While I've whined a lot about Skyrim, I tested the game in vanilla mode (no mod) just out of curiosity...just to see how the game behaved after this patch that took 2 weeks to release and I am honest:

As far as the Introduction is concerned (which was what made me so angry since it's scripted) I am very happy now.

I have an Intel Core i7 965 processor, two Geforce GTX295 set in QuadSLI (but, now that I check, I was only using one as QuadSLI was disabled), a Raptor hard disk as main drive (but Skyrim is on the second, larger drive) and 12 GB of Ram. While mine is not the last-gen gaming rig, I have set the graphic settings to Ultra and I didn't have any issues with the Introduction being played in a choppy way...

...even if I look around when I am not supposed to (which is at the very beginning), the game doesn't suffer any FPS hit, which in the second version, which I played quite extensively, the game definitely did.

I really hope that this means that Skyrim is using a lot more memory from my rig (I'd like it was all 12 GB, since I'm running Windows 7 64-bit Ultimate Edition and I'd really love if the game was able to use all my resources...but I don't think it's likely...I guess it's using 4 GB out of 12 GB available, but I'd like a confirmation for computer experts here in the forum...) and that I'll perceive this boost in FPS also in more substantial (and interactive) parts of the game...

However, for now, I am feeling quite happy with this new patch Bethesda released...

And how's going the game for those who've tried much more after the patch (I've just tested out of curiosity...I am not restarting it truly until January)?

Jashkar

I personally am "meh" about the patch, its just returning what was already there but taken out as apart of a ninja Patch that made it so you couldnt run TES without Steam, period despite PR saying that you could. so no this for me isnt a "kudos beth" its "alright now that that is out of the way can you start patching things that are important?"


I cannot say that its made any difference for me, I've used the modded exe to keep my game running over 4gb, anything other results in crashes ever 10-30 minutes, now that the exe has been released I can go back to using the normal file.

I don't notice any difference what so ever. I guess that's good... right?

My understanding is that Skyrim will never be able to use more than 4GB of RAM, due to the fact that it's a 32 bit application.

I'm far from knowledgeable on such matters however, so feel free to correct me if I'm wrong.

You're right.

Yeah, that kinda svcks... especially since the graphics engine uses the CPU to generate the game's Shadows, instead of the GPU. In other words, the game will lag if you set the Shadow Resolution to the maximum possible, no matter what kind of computer you're running it on. :/

The LAA patch is a non issue for me, I have 2GB of RAM. However, 1.3 fixed the stuttering that I was using a third party mod for, I no longer need that mod.

The game, as far as other issues has been fine. I have not had any quest bugs. I did have one quest glitch on me, but reloading an earlier save and starting it again fixed that. I see no reason to wait until January to play this.

The good news is, setting the shadows to medium has little visual impact in the game.

Oh no, I'm not referring to the preset graphics settings, though the Shadows on Medium no doubt look better than the shadows on Ultra. For some reason, when you increase the shadow draw distance, the game "stretches" the shadows to fit the drawn-in area. This results in the Shadows on Ultra-High settings looking extremely blocky and pixelated.

To counteract this, I manually edited the Skyrim.ini and SkyrimPrefs.ini files to slightly decrease shadow draw distance and greatly increase the shadow resolution (to 8192x8192; the maximum possible for the game's engine). However, this causes choppy graphics in many situations, due the the limited ammount of system resources that can be allotted to shadow rendering.

I really hope that between nVidia optimization and this patch also my stuttering issues were solved. It's a pity to use a QuadSLI rig and have stuttering (which is probably also microstuttering DUE TO the Quad!!)...



Nah...while I follow obsessively any update of the game, my issue wasn't about bugs (I made a lot of jokes about Todd Howard and dragon flying backwards, but I never experienced any of those weird things!! XD)...I did have some significant stuttering issues which made me crazy, but, apart from this issue with the optimal use of my rig resources, I didn't have any significant issues with bug not even when I played. However...I am waiting until January since CK will be out then (and I hope is more December-January than January-February...since third party mod tools are already out and I'd see what "really bad" to Bethesda has done with the official mod...especially to see even if one who had hard time with the old CS like me will be able to use the CK!! XD) and I want to see what marvels modders will do when the CK will be out before restarting the game...

I have already a huge list of graphic mods and other mods I want badly to play with (and Tytanis mod is the biggest focus...)...but well...in January I'll probably see true marvels!!

Has this been confirmed or is it a guess? I wonder if a mod can eventually undo this.

LOL It's a sad state of affairs when the best thing you can say about a patch is that you haven't noticed anything

It's been said by many different people with far greater experience with graphics engines than I, so I assume that they know what they're talking about.

Also, I can partially confirm this, because setting the shadow resolution to 8192 then playing both with and without the 4GB mod or the LAA patch results in a very noticable difference in performance on my rig (also, FRAPS reports no change in my FPS output in either case).