how to fix super long save time

[[59th] Pew Pew You're Dead]

does anyone know? i'm level 73 so im averse to risk in terms of messing around with mods incase it bricks my save, but everytime i save the game it takes like 1 min+ to complete.

[sdack]

Originally posted by Vlad 254:

Don't take it so personal and don't make it personal. You are not a Bethesda developer either. Why always attack people? ...

I am not attacking you. It is not my fault that you are not a Bethesda developer. Perhaps get used to not being one and accept it as a fact. It will feel less like an attack and an insult and more like the truth.

[lizrdfishr]

Originally posted by sdack:

I am not attacking you. It is not my fault that you are not a Bethesda developer. Perhaps get used to not being one and accept it as a fact. It will feel less like an attack and an insult and more like the truth.

But this is off topic.

The more we talk about this and not about fixing super long save times, the worse this gets until the topic is lost, everyone gets cheesed off at everyone else, and confusion reigns supreme.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LQCU36pkH7c

I keep a rolling 5 saves and permasave every 50 after the start. In my game I can load saves 1, 2, 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300, 350, 400, 450, 458, 459, 460, 461, and 462.

I only have 16 save files and I can go anywhen I need.

[smr1957]

Originally posted by lizrdfishr:

I keep a rolling 5 saves and permasave every 50 after the start. In my game I can load saves 1, 2, 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300, 350, 400, 450, 458, 459, 460, 461, and 462.

I only have 16 save files and I can go anywhen I need.

Yes, that is exactly how it should be - and as you get even more saves (or depending on how often you save), you can change it to every 100.

[sdack]

Originally posted by lizrdfishr:

sdack, please let this rest.

You give it a rest. Telling people not to use autosaves and quicksaves, because some run countless mods is about the dumbest and most biased nonsense one can tell players. And all the crying on how this was an attack or how it was common knowledge by "real" modders (please do not make me laugh...) just shows how far off base some of you are. Many players do not play with mods. It is utter nonsense to then go into threads and tell people to stop using autosaves and quicksaves as this will lead to players only saving their game less frequently and they end up with less savefiles to go back to.

[Vlad 254]

Here we go with the "dumb" comments again, insulting people is not at all helpful. Don't they have rules against that? Can we please be civilized and focus on helping the op, then let them decide/

[lizrdfishr]

Originally posted by sdack:

You give it a rest. Telling people not to use autosaves and quicksaves, because some run countless mods is about the dumbest and most biased nonsense one can tell players. And all the crying on how this was an attack or how it was common knowledge by "real" modders (please do not make me laugh...) just shows how far off base some of you are. Many players do not play with mods. It is utter nonsense to then go into threads and tell people to stop using autosaves and quicksaves as this will lead to players only saving their game less frequently and they end up with less savefiles to go back to.

I didn't say anything of the sort. It would be foolish of me to make such presumptions based on one simple question at the top of the thread, and I attempt to not be such a fool.

I just want to be back on topic.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2912401759
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2912401779

Dunno if this helps, OP. Would be interested to hear if cleaning up the files like sdack suggested in the first reply did the trick.

[rabitsrule]

try to go some where safe and wait 30 days to let the game reset and clean the cells because sky rim saves keep track of everything arrows dead bodies dishes misc stuff that could of been knocked around in a fight and if you hoard a lot of stuff in chest try to sell stuff you really don't need and check your mod list for bad mods that are know for save bloat and if you use skyui get the flashing save game fix

[Ozymandias]

Originally posted by lizrdfishr:

Dunno if this helps, OP. Would be interested to hear if cleaning up the files like sdack suggested in the first reply did the trick.

OP already tried removing old saves and mentioned it in his previous attempt on the forums. That thread turned into a futile discussion on Vortex vs MO2, and now it's something else.

He also posted his mod list, assuming it didn't change since a few days ago.

[Death Approaches]

sdack is clearly a clown, and clowns are -- well, at least entertaining.

As for auto or quick save who gives a skeever's butt? Sync'd saves with Steam, that could easily be, but that's up to you. Not the issue here, nor is it hundreds / thousands of saves in the directory - the game I'm using now has 2681 saves, and 26 some-odd subdirectories in Documents\My Games\Skyrim Special Edition\Saves each with a few snapshot full and quick and even console-initiated saves for testing, meaning lots of save files, but also the plugins.txt to put in AppData\Local and the *.ini configs too... because when you're trying to recreate something, you think it's solely about your save game and your installed mods? Well, children think many things, it's true.

The conversation being about SDD or HDD is also asinine, On a 2.5" laptop 7200 1TB drive from 2016, a save takes a fraction of a second, with ~11GB of mods loading, just a continue game from a fresh start-up makes RAM take up 13.8GB and VRAM 6.6GB with my 880-ish mods on this build.

Save game write time? let me open the console... hdd mind you... F5 quicksave...
Save started
Default domain
14784 objects total
3138 public objects
0 objects in aqueue
Save finished in 0.018000 sec

Nope.

There's ONE thing that makes saves go wonky slow, bloated and oversized and trying to access script variables that no longer exist - that's you, user. You did it. Likely with mods. Likely a victim of save bloat enabling tonnes of things not understanding the consequences; like SLab people that track EVERY NPC and give them individual sexual partners and history. Uhhh... you know how many NPCs there are, right? You want to store 26 more variables for every single one? OK. You do you.

Y'know what's embarrassing?? NOT EFF'ING ONCE did someone say, hey go into your saves directory and tell me what size they are, even a late-game save with all DLCs of AE CC content like fishing saints and the various home additions to hearth, will only take up about 10 megs or so. That's it.

So if your save is huge? There's your issue, you're an inexperienced mod user in over their head. I'd suggest a save game cleaner. (there are many, use nexus and try to stay away from ones not updated in a decade)

However if your save is normal size for a 70s level character who did most / all of the DLC content already? It's a mod interrupting, trying to query variables for mods you no longer have active or in a different load order.

You think we're kidding when mod creators say, any mod that doesn't just overwrite existing little stuff like DDS loose files etc. needs a new start, but it's true an awful lot of the time.

Do exactly what Ozy told you like the 2nd reply - start a new game, don't care how many mods just don't change which are active or their load orders, and get to a point you can save, and save, and see if it's normal speed. (it will be.)

Because everything is your own doing, I could almost guarantee it.

[psychotron666]

But if it's taking a minute to save, it's more than just save bloat - or the save is bloated to astronomical sizes.


In either case, that's mod issues. There's a mod, or two or three that are causing the save bloat and long save times.

A level 200 that has done every quest won't be taking a minute to save.

[sdack]

Originally posted by Death Approaches:

The conversation being about SDD or HDD is also asinine, ...

No. The more a drive is cluttered the higher the file fragmentation on the drive gets. This is quite noticeable on mechanical drives, meaning, HDDs. If the savefile then reaches a size of i.e. 100MB (5-15MB should be about normal size) and the OS has to fragment it and there is little space left on the drive then the latency of the mechanic, as well as the increased amount of seek operations of the OS to write the data across several tracks on the platter(s) adds a significant delay, which will reduce a peek throughput of 100MB/s for a modern HDD into 10MB/s and less. You will not see this effect with very large files as these will either fit or produce an out-of-disk-space error. It only shows with files that are just small enough to fill the remaining space of an already packed drive.

If OP still has a problem with it then knowing the file size would be helpful. In my experience should the size be around 5-15MB for an unmodded or lightly-modded game.

Another issue is the use of an external drive for the Documents folder or using the wrong USB port for it. It happens occasionally that someone does not know the difference and plugs their mouse into a blue port and the external drive into a black port. The blue USB ports (3.0) are the faster ones and should be used for external drives, and the black ones (1.1/2.0) should be used for mice, keyboards and other slow devices.

Using a USB stick for the Documents folder is as bad because many of these sticks have very low write speeds and the older these are the worse their speed is. Not sure how Steamdeck and consoles handle savefiles here but keeping savefiles on an old USB stick can cause long save times, too.

[Senor Cinco]

Long saves are due to large save files. There's no magic to it. It's math. The more stones in a bucket, the heaver it is. It has absolutely nothing to do with Autosaves. However, Manual saving and keeping a max of 5 saves at a time is good practice.

Alas, the whole "Don't Autosave" practice comes on the heals of the Dragonborn DLC. The game would crash as soon as it Autosaved in Raven Rock. When players realized that disabling Autosaves fixed that issue, they also noticed a better overall experience. It became a staple management practice after that.

You want quicker save/load times? Don't pack storage containers with 10,000 of every item in the game. The more containers and separated items the better.

Items you don't want and/or cannot carry? Put them in respawing containers or a fallen enemy to clean them out of the save file.

Also, not trying to do every quest in the game with one character will help keep the file size down.

[alexander_dougherty]

Basically once you have a long load time, and have deleted excess saves, there isn't a huge amount you can do to reduce the load time.

You could try removing any texture mods like ENBs, or mods that use vanilla assets, don't remove mods that have scripts. But it has to be said that if you want those mods there isn't much point removing them....

Basically your best bet is starting a new game, and looking at your load order to see what you can remove.... also if you are starting a new game, use the unofficial patch, it helps prevent save bloat...

[LiMpY]

One thing that could slow down saving and hasn't been mentioned is your Virus Checker. Some of these utilities want to parse every byte moving to and from your HDD which could have a significant effect on write speed.... that's all I got. :/

[SIMelissa]

When I get tired of reading the back and forth comments on Steam from those in the know and those who think they know, I do a quick Google search and then make up my own mind. Of course, this means I also have to accept any consequences of my own choice. But then, that's what being an adult is all about, right?

I did a Google search titled "Skyrim quicksave vs save" and the results that came up helped me make an informed decision. No quicksaves for me. I always turn off the quicksaves in my game.