So I looked up some tips and tried running the AA from the application settings and set it at 4 and nothing but nasty lag. This happened when the game first released and I have been running AA from the CCC at 8x Super Sample. It has been many drivers and game updates since then and it still crushes my performance. Is there a reason for this? Also, when enabling AA through my CCC is there anything I need to put in the ini to make sure it is working?

Dual AMD Radeon 6870 1gb's (not running in crossfire)
12.3 Official drivers with the latest CAP
8GB DDR3 Ram
Intel i-7 875k @ 2.93 GHz

Anyone else having this issue?

I played around with all the settings but AA and Shadow detail are the only two settings that really had any impact at all on my frame rate. Maxing the AF resulted in no noticeable reduction of frame rate.

I play with AA turned off and use FXAA instead - at 1080p I'm averaging 40-50 fps in exteriors, higher in dungeons.

It just confuses me because I can run it from my CCC no problems. But the smallest amount done through the in game settings tanks my FPS to about 10 - 30 fluctuating rapidly.

Maybe I should try forcing it through CCC?

The FXAA looks great IMO, I couldn't really tell the difference between 2x or 4x AA vs FXAA.

Yeah, give it a shot. Forcing AF through CCC helps a ton as well.

I do forced AA x8 Super Sample
AF x 16
Tessellation AMD optimized is checked
Catalyst A.I. is set to High Quality
Check the "Enable Surface Format Optimization"
Vertical Refresh Off, unless application specifies
OpenGL Settings Triple buffering is checked

Give all that a shot and see how it works out for you.

AA & AF forced through CCC have not worked in Skyrim since the official 11.12 release, Even on the latest 12.3's i tested forcing AA on still does not work.

More importantly, I'm not sure why you are trying to force 8x supersampling in skyrim with a 6870, The supersampling is enough to choke a donkey & with a 1Gb framebuffer on a 6870(i'm assuming it's the 1Gb version) the performance hit will be horrific & unplayable.

Stick to using 2x MLAA or FXAA if using the official texture pack, 4X MLAA if not, Using supersampling anti aliasing will absolutely destroy your gaming experience whether you have two 6870's or not.

Good to know. The only reason I was attempting it was because it didn't seem to affect performance. Now I know why. I just updated to the 12.4 and am trying your suggestion. One question though, what is MLAA and how do I enable it?

NM, googled it. Got it. I seem to be good with AA at 4x with Morphological ticked in my CCC and AF at 16x with the texture pack.

I meant MSAA not MLAA, Forgot to switch brain on, The AA in the Skyrim launcher option will use the default Catalyst setting which is Multi Sampling AA.
Supersampling attempts to alias everything on screen which looks lovely, You need a flux capacitor to power it though.
FXAA(same as MLAA,Brain is back on now i think) is a post process cheaper version of aliasing which gives good performance at a low vram cost.

I have only recently upgraded to a 6970, Had a 6870 for a year previously.

The more AA you use the more framebuffer/vram will be used up, On a 1Gb GPU it will be a slideshow, 2X AA or FXAA are a good choice for a 1Gb GPU.

I'm just about to install the 12.4's. I'm hoping that you can finally force AA & AF through catalyst which has not worked since the 11.12's.

I am considering getting a new 2gb card and switching to a single card setup. I just want to know how much extra Vram can I obtain if I run my 6870 1gb's in crossfire? I was told once that it doesn't come out to 2gb so I am wondering what sort of benefits I get from owning two 1gb GPU's.

Also, I will try the FXAA. I just DLed the RSO textures and now I am getting 4 FPS. I should probably dumb it down to the 1024 pack

By the way, thanks for the help. A lot of this stuff I never really bothered to look into because I can run all my other games at absolute max settings.

The 6870's in crossfire will mirror the vram usage on both cards & it will be set at the single cards limit of 1Gb, Even though both cards are working only a maximum of 1Gb will be usable.
Having two cards working together is great if the games are not heavy on the vram usage, Dirt 2/3 is an example that scales well in crossfire & it's not a big vram hog, Most games will benefit from a crossfire configuration with the correct drivers but when you threaten Skyrim/fallouts/crysis 2 with a full fat texture pack they will demand that you sacrifice your children for vram, 1Gb is not enough.

My 6870 was fine in Skyrim until the HD official pack was released, It was fine in all games i played using a 1080p resolution & had plenty of life left in it, Then the official texture pack choked the life out of it & made me realise that 1Gb GPU's do not cut it if you want to experience Skyrim & the many visual mods it offers.

It's depressing, The 6870 will tear through the latest games at a sensible resolution but limits you texture wise due to it's 1Gb vram limit, That's the reason i upgraded to a 2Gb card & i'm glad a did it, The 1Gb cards have so nearly had their day particularly if you want the full fat version of Skyrim rather than the skimmed one, A 2/3Gb card is the way forward:(

I have a 3GB 7970 and there's no way I'd be using 8X AA with Super Sampling. I can use 4X with 16x AF Ultra settings and Skyrim Realistic Overhaul textures and HD texture pack and ENB for 40-50fps. 8x just tips it over the edge, as it should running all those extras. No problem running 8X MSAA. I'll take 4X Super Sampling over 8X MSAA anyday though. I force AF through ENB which seems to offer a slight improvement. Just for interest, I tried forcing through CCC the edge-detect AA option, essentially doubling the resolution (?). Think I got about 5fps