[willow]

Even an HD 4670 is better:

http://www.videocardbenchmark.net/video_lookup.php?gpu=GeForce+GT+420

Yes, it's a pathetic thing, only intended for business graphics, really (of course, it's *MILES ABOVE* the total, absolute CRAP from Intel).

lol...my HD 5670 is in, didn't even have to change the power supply and I'm running on high settings with no lag. GT 420...WHAT A PIECE OF CRAP. Thanks again.

[Allison Sizemore]

Maybe high, if you drop shadow quality and AA from the presets (assuming 1920x1080, you didn't specify). That's a weak CPU for Skyrim, which is largely CPU bound. Increasing the speed of the CPU might help you run more smoothly.

Going for a CPU that's faster, with fewer cores, would have been much better. Likewise getting a 560 (non-ti) or 6870/6850 would be better for the GPU.

Cool, like I said, he picked up the parts as a package deal for like $300, so I didn't expect too much, but shouldn't it at least outperform my G73SW (i7-2630QM @ 2.0-2.9GHz and 1.5 GB GTX460M)? I'm running High presets with medium shadows and ultra LOD at 1080p pretty smoothly.

Or perhaps I'm underestimating just how bad AMD processors are, you get what you pay for after all.

[Lovingly]

No, a console system isn't going to offer "Medium" image quality at High Resolution, only at Low Resolution. 1920 by 1080 is very high, and is also the setting that Bethesda was aiming for with their system requirements for PCs. 1680 by 1050 would be at the very absolute top of the Medium Resolution Range, or the lower end of High Resolution. For wide screen, 1440 x 900 would be a good number to use as a standard number for Medium.

Ok well my laptop display doesn't go above 1366x768 (I have no bluray discs nor do I ever intend to buy any so long as they make DVDs and I don't stream HD stuff so buying a more expensive screen on my laptop was pointless). So given those resolution limitations how does that affect how high I can push the graphic quality? (I know I can't achieve ultra but I never expected to, I'd be thrilled if I can achieve a medium setting even though that probably means it would look like the graphics of Oblivion from several years ago).

[james tait]

Want to get my brother a new PC for xmas (for Skyrim!). Looking at a PC specialist one:

CPU: Intel Core i5-2400 Quad Core (3.10Ghz, 6mb cache) + HD Graphics
Motherboard: ASUS P8768-V LX: USB 3.0, SATA 6GBs, ATI CrossFireX
Memory: 4GB Samsung DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2x2GB)
Graphics card: 1GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 560Ti

What settings can I expect to play at? Help much appreciated.

(And if it isn't a great rig, got any recommendations of sites with good pre-built computers?)

Thanks again,

Lookinglass.

[phillip crookes]

playing with radeon 4600 hd 512
6 ghz ram
plenty o harddisk
texture high
radial blur high
shadow medium
decal high

fxaa on
16:9 1360x768
anit-aliasing 8x
anisotropic filtering 8x

my system can more then handle the game at mostly high settings by default. i've tried a spread of settings and with the minimum possible, I still get not quite the same on the default setting when my screen freezes it sometimes crashes. and in doors the skip/lag issue is worse.

hope this helps.

[naomi]

Hey I'm debating on whether I should get skyrim for PC using my school laptop, or settle for the PS3 version which seems to be having a lot of issues right now.

Lenovo ThinkPad W500
Intel Core 2 Duo CPU T9600 @2.80 GHz
4GB RAM
ATI FireGL V5700 - 512 MB
Windows 7 64 bit
And about 1.5 yrs left on my warranty in case things go wrong

Also my max screen resolution is at 1680x1050

[Ian White]

Ok well my laptop display doesn't go above 1366x768 (I have no bluray discs nor do I ever intend to buy any so long as they make DVDs and I don't stream HD stuff so buying a more expensive screen on my laptop was pointless). So given those resolution limitations how does that affect how high I can push the graphic quality? (I know I can't achieve ultra but I never expected to, I'd be thrilled if I can achieve a medium setting even though that probably means it would look like the graphics of Oblivion from several years ago).

Your default will do fine for you. If you could "only" get Medium, it would still look fine.

Hey I'm debating on whether I should get skyrim for PC using my school laptop, or settle for the PS3 version which seems to be having a lot of issues right now.

Lenovo ThinkPad W500
Intel Core 2 Duo CPU T9600 @2.80 GHz
4GB RAM
ATI FireGL V5700 - 512 MB
Windows 7 64 bit
And about 1.5 yrs left on my warranty in case things go wrong

Also my max screen resolution is at 1680x1050

FireGL is for creating new graphics, as opposed to viewing animated graphics. The drivers and the firmware differ seriously between one and the other. For graphics cards, it is quite elderly now. The equivalent Radeon was the HD 3650. Your image quality will be better than the console version, although not by a very large margin.

[Richus Dude]

FireGL is for creating new graphics, as opposed to viewing animated graphics. The drivers and the firmware differ seriously between on and the other. For graphics cards, it is quite elderly now. The equivalent Radeon was the HD 3650. Your image quality will be better than the console version, although not by a very large margin.

Thanks, as long as the game will run smoothly with somewhat decent graphics I'm happy.

[Shianne Donato]

Want to get my brother a new PC for xmas (for Skyrim!). Looking at a PC specialist one:

CPU: Intel Core i5-2400 Quad Core (3.10Ghz, 6mb cache) + HD Graphics
Motherboard: ASUS P8768-V LX: USB 3.0, SATA 6GBs, ATI CrossFireX
Memory: 4GB Samsung DUAL-DDR3 1333MHz (2x2GB)
Graphics card: 1GB NVIDIA GEFORCE GTX 560Ti

What settings can I expect to play at? Help much appreciated.

(And if it isn't a great rig, got any recommendations of sites with good pre-built computers?)

Thanks again,

Lookinglass.

Ultra/Max for sure at 1080p res.

[Darren]

Why would Bethesda recommend 4 GB of RAM when the game won't use more than 2?

[Tina Tupou]

Windows all by itself uses about a GB, if it's either Vista or Win 7, leaving only a single GB for the game, and then you are stuck with wasting some of your memory on Steam's crap, so you really ought to have the full 3.2 that a 32 bit OS can access, or better yet, 4 GBs.

[Bedford White]

Quick question...

Nvidia GTX 580 or 2x ATI 5850's unlocked?

Using a 5870 right now on my AMD build, running 30 FPS with Ultra, uGridsToLoad @ 7, but with some dips when I use mods.

Which would be a better bet for having a 40-60 FPS w/ Mods and tweaks?

[Mariana]

Shadows are hard on CPU, and this game isn't very threaded, therefore to get the most out of it you need a CPU which has very good single thread performance. Unfortunately the Phenom is a little bit behind in that area compared to Intel Nehalem and Sandybridge (though it's better than the newer AMD Bulldozer chips), so it's possible your CPU is not helping shadow performance. Keep shadows at 'high' at most, and consider increasing the speed of your processor.

thankyou for your reply! i havent been able to check back in a while. just recently found out about hte cpu being used to render shadows...hope they fix that soon.

i am currently looking to upgrade my computer system largely from the ground up and was looking for what cpu to get. any youd suggest? im a AMD really devoted fan i must admit even if they cant come up with a i7 equivalent id rather go with amd. (oddly enough im also a nvidia really devoted fan, havent had conflic issues i know of yet and i always here about the issues with ati/amd video cards).

sad to here bulldozer chips lack in said area too.

[Jesus Duran]

What do you guys reckon are the requirements for completely tweaking out the game on a 1080p monitor? I.E. Ultra + .ini editing (with extra grids loading) + Post processing/shader mods + HD texture packs. The lot.

I'm getting rid of my old gaffer and currently looking at this:

Intel Core i5-2500K 3.3GHz
Gigabyte GA-Z68X-UD3P-B3 ATX LGA1155 Motherboard
Corsair Vengeance 8GB (2 x 4GB) DDR3-1600 Memory
MSI GeForce GTX 570 1.25GB Video Card
Windows 7 64-bit

[Daniel Brown]

I am looking to get a new laptop and the First requirement is that it has the ability to run Skyrim. I want it to at least be able to run medium, though I am hoping to edge med/high - high. I am however on a budget.

So here is my question.

I am not sure what the newer i7 processors are in relation to the quad core requirement. Is an i7 better for running the game, or is the quad better?

I will come back to post more specific specs for what I am looking at in the hopes some friendly techy types here can help me out. But first I need to know what processor to look for.

[+++CAZZY]

I tried to "edit" my above post to add this information and avoid double posting, but apparently I am not allowed to edit. So..

Here is the laptop I am looking at:


HP Pavilion DV7 notebook
2.4GHz/1.5GHz AMD quad-core A8-3500M accelerated processor w/ VISION A8 technology
HD+ BrightView LED display with 1600x900 resolution
6GB DDR3 SDRAM
640GB 5400 RPM hard drive
AMD Radeon HD 6750M switchable graphics with 1024MB GDDR5, up to 4085MB total graphics memory


Any good?

[Nicola]

I tried to "edit" my above post to add this information and avoid double posting, but apparently I am not allowed to edit. So..

Here is the laptop I am looking at:

HP Pavilion DV7 notebook
2.4GHz/1.5GHz AMD quad-core A8-3500M accelerated processor w/ VISION A8 technology
HD+ BrightView LED display with 1600x900 resolution
6GB DDR3 SDRAM
640GB 5400 RPM hard drive
AMD Radeon HD 6750M switchable graphics with 1024MB GDDR5, up to 4085MB total graphics memory

Any good?

Yes, that should handle the game fine. Quality settings mostly High, but quite a few Ultra, I'd guess.

[Music Show]

I tried to "edit" my above post to add this information and avoid double posting, but apparently I am not allowed to edit. So..

Here is the laptop I am looking at:


HP Pavilion DV7 notebook
2.4GHz/1.5GHz AMD quad-core A8-3500M accelerated processor w/ VISION A8 technology
HD+ BrightView LED display with 1600x900 resolution
6GB DDR3 SDRAM
640GB 5400 RPM hard drive
AMD Radeon HD 6750M switchable graphics with 1024MB GDDR5, up to 4085MB total graphics memory


Any good?

Given that my laptop (in sig below) can run the game @ 1680x945 at high settings mostly (but no AA and 12xAF)... yours will have no trouble doing the same..
The 6750M card should be able to handle 1600x900 res easily with High Textures and Med-High shadows that are tweaked, and High Distant Object Detail with High LODs...

Go for it mate!

[Undisclosed Desires]

Quick question...

Nvidia GTX 580 or 2x ATI 5850's unlocked?

Using a 5870 right now on my AMD build, running 30 FPS with Ultra, uGridsToLoad @ 7, but with some dips when I use mods.

Which would be a better bet for having a 40-60 FPS w/ Mods and tweaks?

For one thing the GTX580 is an awesome card and it will do anything skyrim can put out. I often hit my 120Hz cap (3D monitor) outside and in towns/dungeons its still above 60 usually. Using ultra settings with 4xAA/16xAF.

The other is that SLI/CF in skyrim is problematic at best currently. So your best "bet" is definately a single card.

[Daniel Brown]

Howdy, folks.

My computer's processor has been giving me holy hell lately, so I'm planning to start rebuilding the thing from the ground up. I'm getting a new motherboard, new RAM, et cetera.

I'm looking at dropping $124 on the AMD Phenom II X4 960T. Was wondering if this is a good processor for playing Skyrim. My video card is a GeForce GTX 460, which the first post implies will play the game pretty well. The processor is what I'm most worried about.

[OJY]

I have the following setup:

Intel Q6600 running standard clock rate of 2.4GHz
4GB RAM
NVidia 460 GTX (768MB)
1680 x 1050
Game runs with video settings on High

Skyrim runs almost perfectly on that set up. FPS is high (above 40) everywhere. The only reliable CtD was in Bonechill Passage when entering from the North but that seems to have been fixed. It did CtD on two other random occasions, both after several hours of gameplay which may be down to memory usuage. I've honestly had no other problems..

[Robyn Howlett]

thankyou for your reply! i havent been able to check back in a while. just recently found out about hte cpu being used to render shadows...hope they fix that soon.

i am currently looking to upgrade my computer system largely from the ground up and was looking for what cpu to get. any youd suggest? im a AMD really devoted fan i must admit even if they cant come up with a i7 equivalent id rather go with amd. (oddly enough im also a nvidia really devoted fan, havent had conflic issues i know of yet and i always here about the issues with ati/amd video cards).

sad to here bulldozer chips lack in said area too.

Well if you were doing a complete system rebuild then Skyrim really suits processors with great single threaded performance, so Intel's Sandybridge chips like the i5 2500 (or the K version if you want easy overclocking) are great, or a great budget build could use the i3 2120, then there are the new Ivy Bridge chips coming quite soon that should be even better.

For AMD you've kind of got two options - for Skyrim you're probably best of 'downgrading' slightly, and getting the best X4 phenom II, something like the 980 black edition - this is the best AMD processor for Skyrim, and as a bonus you wouldn't need to change the rest of your computer. Or wait for Piledriver and hope that AMD have improved their single threaded performance massively.

[Katie Louise Ingram]

Mention of Ivy Bridge brings up a caution that there's a number of "bridge" processors not worth having because they use "Pentium Dual" gutted out CPU cores; I believe those may be part of the Ivy Bridge family . .

[Jose ordaz]

Howdy, folks.

My computer's processor has been giving me holy hell lately, so I'm planning to start rebuilding the thing from the ground up. I'm getting a new motherboard, new RAM, et cetera.

I'm looking at dropping $124 on the AMD Phenom II X4 960T. Was wondering if this is a good processor for playing Skyrim. My video card is a GeForce GTX 460, which the first post implies will play the game pretty well. The processor is what I'm most worried about.

This is a great cpu for the money. It may unlock to a hexacore and even if doesn't you still have a Thuban with a much improved IMC over Deneb and very good overclocking potential.

[Rowena]

Just thought I'd share my experience:

I've been playing Skyrim for several days and things are running fine, I get an occasional stutter but I get that with all games - I think it's a service on my PC, not anything to do with games. That's usually when I'll take a quick break or manage my inventory. Here's my specs:

Nvidia GeForce GT 440 1GB
4 GB DDR 2
2.8 GHz Pentium 4 single core(!)
Win XP SP3

Had some issues getting the game to run consistently at first, read these forums and found the compatibility mode fix for WinXP and it's been gravy ever since.

Just thought I'd share that, I'm running this slightly above Medium settings on a single-core system that I picked up secondhand for $15 and put a few bucks into upgrading RAM and video card. I took a gamble on the processor requirements when I bought the game, but I had a very strong feeling it would work. All you guys stressing over whether or not your Dual-Core and Quad-Core systems will run it are completely insane - of course it will run. It's a port of a console game and the 360 specs, while unique, are basically equivalent to a PC running a dual core 1.6 GHz processor with 512MB RAM and a GeForce 8800.

I knew it would work, I ran Fallout 3 on this same setup no prob and ran Oblivion just fine on an even worse system. Don't believe the hype! The game companies are in league with Microsoft and the hardware manufacturers to all drive sales of each others' products, you don't even need a freaking dual core to run this game if you have a halfway decent GPU. If it's worth close to a grand to you to get a few extra FPS, knock yourselves out.