Seemingly Random: Exterior CTDs, Freezes, and ILS

[Totally_Not_Sir_Hobo]

Hi all. I'm sure everyone here is sick and tired of hearing about the issues I listed in my topic but if you've got the time I'd appreciate any help/advice.

 

I've spent the better part of the last month trying to resolve these issues to absolutely no avail. Within the last few weeks I've re-installed skyrim twice (to 2 different locations), switched Mod Organizers (from NMM to MO), purchased Dragonborn (so I could update some of my more important mods), and BOSS'd, SUM'd, Tes5Edited, Bashed, and Optimized 'till all my thoughts consist of .esps and .dds files. What began as a project for the "perfect" build of Skyrim has devolved into me just not wanting to let this stupid game win.

 

To start with here's my rig:

 

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ASUS Crosshair V Formula MotherBoard.

AMD FX-8150 (OC'd to 4.8 Ghz)

MSI AMD Radeon HD 7950 3 gig x 2 (Crossfire with latest 13.10 drivers and frame pacing, both OC'd to 925 clock 1250 ram)

8 Gigs of G-Skill Sniper 1866 DDR3 Ram

Currently playing off my SATA drive but my OS (Windows 7 Ultimate x64) is installed on my Mushkin 128G SSD

Acer H5360 projector (main monitor via HDMI) playing at default resolution of 1280 x 720

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I also use the latest (as in updated 9.27.2013) enb binary 0.221, with Project ENB fantasy preset.

 

Please find attached to this post my current BOSS log as well as my current Skyrim.ini and SkyrimPrefs.ini

 

Basically the goal was to create a hardcore-RP build of skyrim with some of the best visuals my PC could push at a playable (see >30) framerate. This current build is not my most stable one, however after culling my load order of suspected scions of instability and SMCO-ing my textures it's at this juncture that I finally decided to ask here for help. As it stands I am unable to play for longer than about 10 minutes before either 1. I CTD 2. I Freeze or 3. I ILS upon entering or exiting an interior cell.

 

Suspected culprits have been ENB, Crossfire, ASIS (which you see I've omitted), RealClouds, UniqueRegionNames, Wet&Cold, Dynamic Injuries, and more. I've tested and re-tested multiple configurations of mods (yay MO) and cannot find a common denominator. I set  up 2 configs in MO called Visual and Gameplay whose names I believe are solid descriptions of their individual purposes. Both of these configurations are rock-solid-stable and could even handle me setting my speedmult to 3k and zipping about the 9 holds like some kind of coked-out viking Flash. The issues only seem to manifest upon combing the two into one.

 

At first they were more limited. For example if I ran from the Solitude docks along the road toward DragonsBridge I'd freeze/crash at either a small bush on the path about 20 yards away from where the revelers/redguards spawn, or after crossing the bridge on the other side of the town by the ambushed caravan. I dubbed these locations CTD Bush and CTD Bridge because I am not a creative creator of monikers. Since these two freezes were reliably re-creatable they served as a good way to experiment on the effectiveness of different tweaks. The end result of this extensive testing was the following.

 

There would seem to be a temporary fix upon uninstalling a more script heavy mod (Ie. dynamic injuries or realclouds) however the freezes would then once again begin to manifest after a few more minutes of playing. Also it was possible to fix the issue at one location and NOT the other and vice-versa. There would be times when I could fix both spots only to randomly freeze at a later time in a seemingly unrelated area.

 

It's worth mentioning that for 99% of these "tests" I would create a new character and use Alternate Start to spawn at the Solitude Docks.

 

With the attached config I've started using the "camping in the woods" start in an attempt to run through the beggining of the vanilla start-quest with the eventual goal of making it to Whiterun to warn the Jarl. So far I've managed to see the gates of Riverwood once or twice before being greeted by my desktop. The one time I actually made it into Riverwood (immediatly after uninstalling ASIS and never again) I would then CTD as I descended the slope by the waterfall. Most of the time I'll try to enter the cave to get Ralof after reading the journal and either freeze or ctd upon loading.

 

I've also tried messing about with my enblocal.ini, namely the reservedmb and the totalvram values. Results have been mixed with changes resulting in increased stability and faster load-times until of course I crash or freeze.

 

The interior spinning map trick mentioned in this forum somewhere was also attempted as a possible fix but sadly it was to no avail.

 

At my wit's end here guys. Sorry for the horribly formatted, un-spell-checked, rant/plea. Here's hoping I borked up something obvious and one of you fine people can point out my folly.

 

PS. I know the mod list is megas big but my stupid roomie is sitting over at his machine with a shit-eating grin as he plays his godamn 254 esp loaded Skyrim at a higher resolution on less powerful hardware with only the occasional freeze or crash. There must be something in this setup that's the cause of my woes.

 

TLDR: Shit be unstable yo, specs up above, more info below. If anything stands out please let me know.

 

Edit: Boss Log was broken... attached a backup and my userlist as an added bonus.

[Veladarius]

One of the issues I had when I was crashing somewhat consistantly was the temps on my video card were going a bit high so I changed the speed settings of the fans on it. The other issue I had was WATER, specifically the waterfalls. I replaced it with Realistic Water Two and crashes around waterfalls have dropped dramatically. Also, what is the texture size you use for terrain and such?

[Guest]

checklist

 

1. do u run another another card app along the one u use on computer?

explanation, i once dowloaded nvidia graphics(even thought i use ati) all went compleyely utterly lagged.

2.major culpit enb, if u card cant handle it screw it there other alternatives.

3:be sure to check skyrim cashe by steam by click in auto check/update;

 

but... when u do play disable it, u dont want this enyong steam popups in middle of game saying "theres another update bc thats is a never ending story and a continus issue of crashing and lagging,

 

 

atm no much more ideas since i barely play much more but my tip is make the best of what u already have that works, even means revert if u have to, and improve that

[Veladarius]

The one Item I see in your mods that a number of people have had issues with is Civil War Overhaul causing CTD's. I used it for a very short time and removed it for that reason. As for Running ENB you should have no problem whatsoever with 2 7950's.

[Mud]

Well, even if it doesn't solve your problems, I'd remove Wet and Cold from your list, that's been said to cause instability from how often the script runs.

 

 

I also ran into a thread with people talking about Skyrim Flora Overhaul causing crashes and freezes for them, try removing that for a test?

[Totally_Not_Sir_Hobo]

Actually I recently re-mounted my Twin Frozr II coolers for both the 7950's and my load temps never go past 60C (sorry had to brag since it came up ). I know Wet & Cold is a common culprit and I've tried removing it (a few times actually since I thought "maybe I was just lucky, better try again to be sure") before to no avail. When I get back to my place tomorrow I'll disable it and CWO and see what happens.

 

As for ENB, as Veladarius stated, I'm sure there's no issue insofar as ENB causing any unnecessary strain. However I haven't been able to find a lot of information regarding running ENB with Crossfire. I noticed that with ENBoost (binaries 0.196+) there are two user-configurable settings in enblocal.ini (ReservedMemorySizeMb and VideoMemorySizeMb) which seem to be very important. For VideoMemorySizeMB the recommended setting is "RAM + VRAM - 2048". For VRAM would I add the total value of my ram in the crossfire setup (in this case 6142) or would I just use the RAM of one card (as I believe in crossfire ram is "shared" or something to that effect). I've actually tried both settings already and both "work" in that I don't instantly CTD or anything, but I can't say one seems any more or less stable than the other. Just wondering if any other Crossfire users out there know anything.

[Honesty]

You do know vram doesn't stack right? It doesn't matter if you have two 2GB cards. You'll still have 2Gb vRam.

try following these steps:
 

1.) Uninstall E V E R Y T H I N G. DELETE EVERYTHING. Poof gone.

2.) Download Skyrim from steam (dont be a jagmo and pirate) and fully update EVERYTHING. (I highly recommend purchasing all expansions and letting CK update with the newly expansion'd files)

3.) Download the Creation Kit and let it update everything.

4.) Set both Skyrim and CK to "do not automatically update this game" only after fully updating

5.) Install all unofficial patches

6.) Install Steve40's script fixes (all but the dunbluepalace one as I believe USKP fixed that without error)

7.) use TES5edit and clean Update.esm, Dawnguard.esm, Hearthfiles.esm and Dragonborn.esm

8.) Install latest SKSE files and make sure NMM is using "Launch SKSE" and not "Launch Skyrim."

9.) Slowly start adding mods. Turn on papyrus logging when installing some "newly" made mods and check for errors. Don't forget to turn back off (SOme mods will give you messages no matter what, as they're starting up and checking for additional content - you will also not be able to silence some valilla shit)

10.) Edit your .INI files and tweak everything as needed. Do not add legacy/Oblivion .ini entries as they're junk and won't do anything

11.) Enjoy a beautiful experience!!

 

 

Don't pass your vRam limit. Know Skyrim has a hard cap no matter what, of 3.1GB. Don't use MSI Afterburner. Attempt to disable AVAST antivirus whilst playing Skyrim.

 

[Totally_Not_Sir_Hobo]

Thanks for pointing me to Steve40's lvlpredator script fix Honesty. Been using his SkyRe fix for a while now.

I've done steps 1-5 twice in the last month. Step 7 is old-hat as I'm too paranoid to just copy my ESM's to MO's overwrite folder on the off chance that it breaks something.

I launch SKSE through MO.

I've lately been using Ewi65's .INI configs from Nexus as a base with only a few alterations (for my ENB and GFX card)

For my stability tests I've been running MO's default ini's (with the exception of the necessary tweaks for ENB and Papyrus logging)

I figured that VRAM doesn't stack but SkyrimPerfMon see's my limit as 6.2GB which confused me. With ENBoost and SMCO I haven't come anywhere close to hitting the cap.

(just in case anyone's thinking this, I only use SMCO for DDS optimizations and don't let it touch NIF files. I'm trying to limit potential causes for these crashes not further obfuscate things)

I used to run ENB injector back when I was playing primarily in 3D. However when I'm modding like this 3D and Tridef are variables that I don't mind cutting from the equation so I've been running the Wrapper for these test runs.

I run TESV.exe through SKSE and nothing else (No steam community in game, added TESV.exe to my DEP exceptions, disabled Aero, and UAC).

 

Once again I greatly appreciate any input and always am happy to hear a fresh perspective on the situation. I'm keeping any new ideas I see here written down in my planner and will try to implement them tomorrow evening.

[johnnyboy88]

Civil War Overhaul and Wet and Cold can be rather unstable for a lot of people. Also, there might not be one mod in particular it might be a combination of mods.

 

Could you post a couple of papyrus logs as well?

 

Screenshots of the skyrim performance monitor graph might help too.

 

Also, you say your tests are with vanilla ini's. Those are not vanilla ini's.  Try using the "High Quality" preset and not the Ultra quality.  With you using MO make sure they're placed in the right profile directory as well. Just change the necessary values for enb and mod specific changes. I've also had problems using forward slashes as comments in the ini's (weird I know)  So I use semi colons now.

 

Finally, using Honesty's procedure is the best way. Start fresh and just add 1-5 at a time until things become unstable. Then, when it freezes/crashes, remove the ones you just added. Play for a little while to ensure it was them.  Then you'll know; It will then either be due to a bad mod, mod conflicts, mod load order, or just too much for your system to handle.

 

You also might find this thread over on the STEP forums helpful: http://forum.step-project.com/showthread.php?tid=2653

[morvo]

ReProccerDragonborn.esp
ReProccerNONPLAYERfix.esp

 

Those should sit below reproccer

 

Don't use other lighting mods with climates of Tamriel as it uses its own lightings.

Don't use perk mods with SkyRe

Don't use magic mods with SkyRe

Don't use combat mods with SkyRe

Don't use Civil war overhaul.

[Totally_Not_Sir_Hobo]

Those are indeed Not Vanilla INIs.

Those would be Ewi's INIs.

Figured just posting the Defualt High-Quality INIs wouldn't serve much purpose. Let me apologize for the wealth of convoluted info.

I'm almost positive the culprit is a specific conflict of mods and was kinda hoping someone here would see a "red flag" of sorts in my

specific load-order and that I wouldn't have to sit there and manually re-tool everything bit by bit. The 2 reproccer fixes do sit below reproccer.esp

but since I disable them when I run BOSS (since I usually just let SUM run BOSS for me) I guess they're in a weird spot in that BOSS list.

Leaving for work now. My plan when I get back will be:

1. Disable CWO and Wet&Cold

2. Add the rest of the script fixes.

3. Revert to default High Quality INIs.

4. Use the recommended settings for my 7950 in enblocal.ini

5. Pray to the 9 that that'll cut it.

 

Should that NOT do the trick I'll revert to my default Visual base configuration (saved as a specific catagory of mods in MO)

and begin slowly adding my gameplay mods (1-5 at a time) and testing at each interval. Since I'm off from school and work tm I'll prolly have enough

time to slog through all of this tonight. Will post results when done.

 

Oh but first I'll upload some Papyrus logs and PerfMon graphs. Thanks again for all the input.