Fallout 3 Message Board  

I would very much like to know what kind of Tweak you did

Ok, but make sure you've got a backup of your OS incase anything happens as I won't be held responsible even though this is normally ok to do if you follow what I've typed.. so only do so if your very comfortable.

Only apply this if you have SP1 in Vista, without SP1 you will encounter serious problems. Restart your PC after applying this changes.

Open RegEdit and go to: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE \ SYSTEM \ CurrentControlSet \ Control \ Session Manager \ Memory Management

Change the value on PagedPoolSize to 18000000 (hexadecimal) from the default of 0. For other systems, change CurrentControlSet to look for ControlSet00x X = where CurrentControlSet is located.

This isn't the setting for PageFile which is related to how much RAM you have. More info on this can be found here: Link

Also, if you have X-Fi soundcard, use Alchemy and enter the following correct sound config as audio can be the main cause of app crashes - so don't have lots of codecs installed or make them as an exception:

Game Title: Fallout 3
Registry Path (this is for 64bit Vista in bold): HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Bethesda Softworks\Fallout3\Installed Path
Settings
Buffers: 6
Duration: 5
Maximum Voice Count: 128

If you still experience crashes, either load one of your previous saves or completely remove your mods using the excellent Fallout Mod Manager. I recommend this even if your mod states it is compatible with the latest version. Once its stable, don't revert back to using mods if you can help it.

I didn't have to do any tweaks whatsoever, I updated my video card drivers, and my DirectX. Before I did these things my game crashed when I would enter a new area, open a door, or entered VATS. I have not had any crashes for a week now and I have played over 30 hours of this game. UPDATE YOUR DRIVERS!!!!! By the way I am using a nVidia 8800GT to play Fallout 3 on medium settings, anything less than a 8800GT, you will suffer reduced game play and quality.

I have an 8600GT and it plays just fine on medium settings.

The new Fallout 3 v1.4.0.6 patch is out via Windows Live, let it update ingame. Its about 44Mb. Another reason to disable any mods as they won't work correctly until it gets updated.

@unyonface

All well and good updating drivers but most here would've already done that, I update all my drivers immediately but I suspect there are more trouble with crashes relating to ATI than nVidia. Its not always the case that latest drivers will solve crashes in the minority of cases; sometimes older ones work better in certain games.

The latest ATI driver is 9.2 and I strongly recommend Crossfire owners to update to this to fix instability.