Okay, this actually helped!

Basically, I had forced settings in the CCC like anti-aliasing and tessellation, and THAT was the cause of it, it looks like. I changed them back to "Use application settings" and I am getting a CONSTANT 60 FPS from 20-30 FPS beforehand.

I will update my original post with this, to make sure everyone sees. Thanks a lot, again!

Pattern recognition, gotta love it

Thanks again for mentioning it So simple and yet it made a huge difference, haha.

AFAIK I haven't forced anything in CCC.

Also, just reinstalled Win7 a few days ago, so no driver remnants. Clean 12.1 install.

Have you checked to make sure nothing is active by default or something?

I'm at work but I will definitely check it out when I get home. I wouldn't think default settings would be causing this, though...

If anyone manages to find any more solutions, message me and I'll update the original post!

Worth the check. If it is, we may want to report it to AMD.

I have this issue. 1TB 7200 drive.

Well, no offense, but it helps to know why that might impact the system. Given their hardware requirements are more than enough to run the game & with HD textures, and I'm fine with a worse CPU/HDD than some of them, it's probably some software issue, possibly with Bethesda and/or ATI.

Edit: My replies are too late, glad a fix is developing. See, software!

I've also been reading recommendations to disable mouse acceleration in the skyrim ini. Google for the method. I'm going to try it when I get home, see what happens.

If there's a noticeable difference, make sure to PM me and I'll add the fix to the original post!

If other people can try this too, it would help.

Still having this problem, fixes haven't worked for me. It's got to be either a driver issue with the 12.1 Catalyst drivers or a Skyrim bug. Fortunately Skyrim is perfectly playable in 3rd person mode (and personally I enjoy it more as well) so it's not bothering me much.

Let's hope it gets tracked down and fixed in a later release of the Catalyst drivers or perhaps in an official/unofficial patch for Skyrim.

Just figured i'd throw my 2 cents in here.
I also had issues with skyrim giving me severe stuttering and low fps with patch 1.4, but i found the issue for myself was ati's catalyst/driver 12.1.
Testing I went through to determine cause of problem: All was well with 1.4 beta running almost a solid 60 fps everywhere, upgraded to official 1.4 patch and fps everywhere was 20-30 consistently.
Figured mods had borked my game (had uninstalled all mods before updating to official 1.4), so i uninstalled game deleted any leftovers, re-installed and updated to 1.4. Same results 20-30 fps every where, now I figured all was lost, So i figured I've got an SSD lets see if that makes a difference. Moved skyrim, created a junction and tried it again. No-Dice. In a last ditch effort I figured drivers. Downloaded driver sweeper, used catalyst uninstall manager wiped everything out, used the h/w manager to uninstall and delete my graphics adapter and then swept ati drivers with driver sweeper. Rebooted downloaded and installed ati's latest 12.2 preview driver. Getting 60fps most outdoor/indoor areas 40-60fps in towns and I do have some minor stuttering even using sbw mod. (note all testing was done with vanilla skyrim)
So for those of you using ati 6xxx series be sure to give 12.2 preview drivers a try.

My specs:
Gigabyte 990fxa-ud7
1100T Phenom II X6
Asus EAH6950 2GB
6GB 2x2x2 Patriot Extreme 8-9-8 running 9-9-9
90GB Corsair Force 3
1TB WD Black
(Note installing/uninstalling drivers can be a finicky process, I take no responsibility for any damage as a result of driver installs/uninstalls etc.)

@Retral:

Thanks for the info. I'm gonna just stick with the 12.1 drivers for now, little leery of using non-WHQL preview drivers. As I said, I'm playing mostly in 3rd person now, like it better, so I can wait until 12.2 comes out.