Huge NMS file: steamapp_pipeline_cache.foz

[Krash Megiddo]

I moved NMS to my C: drive to reduce game load time. It worked, but I noticed this huge file gets created here:
Path: C:\Program Files (x86)\Steam\steamapps\shadercache\275850\fozpipelinesv6\
File: steamapp_pipeline_cache.foz

Last year I looked at this and it was 16gb. Today its grown to 41gb. That's a big deal for me with limited space on my C: drive. I deleted it and the game runs fine, but its only a matter of time before it gets out of control again.

I could simply move it back to D: with unlimited space, but are there any other solutions? I rather like the fast load time of the SSD.

[Mr. Bufferlow]

I remember that deleting the shader cache was a common "solution" offered for folks having problems running the game. (At least back in the early days)

I never was quite clear where I would even find that....but apparently you found it!

[+VLFBERHT+]

That is Steams shadercache management schema as a Global Setting... Go to Steam / Settings / Shader Pre-Caching...

Read what it does, then decide if you want to disable it or not.

I have it Disabled (NMS_app id: "275850" does not exist in my steamapps\shadercache location)

I experimented with it a while back (when NMS was OpenGL) and only got slightly longer load times when i first fire up NMS and maybe some transitions like, restoring in-game save and warp transitions... once in game (just tooling around in a single solar system) i didnt believe it mattered that much but, i have not checked the difference again in a long time, they may have optimized it further after transitioning to Vulkan.

THanks for reminding me, i'm going to Enable it :)

P.s. I would make a backup of your current NMS save folder with shadercache "enabled" first before you start playing with it disabled.

[wkitty42]

Originally posted by +VLFBERHT+:

P.s. I would make a backup of your current NMS save folder with shadercache "enabled" first before you start playing with it disabled.

why?

i just turned this off to regain the ~10Gig of drive space that i've been needing recently... my related questions to this setting are:
1. should there be anything left in steamapps/shadercache when this setting is turned off?
2. should i delete everything remaining in there if there is something?
3. if 2 is "yes" does it matter if i delete it with steam running or no?

[Zak]

I have shader cashing turned on in Steam by default, never changed it and this file is only around 440MB after 150+ hours of playing. Why are yours so large?

[Jaggid Edje]

Mine is only 800 MB, with over a thousand hours of play without messing with it. It's kind of crazy yours is so large, @Krash.

My steam shadercaches across all of the (hundreds) of games I have installed is not even 16 GB (it's only 1.2 GB, total, for ALL of the games combined).

[DennisM the Diligent]

Thanks for mentioning this. My NMS shadercache file is 219 GB. I'll disable the steam shader cache and recover that space.

[Jaggid Edje]

Originally posted by Krash Megiddo:

I could simply move it back to D: with unlimited space, but are there any other solutions? I rather like the fast load time of the SSD.

You could use mklink to set it up so that the shadercaches folder is 'actually' on a different drive while leaving the game still installed on the SSD. Though I'd honestly say having the shadercaches on the SSD speeds up load times too, so personally wouldn't do it.

[wkitty42]

when i turned off my shader cache, i regained 4+Gig of drive space...

why was mine (and others') so large? idk but it may be due to GPU driver updates and poor code to replace the old shaders with new ones... maybe the shader names changed? idk...

currently i have only like 5 steam games installed out of some 50 or so that i have in my library... most of my games are pretty large, i guess... i like the more realistic looking ones with stories and as much open world as i can get... anyway, i have to watch what i have installed because my 1TB SSD is smaller than i wish it was and i have no other storage in my gaming system at this time... i do plan to add a 4TB SSD sometime but... well... yeah...

[Krash Megiddo]

Originally posted by +VLFBERHT+:

That is Steams shadercache management schema as a Global Setting... Go to Steam / Settings / Shader Pre-Caching...

Thanks! No more bloated file ready to explode I noticed a little more stuttering in my test run, but not sure if that's because of this change or not.

Originally posted by Jaggid Edje:

Mine is only 800 MB, with over a thousand hours of play without messing with it. It's kind of crazy yours is so large, @Krash.

Because I'm special!

[+VLFBERHT+]

Originally posted by wkitty42:

Originally posted by +VLFBERHT+:

P.s. I would make a backup of your current NMS save folder with shadercache "enabled" first before you start playing with it disabled.

why?

i just turned this off to regain the ~10Gig of drive space that i've been needing recently... my related questions to this setting are:
1. should there be anything left in steamapps/shadercache when this setting is turned off?
2. should i delete everything remaining in there if there is something?
3. if 2 is "yes" does it matter if i delete it with steam running or no?

1. Yes. All the shader files will remain there, but i suppose it will not add or remove compiles files when disabled.

2. I personally had "steam" shadercache disabled from long ago and there has been no 275850 folder present at all (until i enabled steam shadercache yesterday). I havnt experimented to see if 275850 is deleted by the system if shadercache is disabled ...
NMS orginally had it's own shadercache folder in GAMEDATA when it was OpenGL. It still does, but it's empty and i'm not sure why it's there ?

3. I would disable shadercache, exit Steam then delete the folder.

Based on my experience playing NMS and not having the folder there at all, disable shadercache then delete 275850 folder to test but again, i would backup your latest NMS save folder before you proceed, just in case something odd happens. Check for playability and for crashes or other undesirable issues and if they offend, re-enable shadercache.

[+VLFBERHT+]

Originally posted by Zak:

I have shader cashing turned on in Steam by default, never changed it and this file is only around 440MB after 150+ hours of playing. Why are yours so large?

I had it disabled until yesterday.

Played for a while. Teleported around to various planets, in and out of a few space stations, visit some bases etc... my newly created 275850 folder only holds 380 MB of "stuff".

Have no idea why OP's folder grow so massive.

Maybe it's based on the performance of the hardware [system] ? ... i have 11GB vram and 32GB RAM + a fast SSD.

[NZ.Zero]

wow great info Krash thanks

[Zak]

Originally posted by +VLFBERHT+:

Originally posted by Zak:

I have shader cashing turned on in Steam by default, never changed it and this file is only around 440MB after 150+ hours of playing. Why are yours so large?

I had it disabled until yesterday.

Played for a while. Teleported around to various planets, in and out of a few space stations, visit some bases etc... my newly created 275850 folder only holds 380 MB of "stuff".

Have no idea why OP's folder grow so massive.

Maybe it's based on the performance of the hardware [system] ? ... i have 11GB vram and 32GB RAM + a fast SSD.

I doubt it's hardware related. It's probably a bug in NMS.

[wkitty42]

Originally posted by Zak:

Originally posted by +VLFBERHT+:

Maybe it's based on the performance of the hardware [system] ? ... i have 11GB vram and 32GB RAM + a fast SSD.

I doubt it's hardware related. It's probably a bug in NMS.

ummm... how can it be a bug in NMS when the cache being discussed is a steam thing completely outside of NMS?

why are so many people so quick to blame a/the game rather than the tool the game resides within? :sigh:

[+VLFBERHT+]

Originally posted by wkitty42:

Originally posted by Zak:

I doubt it's hardware related. It's probably a bug in NMS.

ummm... how can it be a bug in NMS when the cache being discussed is a steam thing completely outside of NMS?

why are so many people so quick to blame a/the game rather than the tool the game resides within? :sigh:

Yes, it's not logical to be an "NMS Bug" since myself and others report the Steam shadercache folder for NMS in the hundreds of MB's.

It seems more logical that it's either, the way Steams Universal OpenGL/Vulkan shader cache system interacts with OP's hardware -OR- How OP's Hardware (health or other criteria) interacts with NMS causing Steam's shadercache system to "seemingly" bloat on OP's specific configuration.

Still not enough data-points to indicate that anything is truly wrong with having this shadercache scheme go to 40GB ... would need OP's system spec and then have several other NMS'ers with same or similar system specs chime in also reporting there 275850 file size.

I'll play for a few months and check it again.

All i know is, since i turned Both back ON, overall play where one would expect shadercache to help, WOW, big difference in how smooth NMS runs.