Incredibly low FPS on Skyrim with 2-way 670 SLI.

[TheInternal]

Hey all,

I started playing Skyrim again recently and added the SoSENB to it. I play skyrim on my 2560x1440 27" Catleap Yamakasi 2703. I have an old 24" 1920x1200 dell in portrait mode also hooked up / powered on. In NVIDIA control panel, it\'s set to "maximize 3d performance" and SLI is listed as enabled.

I\'m a little confused why Skyrim is averaging a mere 10-24 FPS. I set everything to ultra in the game, then did a few .ini tweaks suggested on NVIDIA\'s skyrim tweak post, as well as installing and enabling SoSENB. The FPS hangs around 10-20 FPS.

Is there something I need to adjust in a .ini file or something? Is this "normal" for a 2-way SLI rig for this game? Benches I\'ve seen (at a mere 4x AA) suggest 80+ FPS.

I tried disabling SLI, and my FPS is almost identical, suggesting that SLI isn\'t working worth a darn for some reason. GPU utilization on each core never goes over 52%.

Why is my framerate so darn low?

Yes, I\'ve already made sure the SLI bridge was connected firmly.

Relevant specs:

Core i5 3570k - OC at 4.4GHz
dual Gigabyte Geforce 670 GTX cards in 2-way SLI (model GV-N670OC-2GD)
16 GB DDR3
Samsung 830 SSD 256 GB programs drive
Windows 8 Pro
Geforce driver ver. 310.70

 

[Black Octagon]

If it stays the same when you disable SLI, that could mean that SLI is not scaling for some reason. But even then, a single 670 should get more than 10-24fps at 1440p...

Skyrim is a total mess. Not sure if you would consider completely uninstalling and reinstalling (with all the latest patches)? I myself have done this a few times.

Also, just in case it's not obvious, when troubleshooting Skyrim, do so in vanilla (non-modded) mode. Only re-enable mods when vanilla mode is working

 

[aaksheytalwar]

Even a single 670 should do much better than that. You probably skrewd some ini file or something.

 

[Qbah]

Aren't ENB configs using a custom d3d9.dll library? I don't know if that's impacting SLI or not though. Googling for ENB and SLI pops up threads on ENB forums with people having similar problems - SLI doesn't scale for them.

Also, 10-24 FPS at 2560x1600 with a heavy ENB on a single GTX670 sounds about right.

 

[TheInternal]

K. Deleted local content and .INI files. Redownloaded and installed. I've only tossed on a few mods, listed below. I may have discovered one of the big variables: disabling the anistropic filtering entirely in the game and doing it via the NVIDIA control panel. Hanging in the 40-60 FPS range mostly as a result... WITHOUT any ENB installed.

List of Mods / Alterations to the fresh install:
Not listed in mod list:
SKSE 1.6.6
UNP and UNPB body mods

Listed in Data Files:
Dawnguard.esm
HearthFires.esm
ApachiiHair.esm (hair mod)
Alicia.esm (aka "painslut" companion mod)
HighResTexturePack01.esp
HighResTexturePack02.esp
Fall of the Space Core, Vol. 1 (Portal 2 joke mode)
SkyUI (UI mod)
Tera Val Tirkai UNPB BBP.esp (UNPB BBP armor set)
R18Pn - Eisen Platte Armor.esp (UNPB BBP armor set)
R18Pn - Inner Wear Set.esp (UNP armor set)
Alicia.esp (companion mod .esp)
EMCompViljaSkyrim.esp (Vilja companion mod)
TERA Armors for Skyrim - UNPB-BBP.esp (UNPB BBP armor set)

 

[BrightCandle]

Presumably one of the mods is causing the issue?

Stock it should run well over 150 fps with vsync off on dual 670's on high graphics.

Do you have SSAA or somethng forced accidentally from NVidia CP?

Go back to a basic install of vanilla, run on high and confirm it works as it should. Or just check another game and confirm something wider isn't going wrong.

 

[blackened23]

Ditch the mods except for the stuff like hearthfire DLC, high res textures and what not. Like BC said ensure that your nvidia control panel has everything set to application preference - don't bother with extras until you hit a performance sweet spot. Mod wise, you can keep the high resolution texture mod but the rest, why bother? Mods have such an adverse performance effect in that game that I play with nothing except the basics. Sky UI? maybe. Nothing else.

You can literally go from 150 fps to 20 in that game from having too many mods - although it seems you haven't gone overboard in that respect.

Also, when you do a clean install of skyrim you'll have to dig around in your user folder to delete all of the configuration files I believe, although it sounds like you've taken care of that

 

[TheInternal]

been keeping vsync on since I've heard of some weirdness occurring if it's disabled. As for mods... that's one of the reasons I like games like Skyrim so much. With Oblivion, you could make the game entirely different. People are still making new stuff for Oblivion.

 

[notty22]

I read your post as if you have not tested other games to see if SLI is indeed working correctly? Why not run Heaven benchmark and enable SLI indicator in the NV control panel, it's option is at the top in the menu's/ 3D control settings. to see if you are getting appropriate performance.

 

[TheInternal]

All the other benchies and games I've run were just fine. Admittedly, it's been awhile since I've looked at any FPS number (at least a month or two).

Tossing ENB mod back in skyrim... it looks like it's effectively halving the FPS. bleargh.

 

[TheInternal]

Not surprising results here. The GPUs were maxxing out in afterburner, almost never dropped below 30 FPS.

Heaven Benchmark, max everything at 2560x1440

FPS:

58.7
Scores:
1480
Min FPS:
19.8
Max FPS:
142.5


Render:
direct3d11
Mode:
2560x1440 8xAA fullscreen
Shaders:
high
Textures:
high
Filter:
trilinear
Anisotropy:
16x
Occlusion:
enabled
Refraction:
enabled
Volumetric:
enabled
Tessellation:
extreme

Not very relevant to the skyrim issue. Apples to Oranges.