Breaking Skyrim on my Xbox One X - Implications for Starfield

What happens when we remove the 30fps cap for Skyrim on the Xbox One X?
In this video I'll outline the results of my weekend experimenting with Skyrim uncapped on the Xbox One X. What I found surprised me but I'll explain the interesting results with videos and FPS graphs.
Was there a reason Skyrim was hard-locked at 30fps on XB1X? Is there a reason for the Starfield 30FPS cap? I'll discuss this too.
Please note that i have done a small follow-on video to this one which includes accurate FPS results for the dragon fight. You can find it here: • Breaking Skyrim Update...
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Contents
00:00 The Start of it all!
00:14 Introduction to my crazy scheme
00:44 Background worth knowing
02:46 Experiment plan
03:10 Raw footage sampler
03:45 Methods & tech summary
04:40 Results
05:48 Discussion - spot my mistake (D'oh!)
06:56 Summary of findings
07:12 Implications for Starfield
08:06 Close-out
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Your questions and comments are very welcome. I am keen to hear other interpretations of these results.
I am making my KZbin channel ‪@ramnexus‬ home for gaming fans to hear about and discuss gaming technology. Likes, comments and subscriptions are hugely appreciated and will all help this channel to grow.
The original video was 3 minutes longer, with a detailed description of how I used TRDrop and interpreted its results. It was "too much information" so I dropped it. However, let me know if you want to see a video on the pros and cons of TRDrop.
Come back again and see what new videos I have put up.
Cheers...
Ramnexus out.
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URLs
Digital Foundry article on the 60FPS mod: www.eurogamer.net/digitalfoun...
Digital Foundry KZbin video on the 60fps mod: • Skyrim at 60FPS on Pla...
TRDrop: github.com/cirquit/trdrop
Bethesda’s Skyrim mods website: mods.bethesda.net/en/skyrim?n...
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Edited with Shotcut.

[@ramnexus]

Please note that i have done a small follow-on video to this one which includes accurate FPS results for the dragon fight. You can find it here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/eXqYn2Znar6VgK8

[@Solinvic]

Your theory about the screen tearing causing the FPS to be misreported is probably correct, I've also had issues before when trying to measure FPS with screen tearing. It also seems unlikely that the dynamic resolution scaling has been turned off with the mod, it only impacts the .ini file, turning off the 30hz vsync and allowing the game to run uncapped (quite literally just turning a 1 to a 0 in the settings). It has been a long while since I played/modded skyrim but I'm pretty sure the Creation Engine is just "hard" capped at 60 fps due to how the physics are tied to the frame rate and this can't be changed on consoles due to limitations on running 3rd party code, I'd imagine that the series X would be able to push it a lot further than 60fps if that hard limit wasn't there. A cool video regardless, especially with how interesting the ONE series hardware is.

[@ramnexus]

Thanks for the response. Glad I'm not the only one! Looking at the pic @ 06:06 of consecutive frames there is obviously a difference between each frame yet TRDrop reported it as

[@ramnexus]

I can now give a quick follow-up on this issue: I just finished testing FPS on Fallout New Vegas on 4 different consoles using TRDrop. Only the Xbox 360 does not have V-Sync and the FPS scores just for that console are quite obviously much higher than actual. Results for all other consoles make sense.

[@zafirovillarreal7462]

The screen tearing happening at the 60fps may be caused by using a monitor that is inputting more than 60 hz. I had that issue on my game after upgrading my monitor and found an article explaining why it is happening.

[@ramnexus]

Thanks for commenting! Yes, I think I made that mistake when I started using TRDrop (monitor is set at 120hz). I was getting strange readings and tearing. But am now able to record a direct video feed from the console, before it is displayed, via the video capture card, if OBS studio is set up right.

[@WizardPaul1976]

Fact is next gen games only work right on PC/PS 5/ XB Series X. I had XB1 X so I tried FPS mod. At first I did happy dance noticing how smooth only to turn and my pretty screen torn in half. Jk's Skyrim mod never worked on XB1X now on Series X no more crashes & fps problems. Pro tip: Series S is also not worth it on multi games. There's a reason why ppl complain Cyber Punk doesn't look & play right on XB1X. Don't worry Starfield 60fps mod coming soon. Also flying your ship off planet to space mod.

[@ramnexus]

Ha! I like it - "Don't worry Starfield 60fps mod coming soon". Yes, I can totally see that. It will be interesting to see how Starfield runs 12 months after launch. They released 9 patches for Skyrim in the first year or so. I can only imagine the same for Starfield.

[@Defiant1376]

Im installing Skyrim now. Im going to try the 60fps mod. I'm wondering if my ssd will make a difference. I'm making the presumption you're using the stand hdd one x.

[@ramnexus]

So the XB1X has the enhanced patch but does not have the FPS Boost - only the Series S and X have that feature. Re hard drives; I actually have a small USB3 SSD drive attached to my XB1X which seems faster than the console’s own mechanical drive - though I’ve not timed it.

[@Defiant1376]

@@ramnexus Yeah it will definitely be faster than the standard hdd. The speed of an internal and external ssd are very negligible.

[@dannydogs4385]

So basically, per usual, Bethesda will rely on modders to put in the fixes; including a 60 FPS mod for the series x. Due to how lazy Bethesda is and their reliance on the modders, I doubt they will ever update starfield to run at 60 FPS.

[@ramnexus]

Bethesda did eventually release an official 60fps mod for Skyrim SE on XB Series and PS5 when they brought out the Anniversary Edition, but I wonder if they would have done it if the mod had not already shown it was possible. Maybe - maybe not.