Not exactly on to the topic, but I can't enable Aeroglass using Vista. I checked the Desktop manager, and it's working fine, but aeroglass isn't enabled. And the graphics are XP styled, not Vista.

Great thread this one

I spent a lot of time trying to find out most of the information here and optimize my system.

Thanks. Before I read this thread I didn't know that SuperFetch used up so much RAM overhead. I have only 1GB RAM, so I'll disable it right now.

Really good and informative thread. I has reduced my worries to a reasonable overhead in my brain, lol!!

After reading the OP amongst others, my 64bit scare has been greatly reduced, and I hope I can get Oblivion to play ok.

-Coors916 :ninja:

For some reason those hot fixes do not apply to my system or so it says when I try to install them. :confused:

should make this one sticky would solve alot of problems

Aero automatically turns off when starting a game though.

Just letting you guys know.

This should read, "Aero is supposed to automatically turn off when starting a game though." There have been many, many reports of it staying active and killing performance.

Excellent guide damicatz. Very well put together.

I've never noticed that though. I see it turn off every time.

Maybe an update fixed it :shrug:

Forgot to say, great job on the guide! :goodjob:

Vista has got be the crappiest OS microsoft has ever brought out :thumbsdown: :brokencomputer:

And I remember people saying that about XP, 2000, and 98 :rolleyes:

Thanks for the info! :goodjob:




And thanks for that... Why you even should rant in a thread designed for Vista users is beyond me though...

EDIT:


Then you have not apparently tried http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,125772-page,2/article.html. (Number 4).

EDIT 2:


I love 98, never tried 2000 actually and it took me sevelar years before I changed from 98 to XP, because of all the problems I heard THAT had...

EDIT:
Then you have not apparently tried http://www.pcworld.com/article/id,125772-page,2/article.html. (Number 4).

That is why waited from changing i went from windows 98SE to XP home edtion


[/quote]

I don't know if anyone has mentioned this before, but you should remove the part about disabling DWM/Aero, as it is auto-disabled when a fullscreen game is run. Also, you should remove the part about 16-bit software not working at all in Vista x64, as these can easily be emulated with http://dosbox.com/.

1.Press the Windows Key and R.

Which is the Windows Key?

http://images.google.nl/images?q=windows%20key

Yep, serious. This is the first time I see this extremely useful and informative page. 2 hours ago DXDIAG showed Page File 1700MB, now is down to 892MB without any loss of visual performance, I already see the difference.
Thank you for this guide. And, of course for the windows key... turns out my windows were locked for the last few years... tsk...tsk...tsk. One lives, one learns.

I guess some things just aren't as obvious as one tends to think. Good luck with the page file!

Disabling superfetch had no change on performance whatsoever. People need to realize we dont all have the same systems, and what works for one might not work for someone else.

I dont have a lame system either its amd dual core, 3 gigs of ram and 8800GTX 768MB, current nvidia driver.

Either vista is coded horribly even with SP1 or oblivion is, or both I have no idea atm, I just know since installing vista that things have degraded horribly. I may indeed need to put xp home back on.

I hope this helps someone else seeing similar pc stats and horrible peformance.

cu
leebo

This is a great thread guys. If all the safe suggestions can make it to the OP it would be great if it can be added to a sticky later on. I've seen some suggestions that I didn't use yet, but I sure will this week. I have some time off until next Wednesday, so time enough to test these things. Yay. I planned to do a lot of FO3 gaming, but I keep coming back to Oblivion. It might help both games.

BTW: I am also playing with AMD's Fusing for Gaming. I am not very fond of the default profiles, but I'll try to incorporate the suggestions made here into a custom profile. As far as I can see the main advantage of a Fusion profile is that it is easy to get back to your regular settings. A custom Fusion profile is a kind of MSConfig setup which you can name. You can switch profiles without the need to reboot. That's very cool. It can also include AMD's Overdrive and ATI's CCC profiles. It's still in beta, but I like the overall idea.

Here is a tip to make Oblivion more stable under Vista x64.

Right click Oblivion.exe and select properties. A multi-tab dialog box appears. Select the Compatibility tab. Under "Compatibility Mode" tag "Run this program in compatibility mode for:" and select "Windows XP (Service Pack 2)" from the combo box. Under "Settings" tag "Disable Visual Styles", "Disable desktop composition" and "Disable display scaling on high DPI settings". Press OK to close the dialog box.

Oh! This is very important. I almost forgot...

Windows Vista has a system called Shadow Copy. It is restricted to some special folders, but it includes the "Program Files" and on Vista x64 the "Program Files (x86)" folders. What it does is that for some file extensions it keeps copies in another folder (called a Virtual Store). The idea is that whenever the data gets corrupted or overwritten by an unauthorized program or by a user action which Vista thinks is invalid it gets the old data back. However, it is a bit buggy and can start to keep corrupt data. Especially after a reinstall of a corrupt game. It does weird things like: It may either read the virtual store data or the actual data (you'll never know which), but when you drag a file from a folder which it protects it will always copy the one in the virtual store. It can drive you nuts.

You can find the virtual store at C:\Users\InsertYourAccountNameHere\AppData\Local\VirtualStore

The best thing you can do is to install the game in some other folder. A folder like "C:\Games\Bethesda\Oblivion" is safe.

You can also delete the Oblivion folder in the VirtualStore. As far as I can tell it doesn't recreate the virtual store once deleted after a reinstall. That workaround seems safe too. But make a backup before trying. Just to be safe.

I've never installed Oblivion under Vista in its default folder, because I encountered problems with other software and the virtual store before. So I would like to know what files (if any) it actually stores there with and without mods. Can someone check this?

I suspect that it will at least store the original ini-files there and probably some other registered files which Vista thinks are data files which need protection.

The Windows and ProgramData folders are other victims of the virtual store.

Played some more with AMD's Fusion for Gaming...

I wrote that it allows access to Catalyst profiles. That is not true. Instead it gives access to the Catalyst Auto Tune functionality.

I've also made some mistakes below earlier, that I have corrected later. The software is new and there's not much documentation, so it is trial on error. But the info below is probably accurate.

I am not sure if this app works on AMD's Phenom only, but I wouldn't be surprised when that was the case.

The hardware options also give access to Catalyst Auto Tune and AMD Overdrive. These options are only interesting for overclockers. However, be carefull with those it can make your system unstable. Real overclockers use the BIOS and often have special tools for overclocling graphics cards. Those are not interested in these options either.

It allows you to use AMD Boost. That can switch off Cool'n'Quiet and power-state switching which will improve performance. Usually these options are available in the BIOS only.

It also allows you to switch on hard disk drive acceleration. That also disables their power saving mode.

In Vista there are two places where you can play with services:
1) Running "Services" from the "Administrative Tools".
2) Running "MSConfig.exe" by typing "MSConfig" (without the quotes) on the Start Menu.
Of course these two have nothing to do with AMD's Fusion.

Option #2 is handy, because it will tell you when you have disabled a given service or start-up application. This allows you to experiment and rollback features you have disabled. Very nice.

AMD's Fusion has less options than MSConfig, but it does allow you to have different profiles. Each one is accessible by a name. The three default profiles are safe and don't have extreme memory and thread improvements, but you can add your own. This is also a handy tool to experiment with. If you switch off the profile it will enable all services you disabled in the profile. So, be careful what to disable. Check "Services" found in "Administrative Tools" to see what services are actually running. Disabling a service in a profile, that was already stopped will start it if it wasn't disabled. I think it is saver to experiment with Fusion than the "Services" and "MSConfig" applets, because you can always disable the profile and reboot to return to your safe configuration when you screw up.

Fusion provides you with options to switch off the start-up applications for the current user and/or for all users.

It prevents some services to be disabled. I think they do that to be sure that the basic services required to keep your machine running will not be killed.

It doesn't allow third party services (i.e. non-Microsoft services) to be stopped. No idea why. Maybe that will be available in later releases, Or maybe they don't want to fiddle with third party stuff. Legal rights or too complex to test?

Another advantage is that it doesn't require you to reboot. That means that it takes a while for the services to stop. It can cause a temporary increase in memory and threads, but that will soon fade away and the improvements will kick in. The same applies to when you disable a profile. It takes time for the stuff you disabled to get enabled and that starting up can increase thread and memory usage, but that will return to normal after everything has been initialized.

If you already tweaked your system using "Services" and/or "MSConfig" then there is not much that Fusion can improve.

I've changed the text in the above posts several times while testing Fusion. I know think it is fairly accurate,