GridstoLoad and CPU/RAM measurements.

[Liudeius]

Firstly, I believe the CTD's I'm having are related to memory or CPU issues, but looking at task manager never shows a single core going over 70% capacity, my RAM usage doesn't pass 3GB, and my GPU only uses about 1-2GB of its 3GB.

And it will crash (either CTD or not responding) while at full FPS (probably 30-60 depending on my mods and settings).

 

This issue seems to have to do with the GridstoLoad ini setting being 9 or higher (7 works fine). I realize 7 is plenty (especially considering I'm playing on a laptop), but I'm more curious why my game is crashing without even maxing out my hardware.

It doesn't crash when I'm using un-modded Skyrim and no HD textures. (But I've tested it partially modded or with/without HD textures and the common element to crashes seems to be the GridstoLoad setting)

 

On a side note, I hear WARZONES is memory intensive, is this RAM or VRAM?

 

My specs are:

Intel i7-3610QM Processor (Quad core, 2.3GHz)

Nvidia GeForce GTX 670M (3 GB VRAM)

16 GB RAM (I know Skyrim can only use 4)

[Brandy1123]

By your post it appears that you have some knowledge of hardware. But again, it seems you may not really understand how mod interact. Most often, a CTD is the cause of a bad mod or conflicting mods. In your case, the 3GB 670, unless you are overclocking it to dangerous levels or have a severe heat build up, should not be a problem for skyrim..at all. Your system, again, unless underpowered or damaging limits of overclocking, again should not be a problem for Skyrim.

 

More then likely you are having a problem with your mod load order. You need to hand set your mods in some semblance of order by type. Pay attention to mod author requirements as they change regularly. Also, be aware that some mods now require that you have the DLC's from STEAMypile... i mean Bethesda as some of the newer mods require the content from them. MAke sure you have mod requirements for all mods. Most one on one troubleshooting i have done comes down to not paying attention to what is required by the author and sometimes load specific orders.

 

Here's a Fantastic tutor on self help for fixing some problems. BBen, a moderator here, has another

 

http://forums.nexusmods.com/index.php?/topic/753253-only-you-can-prevent-forest-fires/ <--- pinned by Board Admin compiled by missjennabee and crew

 

http://s1.zetaboards.com/bbenlibrary/topic/4751769/1/#new <---- bben a crusty OLD admin here at Nexus :P ;)

[Liudeius]

 

 

By your post it appears that you have some knowledge of hardware. But again, it seems you may not really understand how mod interact. Most often, a CTD is the cause of a bad mod or conflicting mods. In your case, the 3GB 670, unless you are overclocking it to dangerous levels or have a severe heat build up, should not be a problem for skyrim..at all. Your system, again, unless underpowered or damaging limits of overclocking, again should not be a problem for Skyrim.

 

More then likely you are having a problem with your mod load order. You need to hand set your mods in some semblance of order by type. Pay attention to mod author requirements as they change regularly. Also, be aware that some mods now require that you have the DLC's from STEAMypile... i mean Bethesda as some of the newer mods require the content from them. MAke sure you have mod requirements for all mods. Most one on one troubleshooting i have done comes down to not paying attention to what is required by the author and sometimes load specific orders.

 

Here's a Fantastic tutor on self help for fixing some problems. BBen, a moderator here, has another

 

http://forums.nexusm...t-forest-fires/ <--- pinned by Board Admin compiled by missjennabee and crew

 

http://s1.zetaboards.../4751769/1/#new <---- bben a crusty OLD admin here at Nexus

 

 

 

To my knowledge, load order only matters for conflicts. I've used BOSS for an automatic load order, made a bash patch, and made my own self-built merged patch to fix any other problems that I saw (Though I avoided mods that I expected to conflict with each other, so I didn't have many in the first place. Just a leveled list or two.), so I don't think I would have any CTD causing conflicts.

When testing, I've had this CTD with as few as one or two mods*, HD textures, and an FXAA injector running, but it instantly stops once I switch GridstoLoad down from 9 to 7, with no changes to my mods.

I guess I'll test it again with only HD textures and no FXAA.

This CTD always happens when I am approaching Whiterun from the tutorial cave (I've tried going other directions and still had a CTD). After changing GridstoLoad to 7, I've play a few hours and the only CTD (with the same mods) I've had was near solitude as a WARZONES battle broke out (after reloading, the CTD did not repeat, and the battle went smoothly).

It's absolutely unnecessary to waste time on this I suppose, but I want to.

 

* Deadly Spell Impacts and Burn Freeze Shock Effects if I remember correctly, I was trying to narrow it down and thought I had narrowed the issue to those two, but it still happened for both when I had only one activated at a time if I remember rightly (and nothing else other than FXAA and the HD pack). I'm not knowledgeable enough about how the FXAA injector works to know if that could be the issue.

 

And I've not risked overclocking anything, at the crash my GPU was in the high 60's or low 70's.

 

Edit: I did log papyrus script and found a HUGE number of errors from Unofficial Skyrim Patch's DeadBodyCleanup and I think the Dance of Death mod, but removing Dance of Death the Unofficial Patch did nothing to remove the CTD's.

Edited January 8, 2013 by Liudeius

[Brandy1123]

Boss and Bashed patches are good and a great deal of care has gone into those applications. However, They are not fool proof. A Bashed patch for example, can only take into consideration a mod that has been examined or falls into a specific profile. Most mods will. Some will not. It will move your load order around unless you set up specific guidelines for it not to. Most people also have no idea what a ptach from them is even doing, what the dfialog boxes really are saying or have personally taken time to read the user guidlines (instructions) for those programs.

 

When you change the ugrids, you can be introducing a game save error if you bring it back down to a lower value. Ugrids and its associated partners : uInterior Cell Buffer, uExterior Cell Buffer and PreloadSizeLimit need tobe set with care.

 

If your game works sometimes and crashes seemingly at the same spot at other times, then I would start looking for a mod conflict. An NPC problem, an Item issue, even an overlapping struggle between mods fighting for the same physical space. Start papyrus logging and check your log file after a crash. see what in conflicting at the time. This may not show you the problem, but will point you generally in the right direction.

 

 

edit : lol...it seems you and i were writing about papyrus at the same time. :tongue:

[Liudeius]

 

 

Boss and Bashed patches are good and a great deal of care has gone into those applications. However, They are not fool proof. A Bashed patch for example, can only take into consideration a mod that has been examined or falls into a specific profile. Most mods will. Some will not. It will move your load order around unless you set up specific guidelines for it not to. Most people also have no idea what a ptach from them is even doing, what the dfialog boxes really are saying or have personally taken time to read the user guidlines (instructions) for those programs.

 

When you change the ugrids, you can be introducing a game save error if you bring it back down to a lower value. Ugrids and its associated partners : uInterior Cell Buffer, uExterior Cell Buffer and PreloadSizeLimit need tobe set with care.

 

If your game works sometimes and crashes seemingly at the same spot at other times, then I would start looking for a mod conflict. An NPC problem, an Item issue, even an overlapping struggle between mods fighting for the same physical space. Start papyrus logging and check your log file after a crash. see what in conflicting at the time. This may not show you the problem, but will point you generally in the right direction.

 

 

edit : lol...it seems you and i were writing about papyrus at the same time. :tongue:

 

 

 

As I said, I also used TES5Edit's conflict filter and made my own hand-made patch to override anything that the Bash Patch didn't fix.

But as I said, even with only one or two mods running and uGrids set to 9 I crash almost without fail near Whiterun (I presumed the few failures to crash were because it wasn't G/CPU intensive enough), but I've never had this specific error (barring the single Solitude occurrence) when running all my mods with a uGrids of 7 or below.

The majority of the conflicts were caused by Immersive Armors, Cloaks of Skyim, and Jaysus Swords editing leveled lists. Additionally Realistic Lighting conflicted with its own patched .esp (expected), and Ultimate Follower Overhaul changed the maximum level of most followers to 0, but another mod changed reverted this change so I changed it back to 0. Additionally WARZONES removed the compressed flag on some Worldspace entries, since many other mods left the compressed flag, I let them override it. I suppose the exception to my patching is the Cell category. I presume you need Skyrim's GECK equivalent to do that reliably, but I've never been able to get it to function.

 

As for uGrids, I found that problem when I was looking it up. It actually immediately crashes on loading the save if you mess up this value, so that's not the problem (and I never tested by switching it down anyway, I would just reload a file with a lower uGrid setting, or start a new game. Hence only testing around the tutorial cave).

 

Thus far I've found no problems with HD textures and FXAA alone. If it is mods, which I don't see why it is considering it happens exclusively at 9 uGrids and not 7, it must be that FXAA and a graphics mod don't play well with high uGrids settings. Ah well, I have no idea how to fix it, I just wanted to find out why it didn't work.

 

7 uGrids is still visually awesome, so I guess I'll just stick to that.

[Brandy1123]

It is a strange problem. I have one follower mod that, by itself causes no problems, but when I add a lighting ENB, the mod causes horrible striping glitches in my HD object lighting. I also had the Kajiit merchants (in Whiterun) have a bad levelled item in thier inventory. The moment the Merchant said "Take a Look"... I was looking at my desktop. I had to removed all my item mods 1 at a time to find the problem. The culprit mod ended up needing Dawngaurd and it wasn't listed as such by the mod author. (I don't use Dawngaurd).

 

There's a lot of "construction" around Whiterun. I found the Whiterun Market has at least four house mods and a caravan mod that fight for valuable space and mesh. Insta-desktop. If you are using the market, look closely at other things going on, to include fast travel and carriage mods.

 

 

AS a side note, there is a way to still lower ugrids and use an already saved game, but you have to go through a somewhat tedious "cleaning" process for the save. Like you, I just start a new game when I alter the uGrids.

[FiftyTifty]

I'll just add that some SKSE plugins will cause CTDs when they have been uninstalled/updated incorrectly. Had an issue with SkyUI after updating to the latest patch, due to there being an old .dll left over by the earlier version.

 

Might be an idea to look through your Data\SKSE folder.