M17x R2 and Skyrim

I'm using 11.10 drivers with the 11.11cap1 app profiles.

With the specs that I have in my sig, what kind of performance should I be getting from skyrim? I get the best performance when I set Catalyst AI to advance, but that doesn't benefit my other games very much. I had the game on high but I had low frame rate then switched to medium but I haven't tried advanced ai yet. Any suggestions? What should I expect to reasonably get? How do I enable ingame FPS?

 

Intense, check this thread: http://forum.notebookreview.com/alienware-m17x/623774-elder-scrolls-skyrim-low-fps-8.html

there you can see what people are getting on wich settings, and there are also some tweaks to improve performance.
With your rig you should be able to achieve smooth 45-60 FPS with custom settings

edit: ingame FPS you can monitor with FRAPS or RadeonPro utility

 

ultra with 2xAA, +40fps I would say.

monitoring FPS ingame, I am using msi afterburner (for the past 2 days ), apparently it doesn't slow down the game like FRAPS (from rumors though, didn't try FRAPS)

 

And a rumor it is. FRAPS doesn't slow anything down when you're monitoring FPS. If you want proof, run a benchmark with FRAPS running, and another without it running. There is no difference whatsoever, other than the normal variance between benchmarks. Making a FRAPS movie is a whole other story because the program intentionally runs your game at a specified fps. I think a lot of people get the fps monitor and making a movie mixed up. MSI Afterburner is an overclocking program, and FRAPS is a fps monitoring program. Compare apples to apples.

 

I dont know how processor intensive Skyrim, but my specs are same as yours except for the processor.

I get 30-35 in town and 45-60 in caves (on default "high" settings). Frame rate drops a little (20-25)when there is a ton of fog affects like in Marcoth or at the bottom of waterfalls. I am gonna try some "tweaking" of the settings later today, but you should get 30-35 + most of the time with your rig.

 

What video driver version are you using? What do you have catalyst ai set to?

 

now it makes sense all those youtube geniuses complaining about FRAPS all the time... will try FRAPS asap this weekend

 

Also, Skyrim runs better with catalyst ai advanced and SC2 runs better with standard. Is there any way to make it so that I can have Skyrim run with advanced and keep standard on as default?

 

Just save the Profile on CCC one with Cat AI on advanced and one in Standard.

 

Even with it on Advanced it doesn't work that well. It helps for medium and low but high is laggy regardless. Any ideas whatsoever?