OH!! Your last sentence is genius! I can definitely make that happen here at work. I have 256mb vid card and could use 4gb memory to outweigh it!
I will try that as soon as I get a chance. Still finishing up XP 32bit w/LAA enabled test, which is going smoothly so far

@Arthmoor - Bingo! That's what I noticed as well. The instability doesn't occur just because you hit 1.5gb and suddenly everything goes haywire... I noticed it was how long your VRAM stays at that level as well. I did get my game as high as 1.5gb too. There is a screen about 1 page back I think that showed this. I was only able to get that high once I backed off my overclock to stock settings. The CTDs were less frequent, but I still ruled it unstable. IDK it's craziness!

@Unmmph! - Great to hear you are enjoying more stability! Curious about your 300mb+ over your 768mb dedicated VRAM? If you are indeed experiencing the stability you say, that could also re-surface the idea that maybe Oblivion just handles VRAM stable up to a certain amount? Oh and thanks for the advice with OCing... Actually I never touch my RAM when overclocking. I always run at the suggested timings and voltages when it comes to RAM. Honestly, I think I just didn't have enough voltage to the CPU, but I couldn't give it anymore because I was already just past the safe voltage suggestions for my type of processor. So I got a little greedy with the overclock... big deal!

I'm noticing that folks who go over their VRAM and remain stable are so far all using Win7 x64. That doesn't seem like coincidence to me. Clearly the OS is shifting the overflow into normal memory, and with LAA enabled there's more of it for the game to use. Since that's all handled transparently behind the scenes, Oblivion shouldn't care where it's at unless the system ends up swapping some of that RAM to disk and then slowing things down to the point where the game can't keep up anymore.

As far as overclocking, you have to consider more than just your internal case cooling. You also need to be running the PC in a reasonably cool room. Letting the room get too warm causes too many problems. In my room during the summer even with AC running it gets warm enough that even without overclocking things heat up to uncomfortable levels. So I just don't bother. If I couldn't see an improvement in game performance by switching from a 2.4Ghz to a 3.2Ghz CPU, another 10% on top from an OC isn't going to do squat anyway.

Yes, but I was running on Windows7 64bit for my tests and kept experiencing issues after exceeding my VRAM. Stability increased after I dropped my OC settings, but it was still unstable non the less. The CTDs just weren't quite as frequent, but they would still occur within 15 -20 minutes of gaming. Come to think of it. The first time I went back to stock CPU settings and played the game at 1.5gb VRAM, it actually played for about 45min without a CTD. It wasn't until stopped my game, updated the forums and then started from my last save point that I started getting the conisistant CTDs at high VRAM usage. Not sure if that means anything. I definitely didn't make any changes to my game since I thought I had finally reached a stable point

Yeah, I don't really overclock in the Summer time. Arizona tends to be a bad place for OCing... Go figure... :shrug:

@Tommy_H - UPDATE - Winxp 32bit w/ LAA seems to of CTD'd just under 1.7gb? I think I will re-test just to make sure this is accurate because I can't imagine why non LLA would perform better than with LAA enabled...

Windows has never really cleaned up after itself well, especially when it comes to RAM. it stuffs things in there, and then leaves them 'just in case'. Probably, doing a cold boot would alleviate some of the symptoms you see after playing for a while, exiting, doing other stuff, and then trying to play some more.

Oblivion DOES seem to have some ability to address that issue, as in my own experience, if i run firefox when I first start my machine, then close it out, do something else (not gaming), and fire it up again, it starts MUCH faster. however, if i run oblivion between FF sessions, it again takes it a fair bit of time to initialize.

I am not sure that trying to use LAA would do me any good though. I run XP Pro, 32 bit, and only have 2gig of RAM. Vid card is a AGP version of the 3850, with 512mb.

You may be on to something there. I don't know the specifics regarding which type of memory is faster. Video or System. However, one common thing I always noticed once my VRAM would increase past it's dedicated amount and use the system available ram... I would experience increased stutter and lag. Maybe the difference in speed is what is causing the issue? Arthmoor may have a point. If you think about how much data is getting spewed into memory within a small amount of time when using so many large texture mods etc... it seems likely that the system ram may have trouble keeping up. One point to mention in your comment though Arthmoor... I don't think we are discussing harddisk memory swapping. Unless we are and I've just been off in space all this time... :twirl:

@Tommy_H - UPDATE - Winxp 32 bit w/ LAA CTD'd again just above 1.7gb. I am convinced that LAA has no effect on Windows 32bit. In fact it carries a slight disadvantage to the normal Oblivion.exe. Weird, but the test is accurate. I wonder if Vista or Windows 7 32bit would behave the same? Time for an OS upgrade Tommy_H. Now, off to update the OP with this info...

Could it maybe be a paging issue? I just started using Windows 7 (I can say I am rather impressed with it. Never thought I would say that) so I am still learning about it but doesn't XP page things to the HDD no matter the circumstances? Maybe 7 handles this differently? I dunno. This was kind of outta my butt.

When I mentioned swapping in that comment, yes, I meant to disk. The time it takes for the OS to page memory in and out of that is too long for the game engine to tolerate.

Yes, swapping video to system memory will also slow things down, but that's only a difference measured in nanoseconds. Disk swapping happens in milliseconds. The disparity piles up quickly.

Video memory is generally dramatically faster than system RAM. Unless you have a rather old card, on a newer system. Vid mem is up to what? DDR5? so data flow within the video card itself is going to be dramatically faster than having to run it thru the system board, into RAM, and then back, when it wants it again*. And if the O/S starts paging things to disk, well, I am reasonably certain that is going to cause some major timing issues. Now, consider, if the O/S HAS paged some vid memory to disk, and then a PCB is called, there is going to have to be a fair bit of monkeying around, to get rid of it. This may very well be what some folks see as a 'memory leak', if the game engine just abandons that memory in ram, or on the disk.

I am still of the opinion that it is a memory timing related issue, if you have bits scattered between the vid card, system ram, and possibly the hardddrive, changing cells, or doing a PCB call is going to stir things up dramatically.

*system bus speed is a consideration here, as well as the PCI-e bus.

@Arthmoor and HeyYou - I don't I have anything really to add on those last comments. I gather that performance for players who's VRAM exceeds past there dedicated amount will vary depending on there installed components. Arthmoor, this may well explain what you PM'd me on in regards to the differences you experienced after switching motherboards. Of course you already suspected that.

The maximum transfer rate for a PCI-e v2.0 bus is 8 GB/S, while my VRAM (clocked at 800MHz, with GDDR5 you can get a clock as high as 4 GHz with a bandwidth that's 4 times as high as mine) can transfer 25,6 GB/S. Quite a difference...

I noticed that my Oblivion crashed when it's memory usage increased to about 1.2 GB, and my total system RAM (2GB) usage increased to exactly 90%. I'm using Windows 7 64-bit. It could be totally unrelated, but I'll see if it's consistant when I'll play a new test game to get FCOM working.

to sum it up: don't use QTP3 if you don''t have lots of VRAM

Curious... I have the same trouble as MrFurious (2GB RAM, crashes on 1.2GB aprox.)... but my GTX280 has 1GB of VRAM...

@ MrFurious and jhondidfool - I haven't tested Oblivion for a memory ceiling yet with 2gb of installed memory. I could try that out tomorrow at work and see if I hit 1.2gb and crash. For now, the best I can suggest is to run your game in window mode and have your task manager open and on top. There are detailed instructions on how to do this on the OP.

I will try again with most of my other applications turned off to free up some more memory, to see if it crashes at about 1.2 GB or 90% total RAM usage.

@MrFurious - Good luck. I will let you know the results I test today... What OS were you using again MrFurious?

To add to yesterdays discussion between HeyYou, Arthmoor and others... I thought of a couple more key points that I don't think we really touched on enough...

1. Arthmoor and I both hit 1.5gb VRAM. There is a key difference though. Arthmoor has 2gb of dedicated VRAM available. I have 1gb of dedicated VRAM available.
2. Arthmoor is currently running WinXp 32 and therefore is unable to use LAA. I'm using Win 7 64 w/LAA enabled.

Is it possible that Arthmoor is hitting a system memory ceiling rather than a VRAM related CTD? Just trying to sift through the variables here so I can get a grasp of where some balance might lye in order to make use of additional VRAM with stability. Our types of CTDs were slightly different, so I'm under the impression our games are failing for different reasons.

3. I'm still intrigued by Ummph's post from yesterday. Remember he said he has had stability with +300mb above his dedicated 768mb VRAM.


There are a few things he is doing here that I haven't tried yet.

• weOCPS
  
• +mem allocated, +int/ext cell buffer (This one really interests me)
  
• music off
  
• borders off
  
• OSR

I think I will do another round of VRAM limit testing with LAA and these tweaks to find out if there is a way to get more stability.

I've just finished another test, with most other applications turned of. Memory usage without Oblivion was about 30%, instead of 50%.
I'm using Windows 7 64-bit, and I should note that I'm also using OSR, Streamline and weOCPS.

This time Oblivion's memory usage went up to about 1.6GB without any problems. I've even had a total memory usage of 96%. I couldn't get memory usage above 1.3 GB or 85% total without PlaceAtMe, as something clearly started purging it. When I spawned about 40 copies of myself, I tried to add 1000 copies at once... Crash. If I didn't do that, I might've been able to get very close to 100% total memory usage or Oblivion's memory ceiling.

far327 and All, I have read with interest that LAA is ineffective with WinXP 32bit. Well, I am planning to buy a new PC sometimes later this year, basically waiting for reviews of the new Nvidia 400 cards (if they should ever come out...) and the Intel 32nm CPU's.

Since this thread has started, I also keep an eye on my RAM usage. I never get as high as 1.7 GB, not even close. About 1.1 GB was the maximum to date. But my graphic mods are relatively low key (no Quarl). I do get a crash sometimes, but it is very rare, and it can happen at RAM usage of only 550 MB (that is short time into the game). I suspect it is usually script overload. Or the videocard goes on a LSD trip sometimes, and I have to reboot the PC. But that's a card problem or Nvidia drivers problem I guess. I'm not losing any sleep over it.

If my PC produces something worthwhile to report, I'll share it. I really wish I had a crash at 1.7 GB once, just to see it.

Anyone else notice that crashing increases after the oblivion gates start opening?

I use EDI and I swear each time I crash in the wilderness I'll reload and look around the area (thinking maybe corrupt spawn point) and about 70% there is a gate nearby that I did not see before.

I've never crashed while on the plane of Oblivion, in caves, sewers, ruins, or dungeons and only a couple of times in the Shivering Isles. I know that none of those are as big a space for this game to process and the single most intensive thing I can do is have my character ride a horse full speed across dozens of cells.

So even though I never crash in interiors, other places or SI ... the last few weeks have been a constant crash episode in Tamriel exteriors.

I think I will make it a point to finally finish the main quest and close those gates for good - just to see if that improves.

I don't know about ineffective, but i used the LAA hack for the "lulz"(read investigating to see if i could get away with throwing even more heavy mods at Oblivion) and I never had problems with stability and this was on 32-bit XP.

Funnily enough my physical RAM useage was about 75-150mb LESS overall than usual and didn't seem to creep up overtime. I can only assume in my case that the LAA hack either papered over some crack in Oblivions memory (Re)allocation or the Oblivion.exe has decided to start playing ball before i get anymore funny ideas(like timeslips exe optimiser).

Either way i'm happy.

@MrFurious - You did a good job of freeing up system ram! That's a nice gain. I will have to note when I make my final OP that the memory ceiling for Oblivion can be increased when freeing up memory used for OS processes. I added a caveat more or less stating this, but it would be helpful to be a bit more specific for players.
Good test MrFurious. :goodjob:

@Tommy_H - I PM'd you with some helpful tips on how to raise your system memory usage so you can hit your memory ceiling. haha! What a funny thing to give advice for... "Here's how to break your game"

@Psymon - I read in previous forums about the instability that EDI has supposedly caused other players. I haven't narrowed it down to that mod myself, but I don't have it loaded to test right now eiter. I like your idea about closing the gates to see if stability improves though. Let us know when you do.

@Windfang - Well, I'd say it's not adding any signifigant benefit to a player's game. I don't see any reason that a player couldn't use it on a 32bit OS, but the LAA patch isn't going to be serving it's defined purpose on a 32bit system. If you think it's helped your game, I won't argue that. Oblivion is a touchy game. It acts wonky for weird reasons, I think we can all attest to that.

If anyone would like to know, I use the AMD Fusion Utility for Desktops to quit a lot of processes. I'm using the standard "Offline Gaming" profile. Most of the time you'll have to restart your PC when you re-enable these processes, though. But it's worth it for me

Also, memory used by other processes was cut down by another 15% or 300MB while Oblivion was trying to get more memory. I'll have to check my page file next time, to see if that's the cause, or if there's something else going on that frees up additional memory.

Aww bummer.. It requires an AMD processor. Well, I guess I pretty much did this manually on my PC. It's just nice to have a one click solution. Thanks for the suggestion.



I meant to say something about this.

This is a built in feature. Not sure if it is an Oblivion feature or OS feature yet. I actually forgot to watch for this during my tests. Kinda of tough since I'm at work.

Basically one or the other purges the memory once you are nearing your memory ceiling point. But, it can only purge so much before it gives up and crashes. If you stayed in a single cell, the cache would run out of data to purge eventually. If you were moving around from cell to cell, the cached data would be increasing and decreasing enough from the automatic purge that it would probably keep up enough to keep you from crashing. That is until you overloaded it with 1000 copies of your character at which point it didn't have a chance to purge probably because the amount of data you requested to be displayed was enough to exceed your memory ceiling in one shot.

This brings up a good example why mods like Better Cities and UL can cause crashing on a non LAA Oblivion game. If you enter Anvil Docks with Better Cities and UL loaded at the same time, you notice a HUGE jump in system memory usage. Probably enough to where the automatic PCB cant keep up.

Can anyone think of an object that contains a large amount of texture data that could be copied over and over enough to use for testing VRAM stability?
Maybe that would be a better way to test how far we can push our VRAM with LAA enabled.

I'd have to second this. I'm trying to remember if I've ever crashed in an Oblivion plane, an interior cell, or in the Shivering Isles in general. I think that if one can't remember, it's safe to call those areas stable. No doubt it's because none of those areas are filled to the brim with extra resource hogs.

I can also confirm the same result from trying to ride a horse too far too fast. The game simply can't keep up if you've got Shadowmere at a full gallop over a long enough distance.

You can try http://www.iobit.com/gamebooster.html for a similar effect. It cannot speed up your hardware or automaticly select an overclock profile to apply, but it can shut down a lot of processes. The default list doesn't contian quite as much processes as AMD Fusion Utility, but it still gave me a 10% cutdown on memory usage. And it's free!

I just played the game for some 3+ hours. It ended in a crash - actually inside the Oblivion gate of Kvatch, when I entered from the planes to the Blood Well ground floor - but I have the suspicion that it is more a hardware or drivers issue with my Nvidia 8800GT. It came totally out of the blue because up until that point it ran all smoothly. Reason I think it's hardware or drivers: I killed the process and restarted the game without a reboot, and then after only 5 min the video went on the LSD trip again. Something (on the drivers?) was still messed up from the long session. By experience I know that only a reboot will cure this.

Basically I totally agree with your observances that when I crash it is usually outside, in the wild.

At the moment of crash, Oblivion process was using 938 MB of RAM. And that was after 3 hours. It definitely seems my game never gets really high on RAM, around 950 MB seems to be a RAM ceiling of sorts for my particular installation. Before entering the gate I spent a long time riding, harvesting and fighting in the wilderness, arriving at Kvatch from Skingrad, so it was a very mixed session.

I'll be testing what far327 has instructed me and report again, curious to see the 1.7 GB crash.