I solved my issue and that was I didn't tick the "Load Loose Files" box in the Data Files option in the Skyrim launcher before launching Skyrim.

If you want to know if your games has been updated just check the version in-game and if you have 1.2.0.21 I think then Skyrim has been updated. Also check the \Steam\steamapps\common\Skyrim\Data folder for Skyrim.esm and Update.esm/esp.

where is load loose files ?

before you launch the game you get the start up screen - hit data files and tick the box at the bottom

Click on Data Files in the launcher then tick the "Load Loose Files" box in the left corner of that window and click OK.

Data Files is grayed out for me :/

Loose Files didn't work for me, still freezes

Also tried vsync off (as i thought vsync without triple buffering would be bad) but it makes no difference

Crap now it crashes to desktop, before appear the new game menu etc.

The freezes seem to become more and more as you progress through the world

Forget about using a horse as well

I am also having random freezing, the game doesn't crash just the screen freezes for several seconds, the interval between freezes increases when outside a lot. run a hundred yards and freeze, rinse and repeat.

I'm on Windows XP
EVGA 9800 GTX+ 1 gig video card

game runs smooth as silk when it's not freezing randomly.

ive tried low settings, high settings with and without FXAA turned on and without/without AA on

I have also tried setting Affinity on the process to just 1 core and tried setting higher priority on the process in the task manager...

nothing seems to help

checked my video drivers and they are up to date.

Skyrim was updated with the patch, but didn't fix the random freezes...

I did check to see if it was loading, but when it randomly screen freezes my hard drive light is not on, and there is no churning of the hard drive, so it's not that.

I don't know what else to do other than wait and hope there's a patch, but of course enough to drive one mad waited over a year for this and have it and now can't play it

Well thats the problem of most ppl here, i reinnstaled and try new things... any change i update here.

Exact same problem as everyone else: 5-8 second freezes, while cpu is @ 100%, then game continues. It's especially bad in whiterun (big open world, lots of npcs, etc.)

Windows XP
Core 2 Duo E8400 @ 3.0ghz
4 gb ram
GTX 470
SoundMax Audio

I think this freezing thing is probably a Windows XP / XP drivers (sound/audio/directx) issue - maybe a dual core issue (CPU can't keep up.) NPCs seem to trigger it a lot.

Keep reporting back everyone!

I don't see any number in game stating the version? And i can't do anything with ESM files?

:[

Open the game (TAB) menu and see a small number there.

Same here. Game hangs (except audio) for about five seconds, then proceeds as normal. Sometimes two of these hangs occur in rapid succession, but never more than that. Once, the second hang totally froze the computer and I had to reboot. It's occurring almost strictly while traveling cross country, every 30-60 seconds at worst. Reminds me of Morrowind, only without the 'Loading' message.

It did occur at a few specific points, though, during the opening escape. The first was when the dragon blew a hole through the tower -- stalled for a few seconds, then immediately *boom*. Also occurred while escaping under the city, though I can't remember the exact point; I think it was when approaching the torture room. Those incidents led me to believe it was a script problem. My CPU's not the greatest, so I'm usually suspicious of heavy scripting.

Pentium E2160 Dual Core 1.8 (svcks, but the game is running smoothly aside from this issue)
NVidia GT 430 1 GB
3GB RAM
Windows XP
Realtek HD

Same problem here. Try everything, no good.

win xp 32
E8400
GTX 260
4G ram
ENVY24 Famili Audio / Realtek HD ( I try both sound hardware, both freezing. Change HZ didn't help also)

Perhaps this problem is similar to Oblivion's footsteps BUG, just worse.

update:
It looks many ppl use integrated Realtek soundcard. My motherboard use realtek too.
But I have another stand alone VIA ENVY24 sounde card and it freezeing too.

update2:
Sometimes it freeze on loading screen.
no crash so far.........

Ok, so, i seem to have resolved my problems....

I ground through everything else in the forums i could find.
Sound/soundcard related
loose files
community patch
DEP
total reinstall of everything
etc

Turns out, that it was a conflict between the catalyst app from ATI and the game. With my cards set to force their settings on game, not use app settings, it was creating a battle between the two. By turning both my cards, in every field possible, to 'use application settings' it's now running like butter.

Give it a try! i'm kicking myself w.how easy it was.

Can you elaborate? I know I heard that somewhere before... can you tell me how to get to the catalyst app? sorry kind of a noob

Didnt work for me

Im convinced it's a bug with XP, although the one who posted this thread is using Win7.
The symptom with Win7 varies, but with XP, it's actually not so random, it happens every 10-20 minutes, freezing for a few seconds then going on as usual, and all happened in the open area.

I've tried the Load Loose Data and disabling Autosave suggestions, neither have worked.

Bumping since lots of people are having this problem and more and more threads keep getting made about it.

This has gotta be some kind of problem that Bethesda can fix.

Like other comments, this happens to me in outside areas, NEVER in inside areas. The game will just randomly freeze (sound keeps going).

After about 5 seconds, it unfreezes. I'm assuming this is due to the way that the game streams content in and out.

I set absolutely everything to the lowest settings, and turned off all possible options, and it still does this.

I can turn the settings to medium / high, and the game runs perfectly smoothly, except for this occasional 5-second freezing that happens all the time.

It's very weird. My computer is on the lower end, but it does meet / exceed the required specs.

I have a 3.00 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo running Win XP SP3 with 3.25 gigs ram.

I have a GeForce 8800 GT (a 512 MB card), running the game at 1680 x 1050, and 30+ gigs free hard drive space.

Hi. (I hate to be one of the guys that always says "same here" and doesn't help with anything lol"


Same thing. Thought it was just me.


Pretty much getting exactly what most of you described.
Runs fine on high/med. Apart from the freeze we have.

Freezing outside for about 5-10 seconds, only while travelling outside.
100% cpu at the time of the freeze.
Turned all settings to low + windowed, no cigar.
Done the driver update shinanigans, v-sync etc.
Even ran combofix.

Reading this thread makes it seem that we just need a patch.

Thought it could just be my cpu but I would see changes in other settings and performance.

Specs.

XP
Core 2 duo, E7500 2.93gz
3.50GB RAM
Nvidia GTS250
1920 x1080
High amount of porm.
Dust.

I was thinking it could be something like that. There's no triple buffering options for skyrim and vsync works a lot better with it on. But i've also tried vsync off with exactly the same thing so chances are it won't fix the issue everyones having

Same problem here - game runs very smoothly on mid-high settings in interiors, but exteriors are a lag-fest. Every 1-5 minutes (depending on whether anything major's happening, or I'm moving into a new cell), I get very obnoxious pauses lasting for about 6 seconds (usually a couple in a row). Otherwise the framerate is perfectly fine. I've tried pretty much anything described in the thread, and the 15 minutes save thing seems to have made it better a *bit*


My specs:

Win XP 32 Bit
AMD Athlon II X2 240 2.79 GHz
3,12 GB of RAM
ATI Radeon HD 4800


No idea whether I have Realtek. How do I check on XP?

Control Panel -> Sounds and Audio Devices -> Hardware tab. Should list whatever relevant device(s) you have.

Really hope this is acknowledged by Beth soon... Skyrim is tremendous but I can't really get into it until these freezes (and the low volume issue) are fixed.