Hi I added Xenius retextures of characters
http://www.skyrimnexus.com/modules/members/index.php?id=726673

and TC1984 armor and clothing texture replacements
http://www.skyrimnexus.com/modules/members/index.php?id=2337365

The result was that the game started crashing, screen goes white, music continue for some time then I have to hard reset.

It appears that this happens more often with more replacements, it was perhaps once every 3-6 hours with just the clothes and armor and went to 30 minutes to 2 hours with the character retextures.

After removing them I have had no problem, still has the more visible ore mod
http://www.skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=193
and it works nice.

Run on an amd system with an 5700 graphic card on win 7, 64 bit and 8 gb ram.. Some other people has had problems with Ati cards.
Im interested in other has the same problem and if anybody know any solutions.

I haven't had the CTDs, but I HAVE noticed more stuttering and tiny freezes, and I have a feeling, it's because the game has to access the texture from the HD rather from the BSA,
and the more and more textures you add, the more and more access there is.

I'm wondering if I could just compile all my favorite (and personal) texture mods into a BSA....

The texture replacements in question possibly aren't using the correct format for some of the textures - all textures must be in DXT5 (Interpolated alpha) format or they will crash the game. Might be worth sending a message to the creators of those replacers to bring their attention to the problem.

Not sure why you're using the Armour/clothing one though - it doesn't seem to do anything.


If you have plenty of system memory and a graphics card with at least 1024Mb onboard, 'loose' textures should not be a problem

I don't like place texture replacers in folders, I injected this in default textures .BSA and work flawless!

Can you please tell us newbies how to do this?

I've got a SSD and when I install texturemods like Chris Whiterun or Skyrim HD I always get a 1-2sec blackscreen after closing the map.

double post

you need FOMM (fallout mod manager) but you need version 0.9.17: http://sourceforge.net/projects/fomm/files/Fallout%20mod%20manager%20%280.9%20series%29/0.9.17/ with bsa creator (latest version not include bsa creator)

With bsa unpacker option unpack the bsa file in a new folder and add texture replacers (overwriting files) and with bsa creator repack in a new bsa file with same name than default bsa. You must backup the old before do it. When you repack a new bsa also you can set a compression level and adjust size file to more or less 2GB (compression level 40% or 60% etc) for more performance.

And finally you have change 2 numbers with this hex editor program: http://www.hhdsoftware.com/free-hex-editor and set in the new bsa file with texture replacers in first line 67 (right click on the bsa and open hex program with new option) change to 68 and 07 change to 00 and save. And play the game!

You need to install Nexus Mod Manager and use the Archive Invalidated option for it. It'll fix all your problems. Like New Vegas, Skyrim requires AI to fix. I highly suggest you do not use FOMM to do it since the AI in NMM is specifically made for Skyrim.

If you change with hex editor in first line 67 to 68 and 07 to 00 FOMM .bsa change to Skyrim .bsa format, tested and playing and this give more perfomance and more space injecting in default texture bsa file without useless folders in data folder

Thanks for the info VagagbondAngel, I was using DXT3 but haven't struck any problems (possibly because I have only done 2 so far)

What? No, that's just wrong. Different dxt compression is used depending on the needs of each asset.

Could you post a list of which dxt compression should be used for each asset?

It'd definitely be helpful

If you CTD often, try the large address aware to make Skyrim utilize more RAM. It made my CTDs go away.

That's what I thought... but I have so far had CTD problems when using textures in DXT1 with no alpha. Any ideas why that might be?

This is why I'm waiting for the actual Skyrim made tools befor I start messing the BSAs and plugins

I have an awful feeling that for months or even years to come we'll be fielding questions about instability/CTDs due to popular mods made using toolsets for different games. I hope not but you never know. Soon the CK comes out the better (not that that should have anything to do with texture replacements)

It depends on what the asset is configured to do, and what the shader expects, I'd guess. If it's a retexture only, I'd check what format the original was in, I use ATI's Compressonator for doing that. It could be a loose/BSA problem too. I've been too busy with the .nif decoding to really follow modding progress so far to see what problems people are running in to.
Previously, the lack of an alpha channel, the games would just act like there's an all-white alpha channel present if it was needed, specular for normal maps, for example.

http://cs.elderscrolls.com/constwiki/index.php/Choose_the_right_DXTC_compression_algorithm is still a handy guide. It won't do to have everyone using the wrong compression when it's not necessary.

I'm pretty careful about choosing the correct format usually but thanks for the response. Actually on further investigation I think the problem starts on export and is either due to the dds plugin or my copy of Photoshop. Any textures I save in DXT1 won't open in Photoshop thereafter. I'll try a new plugin and/or reinstalling Photoshop.

Ah bummer, but cool you found the problem

Now I have run Oblivion for years with all loose files, as in unpacked all the models and textures. Had issues with the CS if it could not find files.

I'm way more skeptical of modifying the existing ,BSA and naturally if you have multiple mods and want to disable one you are pretty stuck.
Yes for later mods an esm bsa file would be an good idea.