A heads up from more experienced modders on HQ mods' impact on performance

[wordflow]

This got a little long. Bear with me or read tldr :)

 

First thing to note is that I have a Nvidia GTX 1080 (8gb) and a 3k res screen (Its a laptop though, 17" and not perfectly ventilated).

 

Anyway, I'm following the step guide. I've made it to 2.G Landscapes and Environments, and glancing down this list, and beyond to the other sections, I see that the guide stays away from the highest quality versions of the mods listed, choosing 1k over 2k and 2k over 4k. I understand why of course, but I have a few questions.

 

Can I choose the highest quality versions (up to 3k ofc) of all the mods in this guide without any issues?  Can I assume that the guide chooses the resolutions it does purely to avoid being resource intensive? Or is it an issue of the trade off in performance just not being worth it for the HQ versions?

 

What kind of performance drop can I expect forgoing a faithful step installation to an all HQ one? Can a 1080 handle it? What about with another 50 - 100 mods on top of the step process? ENBs and city overhauls and grass/tree mods and all them sweet sweet pretty people mods.

 

Maybe you can tell, but I've never had a good computer, and this will be my first game on it. Even worse, I've not even stepped into the game for any meaningful amount of time yet. I have no idea of what I can expect from my laptop "rig" yet, and while I'll have figured it out at the end of my modding journey one way or the other, a heads up from more experienced modders and computer nerds would help me out greatly.

 

TL;DR: Can I choose the highest quality versions (up to 3k) of all the mods in this guide without any issues? What kind of performance drop can I expect going forgoing a faithful step installation to an all HQ one? Can a 1080 handle it? What about with another 50 - 100 mods on top?

 

Thank you for your time.

Edited July 17, 2017 by wordflow

[Mator]

The main thing you'll run into when using large textures with a top of the line graphics card is VRAM limitations.  If you're on Windows 8 or 10, there's a 4GB VRAM limitation due to DirectX9, assuming you're playing Skyrim Classic.  Else the limit will be the VRAM on your card, which is probably 6GB I'd guess?  If so, you're unlikely to reach it unless you're trying to.

[wordflow]

Right after posting this it occurred to me that this type of question would do well on the r/skyrimmods subreddit and maybe I should of posted this there instead. Is it ok if I multi-post? I don't know the proper etiquette for this.

[TechAngel85]

You should be fine going HQ with a 1080.

[wordflow]

Well ship. Its 8GB, but I am on Win10, unfortunately. So where does that leave me? Should I stick to all of STEPS recommendations after all? Only some? Half res textures, but full res everything else? Vice versa?

Edited July 18, 2017 by wordflow

[wordflow]

Read up on the 4gb vram issue. I think I know what to expect now. Thanks for filling me in.

[LordOfLA]

Incidentally, the fall (Oct/Nov) update will remove the VRAM limit, but so far seems like MO might have issues. Fix one bug, add another :p

[Mator]

Well ship. Its 8GB, but I am on Win10, unfortunately. So where does that leave me? Should I stick to all of STEPS recommendations after all? Only some? Half res textures, but full res everything else? Vice versa?

4GB is still a lot.  You can probably go 1K/2K on most things and 4K+ on large landscape/building textures.  You can use Skyrim Performance Monitor to track your VRAM usage in different areas to see where you're at and how different mods affect it.  A good place to test peak VRAM usage would be Whiterun or Riften.

[wordflow]

Incidentally, the fall (Oct/Nov) update will remove the VRAM limit, but so far seems like MO might have issues. Fix one bug, add another :p

It's a special thing to read all this content out there about how the vram bug is uncircumventable, make peace with it, and then learn that its getting fixed on its own the next day within two or three months. :D Even if it does break MO, at least the problem is on our side again and the community can be proactive about it.

 

My only concern then is if MO is still being maintained by anyone; if there will be anyone around left to fix it - since as I understand it, its creator has moved on to working on Vortex with nexus.

[fbrafa]

Incidentally, the fall (Oct/Nov) update will remove the VRAM limit, but so far seems like MO might have issues. Fix one bug, add another :p

I must've missed it. Where did you find out it's gonna be patched? And why will it break MO? Insiders preview?

 

Enviado de meu SM-G850M usando Tapatalk

[phazer11]

Haven't heard anything about it breaking MO, but the "fix" for DirectX will be released in a Windows 10 update soonish (idk about Windows 8)