Almost everyone is seeing a performance boost with the latest patch, except me. Now, I understand that my rig (a laptop), which can be seen below, isn't exactly built for gaming, but regardless of that, it could run Skyrim before this patch on the following settings with the help of Skyboost and a dll file downloaded from Skyrim Nexus.

Before the patch:
1176x664
AA: Off
AF: 16X
FXAA: On
Textures: High
Shadows: Low
Radial Blur: High
Distance: Ultra
Other settings: Maximum
Programs used: Skyboost and dll file.
Mods: None
Average FPS: 20

After the patch:
Settings: Same
Programs used: None
Average FPS: 5

After the patch (with dll file):
Settings: Same
Programs used: dll file
Average FPS: 5 (no change)

Laptop Specifications:
Intel Core i5 M520 @ 2.40Ghz
4 GB Ram
Nvidia Geforce GT 330M
Windows 7 64-bit Operating System
UAC turned off (if relevant)
Driver version: 295.18

So, what's going on here?

i think its your graphic card

How do you explain the fact that the game was running fine before patch 1.4, considering I haven't made any changes to my graphic card?

Average FPS: 20 on a Geforce GT 330M, doesn′t seem that bad imo. Your gpu ist just very very bad.

Edit: sry, should should read properly.

Make sure you totally remove any programs like Skyboost or Tesval, and any dll file you put for performance.

These are not compatible with the 1.4 patch and will cause the game to run worse.

Edit: dieterdax, he used to get 20 fps before the patch, now he's getting 5 fps!

Remove the 295.18 drivers and use the 290.53 beta drivers. It performs much better. Also delete skyrim.ini and skyrimprefs.ini and verify game cache to replace with standard versions.

I reinstalled the game for the sake of this patch.


Going to try this now.

Which dll did you use? One of the ENBseries? If the above suggestions don't help, emove it if you haven't done so and wait for an update, I guess it may be incompatible with 1.4.

Playing the game without a dll file made no difference at all.

Unfortunately for you, moving the Skyboost .dlls back won't do anything as you alraedy found out. Skyboost only supported version 1.3. Have you tried deleting your .ini files, deleting any mods, reverifying Skyrim cache via Steam & then running the Skyrim launcher to generate the .ini files again? Do you still have bad performance?

I've already tried all that.

Drivers 290.53 didn't help either.

Is this in specific locations? Or in the infamous Whiterun viewpoint? I'm getting 45 there (better than before), but less in some interiors.

Try deleting every *file* (not folder) from the root folder of Skyrim (including the main Skyrim exe) - and reverifying game cache from Steam. There's not much it has to re-download so it won't take long, and it'll just make sure you haven't got a 3rd party dll or anything in that folder you hadn't noticed that's interfering, or any modified SKyrim exe from the old LAA mod days etc.. You could also delete everything (files & folders) except the "Skyrim - xxx.bsa" files (9 of these), Skyrim.esm and the Update.esm Update.bsa files (that's 12 files to keep) from the Data folder, and do a verify game cache from Steam, just to ensure no third party mods are hiding in the data folders. And as you say you've already done but for the sake of anyone else reading - also delete (or backup if you've customised them lots and want to keep the customisations to bring back later) all the .ini files from the Documents->Skyrim folder, and let Skyrim recreate it.

I realise you've likely already tried all of this, but the above is about as comprehensive as I can think of to ensure NOTHING - no mods, no ini tweaks, no 3rd party boosters/D3D mods etc. are interfering anywhere, it'd be as good as a fresh install - and maybe there's something you missed.

Beyond all of that, and beyond any graphics driver changes (which seems unlikely since as you said, it ran fine pre 1.4)... I think it's a case of finding other users suffering the same problem as you (who have also ruled out mods/3rd party stuff themselves) and try and find the common ground hardware/specs wise - as perhaps certain optimisations/tweaks done in version 1.4 do have problems on specific hardware?

I'm getting bad framerates everywhere, not just any particular locations. Before the patch I used to get around 30 fps in Markarth which is now reduced to mere 6-7 fps.

Horatius: I hate to say it, but I'm surprised you managed to get even 20 FPS with that GPU. The GeForce 330M is powered an incredibly weak graphics chip (GT216). The same chip was used in the desktop GeForce GT 220 card, which was a budget card from 2009. You would have been able to pick it up back then for under 60 USD. The only major difference between the GT 200 and the 330M is that the 330M runs at a slower speed.

I know that this doesn't explain why the game is running slower than it used to. I can only guess that the game is pushing the graphics a little harder than it used to, and the change is enough to kill performance on your GPU. The only thing you can do is to turn your graphics settings down a bit at a time until you get a decent amount of performance back. I'd start with all of those settings you've got set to max, and drop them down to about 80%. This will hopefully be enough to reduce the graphics load without having too much of an effect on graphics quality.

Maybe they dont want to weak graphic cards? :I i dont know.

Could you try running GPU-Z in the background while you play? See what the max resources are? You'll need to tick the box to get it to scan while in the background.

You could have a hardware malfunction. May just be your bad luck that one of your parts (cpu, gpu, psu, etc.) is dying on you and it's just bad luck it's happening at the same time as the patch.......or as mentioned above, you've got something else svcking up your resources.

Something else to consider is that quite a large number of people have reported that there no longer seems to be a difference in the visuals with AA on or off. If at all possible could you check if edges are smooth or jagged? With AA off it should be quite obviously jagged. Also try to force AA off in nVidia control panel rather than in the game although many people also reported this makes no difference either. It's worth a try though. Might be that they enabled some level of AA somehow during the engine optimization.

As stated, 5fps is probably nearer the expected performance, so it could be that before you weren't actually getting the real settings, but after the patch you are.

Otherwise it could simply be overheating - the patch makes better use of the CPU, which might increase temperatures, which on a laptop might result in CPU throttling and a drop in FPS. That's why laptops aren't recommended for playing Skyrim.

Really , on a laptop with a weak GPU? even IF the game used to play OK with these settings before have you tried using a realistic setup ?