Northernx Posted March 17, 2012 Share Posted March 17, 2012 I guess its bound to happen to everyone and it happened to me. Yesterday, my game was playing perfectly and when I say perfectly, I mean that it would freeze once in a while, ctd one in a while and so on but, yesterday things got really out of hand. My system is not top of the line by any means: I am running an Intel 6320 dual core 1.8ghz processor, 2 gigs of ram and an Nvidia Geforce 8800GT- GDDR3- 512MB Memory / 256Bit Bus. I have been able to play the game since release at mostly high settings with AA off. I have several texture packs installed but not the DLC HD Patch (no 4gig memory). The problem happened all of a sudden with a freeze. I had to hard reset, continued on for a while then another freeze with colors changing and flashing. Shut down the machine, rebooted into the game and it now freezes the moment a save opens or right at the loading screen. I have tried disabling all mods and lowering settings to minimum to no effect. I have tried loading older saves with the same result. I have been running the Nvidia 295.73 drivers for a while now and they have been just fine. Last night I decided that perhaps the lastest 296.1 driver would solve the problem and it did not. On top of it all when I tried to uninstall the 296.1 drivers to reinstall my friendly 295.73, the uninstall went badly and I was unable to reinstall the older drivers. (The infamous "Access Denied Problem). Today I did a system restore to just before the 296.10 drivers and everything is back to where I was except I lost the Nvidia Control Panel custom settings for TES5: Skyrim...no big deal, but the main problem still persists, I cannot start the game at all. I do use the SKSE launcher for the SkyUI mod but the game won't with it or without it. Freeze at the loading screen followed by shifting colors and text turning into white blocks. I don't think overheating is the issue because the game would start then crash after some stress. Any ideas? Suggestions would be greatly appreciated because as it stands the game is kaput. Thanks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Northernx Posted March 18, 2012 Author Share Posted March 18, 2012 Well, problem solved. After poking around in the guts of my machine for most of the day and coming to a point where windows wouldn't even start anymore except in safe mode, I decided to toss the video card and install an old 7950GT. You can guess the rest. My 8800 had become so unstable that it began corrupting my reboot process. Anyway, it's history. I am up and running but afraid to try Skyrim :) Bad memories although those should pass in the next half hour or so... not one to leave things alone :)) Done deal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GomuGomu64 Posted March 18, 2012 Share Posted March 18, 2012 Eh. I say get an ATI. I've (As in, personally. Your mileage may vary). My 6670 DDR3 runs Skyrim like a dream with graphic mods (Albeit with a bunch of tweaking, but hey.). I'd recommend nabbing one if your not going to play on high resolutions (Card does absolutely dandy on 1280X1024, and at that res, 2/4X AA or FXAA will be fine for getting rid of the jaggies). Don't know if the 7950GT will hold up. My 8600GT couldn't cope with Skyrim. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rennn Posted March 18, 2012 Share Posted March 18, 2012 But with ATI you can't use SSAO in Skyrim unless you get ENB (fps killer). In addition, the Nvidia driver updates got me an extra 20 fps above what my hardware would normally provide. I'd stay with Nvidia if I was you.Also, it's almost certainly not Skyrim that messed up your video card. Chances are it started to die, and running a game as high-stress as Skyrim sped up the process. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Northernx Posted March 18, 2012 Author Share Posted March 18, 2012 But with ATI you can't use SSAO in Skyrim unless you get ENB (fps killer). In addition, the Nvidia driver updates got me an extra 20 fps above what my hardware would normally provide. I'd stay with Nvidia if I was you.Also, it's almost certainly not Skyrim that messed up your video card. Chances are it started to die, and running a game as high-stress as Skyrim sped up the process. I agree with you on the stress part. I know that the game did not kill the card because once I had the 7950 installed, the game booted up immediately with none of the video glitches I had seen with the 8800. The problem of course is that I am now getting 12fps inside Jorrvaskr. The 7950 is simply not nearly strong enough for Skyrim and all the graphic texture mods that we all like to install. I am just happy to have the comp running again and will probably be shopping for a totally new gaming rig as this one is weak in too many places. The 8800 was fun while it lasted and I have to say that I was quite surprised at how much it could handle. It was one pretty good card. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BigDon1 Posted March 18, 2012 Share Posted March 18, 2012 A side tip that can perhaps help lengthen the life of a graphic-card and the computer; Clean the insides of it sometimes (perhaps once every couple of months, up to you though how often). Dust-bunnies and dirt built-up on the cards, fans, vents, etc... over time can cause problems, overheating issues, etc... A can of compressed-air can help with this (be careful not to focus too long with a concentrated-blast of air on just one part though, keep the motion going and use short bursts of air). Keep the computer well-ventilated (ensure nothing is blocking the air vents). A clean and cool computer is a happy computer ;) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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