaning it can potentially access up to 4 GB minus overhead, that doesn't mean it will do so unless it has a reason to.The game code with mods will probably not take up 4 GB unless you load insane amounts of mods/ugrids (and really, you'd be experiencing endless CTDs before hitting the 4 GB limit) and the textures and meshes go into your video card's ram.

Edited December 6, 2012 by acidzebra

[billyro]

Damn, so that means I can't make Skyrim run better? Bummer.

[acidzebra]

There is lots you can do to make skyrim run better - ini file tweaks, not running heavy ENBs, sane texture sizes, not running resource-intensive mods, maybe even things like that hialgo boost mod (although for me that makes the game stutterville).

 

I had a quick look at your laptop's specs, if you bought the 1GB videocard version you're always going to be hobbled by that, the 2GB card is obviously better but still would maybe not be able to run super-duper HD textures (depends on just how high-res they are I guess). I'm not sure how the "mobile" variant (since it is a laptop) would impact performance, since I don't know what they did to get it into such a small space. Usually mobile graphic cards are tweaked for lower heat output, meaning they run slower than their desktop counterparts. But perhaps you could overclock it - again, I have no personal experience with that.

Edited December 6, 2012 by acidzebra

[billyro]

Yep, I'm using the 2GB videocard, and I haven't downloaded any texture packs - simply stuck with Bethesda's DLC. Plus I have no ENBs and probably the most intensive mod is Warzones, which makes my framerate go down by about 1.

 

I was just concerned I wasn't getting the most out of Skyrim as I possibly could. I think I'm acting a bit foolish, considering the graphics look great, but just checking. :)

[acidzebra]

Nothing worse than suspecting your shiny new toy may not be living up to its advertised potential ;)

 

I've had a lot of success tweaking the ini files to make the game look more gorgeous than it already does - and using the skyrim configurator is the tool of choice for me to do that.

http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/814

 

And while my aging video cards doesn't allow me to run high-end ENBs (and most of the published ones give me nosebleeds with the amount of bloom and oversaturation anyway), I had good results from using imaginator.

Edited December 6, 2012 by acidzebra

[bben46]

Here is a link to my troubleshooting blog.

http://s1.zetaboards.com/bbenlibrary/topic/4751769/1/#new

This is updated often so come back later for more.

 

If you use any of this and have some success - or even if nothing works - please post back here what you did that worked or didn't work. That kind of information can be invaluable to other members having the same or similar problems - And to me in fixing any problems in the blog.

[FiftyTifty]

Troubleshooting? What!? There is no problem. He just wants it to run better.

 

Non-Skyrim-specific tweaks:

 

Download FancyCache, install, set aside 2-3GB for Skyrim

Download Razr Game Booster. Use it when launching Skyrim.

Download CCleaner. Let it run.

Get Auslogics' disk defrag. Choose 'Defrag and optimize'

 

Skyrim-Specific tweaks:

 

Download this, this, this, and this.

[bben46]

Troubleshooting includes getting it to run better. :rolleyes:

No matter how many tweaks you apply to the game, if your computer is running poorly, your game will also run poorly.

 

Fix the computer & operating system FIRST. then optimize the video system for games. Then after you have done this, if you still need it, look into some of the improvement programs - most are just trading eye candy for fps - not a bad thing if you gain enough speed.

 

As for FPS, it is very much overated. The xbox version is capped at 30FPS - and xbox fanbois brag about how good it looks. Many problems blamed on FPS are really caused by the PC allowing the FPS to jump all over causing small hesitations when the fps makes a big change. - I have my game capped at 40FPS and it runs very smooth on high video settings. If I cap at 30 I can run at ultra much of the time. When I tried a cap of 25 I could run Ultra all the time. Movies & NTSC TV run at 24fps, So why do you think you absolutely must have 60fps for a game? Be willing to cap your FPS to a bit lower value to get more eye candy. It's a cheap trade and you will probably not even notice. If you see 60fps most of the time, you may try capping at 60, or 58 - experiment to see what works for you.

 

The list given - Game booster, ccleaner and auslogics defrag are programs I also use. Fancy Cache allows you to dedicate a portion of your RAM for use as cache. - if you have more than 5G of Ram, it may help. On a 64 bit system, the game can use up to 4G, but some ram is still needed for Windows and some other stuff (about .5G to .7G) Be sure to allow for that ram above 4g needed for anything else needed on the computer. :thumbsup: