How to increase dedicated memory?

[downjonsie]

So, after checking out my specs. I noticed my PC had 4064mb on VRam. But only 128mb on dedicated video memory? Is there a way I can increase this? I figured this laptop would be able to run Skyrim at ,40+ fps no problem, but after installing Skyrim HD, I'm down to 20-25.

 

Currently on win10, 64bit, i7 7500u processor, GeForce 940mx@ 2.1hz, 16g ram ddr3

[Nazzzgul666]

Most likely the 128MB you're refering to is not VRAM. I'd rather think you have seen this related to papyrus and it's the dedicated ram for the log or papyrus engine.

To make sure that Skyrim uses all of the 4GB, use ENBoost. Papyrus engine memory is handled by the SKSE patch, and i believe the log size in your Skyrim.ini settings.

[downjonsie]

Most likely the 128MB you're refering to is not VRAM. I'd rather think you have seen this related to papyrus and it's the dedicated ram for the log or papyrus engine.

To make sure that Skyrim uses all of the 4GB, use ENBoost. Papyrus engine memory is handled by the SKSE patch, and i believe the log size in your Skyrim.ini settings.

I googled the SKSE path - but I'm a little confused... What use is launching Skyrim+SKSE? Just to make launching SKSE easier via steam, etc?

 

And by log files in Skyrim.ini, do you mean SKSE.ini for memory memory heap and scrap heap? I've set up ENBoosy, as well. Though frankly, I haven't ran the game since. I set videography size to 4064, and honestly don't know what to go with with reserved size so i set it to 256 for now to be safe. So my laptop's initial dedicated memory doesn't affect Skyrim?

[Nazzzgul666]

 

Most likely the 128MB you're refering to is not VRAM. I'd rather think you have seen this related to papyrus and it's the dedicated ram for the log or papyrus engine.

To make sure that Skyrim uses all of the 4GB, use ENBoost. Papyrus engine memory is handled by the SKSE patch, and i believe the log size in your Skyrim.ini settings.

I googled the SKSE path - but I'm a little confused... What use is launching Skyrim+SKSE? Just to make launching SKSE easier via steam, etc?

 

And by log files in Skyrim.ini, do you mean SKSE.ini for memory memory heap and scrap heap? I've set up ENBoosy, as well. Though frankly, I haven't ran the game since. I set videography size to 4064, and honestly don't know what to go with with reserved size so i set it to 256 for now to be safe. So my laptop's initial dedicated memory doesn't affect Skyrim?

 

It's the SKSE patch, not path. And that is the memory heap and scrap heap.

You can also make some edits in your skyrim.ini about papyrus, i'll quote the "harmful tweaks removal guide" from Nexus:

 

 

Papyrus (Skyrim.ini)

First section is the most important. Papyrus, which is the scripting system Skyrim uses, is very fragile. The most popular tweak for it will overload it, and can hurt performance, and overwork the CPU.

 

Replace anything you have here (in Skyrim.ini) with the default settings (vanilla master Skyrim.ini uses these numbers):

[Papyrus]

fUpdateBudgetMS=1.2

fExtraTaskletBudgetMS=1.2

fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS=500.0

iMinMemoryPageSize=128

iMaxMemoryPageSize=512

iMaxAllocatedMemoryBytes=76800

bEnableLogging=0

bEnableTrace=0

bLoadDebugInformation=0

bEnableProfiling=0

 

Notice that the MS values is ~660x smaller than what some recommend (800)?  To put it simply, 60fps requires around 16.6ms max to be spent on rendering each frame. Allowing up to 800ms of CPU time to one task is not a good idea, it needs to share CPU time with other things. Also notice the small memory values. Setting these larger is not a good idea, just read the link below to know why.

 

If you are running a script-heavy setup (you shouldn't be), and your scripts start to misbehave/perform badly, you could increase the fUpdateBudgetMS value in increments (to 1.6, then 2.0 at max). This will help prevent the additional time in fExtraTaskletBudgetMS being allocated to the CPU, instead adding a smaller amount to additionally always be allocated to the CPU. This will ensure all scripts have sufficient time to run.

 

 

The iMinMemory stuff will enable other sizes for papyrus log, you should already know about logging and for myself i changed 

fUpdateBudgetMS=2

fExtraTaskletBudgetMS=1.6

fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS=2000.0

iMaxAllocatedMemoryBytes=276800

giving scripts some more time to load during loading screens and to finish in exchange for performance.

 

But now i'm a bit confused, i assumed you saw something like that "] Memory page: 128 (min) 512 (max) 76800 (max total)" in your log or something and thought it's VRAM.

When your laptop tells you that only 128MBs are dedicated, that's something completly different. Not sure where you saw this, and depending on your hardware and system, there would be several possibilities to change it IF it's actually true... what i doubt, somehow. It might be dedicated for a special program which doesn't need more, but even Skyrim without any mods should demand MUCH more. You'd probably recognize if that's all you get. Badly and period.

 

If you think it's that bad, you should google that + your hardware/OS/video driver info, that should give you some hints. Maybe laptop name + 128MB VRAM dedicated would already be enough if it's a known problem.

 

*edit: what i could imagine is, that 128MB of your RAM are dedicated to be used as additional VRAM or something. But without further information, that's pure guessing. 

[downjonsie]

 

 

Most likely the 128MB you're refering to is not VRAM. I'd rather think you have seen this related to papyrus and it's the dedicated ram for the log or papyrus engine.

To make sure that Skyrim uses all of the 4GB, use ENBoost. Papyrus engine memory is handled by the SKSE patch, and i believe the log size in your Skyrim.ini settings.

I googled the SKSE path - but I'm a little confused... What use is launching Skyrim+SKSE? Just to make launching SKSE easier via steam, etc?

 

And by log files in Skyrim.ini, do you mean SKSE.ini for memory memory heap and scrap heap? I've set up ENBoosy, as well. Though frankly, I haven't ran the game since. I set videography size to 4064, and honestly don't know what to go with with reserved size so i set it to 256 for now to be safe. So my laptop's initial dedicated memory doesn't affect Skyrim?

It's the SKSE patch, not path. And that is the memory heap and scrap heap.

You can also make some edits in your skyrim.ini about papyrus, i'll quote the "harmful tweaks removal guide" from Nexus:

 

 

Papyrus (Skyrim.ini)

First section is the most important. Papyrus, which is the scripting system Skyrim uses, is very fragile. The most popular tweak for it will overload it, and can hurt performance, and overwork the CPU.

 

Replace anything you have here (in Skyrim.ini) with the default settings (vanilla master Skyrim.ini uses these numbers):

[Papyrus]

fUpdateBudgetMS=1.2

fExtraTaskletBudgetMS=1.2

fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS=500.0

iMinMemoryPageSize=128

iMaxMemoryPageSize=512

iMaxAllocatedMemoryBytes=76800

bEnableLogging=0

bEnableTrace=0

bLoadDebugInformation=0

bEnableProfiling=0

 

Notice that the MS values is ~660x smaller than what some recommend (800)? To put it simply, 60fps requires around 16.6ms max to be spent on rendering each frame. Allowing up to 800ms of CPU time to one task is not a good idea, it needs to share CPU time with other things. Also notice the small memory values. Setting these larger is not a good idea, just read the link below to know why.

 

If you are running a script-heavy setup (you shouldn't be), and your scripts start to misbehave/perform badly, you could increase the fUpdateBudgetMS value in increments (to 1.6, then 2.0 at max). This will help prevent the additional time in fExtraTaskletBudgetMS being allocated to the CPU, instead adding a smaller amount to additionally always be allocated to the CPU. This will ensure all scripts have sufficient time to run.

 

 

The iMinMemory stuff will enable other sizes for papyrus log, you should already know about logging and for myself i changed

fUpdateBudgetMS=2

fExtraTaskletBudgetMS=1.6

fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS=2000.0

iMaxAllocatedMemoryBytes=276800

giving scripts some more time to load during loading screens and to finish in exchange for performance.

 

But now i'm a bit confused, i assumed you saw something like that "] Memory page: 128 (min) 512 (max) 76800 (max total)" in your log or something and thought it's VRAM.

When your laptop tells you that only 128MBs are dedicated, that's something completly different. Not sure where you saw this, and depending on your hardware and system, there would be several possibilities to change it IF it's actually true... what i doubt, somehow. It might be dedicated for a special program which doesn't need more, but even Skyrim without any mods should demand MUCH more. You'd probably recognize if that's all you get. Badly and period.

 

If you think it's that bad, you should google that + your hardware/OS/video driver info, that should give you some hints. Maybe laptop name + 128MB VRAM dedicated would already be enough if it's a known problem.

 

*edit: what i could imagine is, that 128MB of your RAM are dedicated to be used as additional VRAM or something. But without further information, that's pure guessing.

Thank you for the help I'll look into as soon as i can

[Lodakai]

One thing to note..  the following settings,

 

fUpdateBudgetMS

fExtraTaskletBudgetMS

 

they use the same loop that rendering does to run skyrim scripts.  The longer you give the scripts to run... the less time your hardware has to render your images (ETA: actually.. to be more correct.. it simply increases the rendering time overall).  This can lead to framerate hits if you run into heavy scripts.   Use with severe caution (if at all).

 

Increasing fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS  will also increase your load times.  So be aware of that.

[Nazzzgul666]

 

One thing to note..  the following settings,

 

fUpdateBudgetMS

fExtraTaskletBudgetMS

 

they use the same loop that rendering does to run skyrim scripts.  The longer you give the scripts to run... the less time your hardware has to render your images (ETA: actually.. to be more correct.. it simply increases the rendering time overall).  This can lead to framerate hits if you run into heavy scripts.   Use with severe caution (if at all).

 

Increasing fPostLoadUpdateTimeMS  will also increase your load times.  So be aware of that.

 

Like i mentioned, i sacrifice performance for stability (and that i quoted it from "how to remove those tweaks" had a reason. My games are usually too script heavy to run properly without those tweaks, and they improve my stability a lot. But i wouldn't recommend it in general. The loading times are in mili seconds, to add 2 seconds is the smallest disadvantage in my opinion. But as everything else here, that's just a personal thought.