I installed the Hi-Rez Texture pack today. The visuals look great. Too bad I can only play the game for about 1 or 2 minutes then it crashes to the desktop every time. It doesn't matter where I am or what I'm doing. Turned down all visuals to lowest settings, same result.

I also notice that when I cast a spell it creates square artifacts on the ground where it hits. Also, when I press and hold a spell I'm casting, I seem to see through the bottom of the world.

With the way this game has launched and all the new bugs introduced with each patch, I should have known better than to install this DLC on its day 1 rollout.

I'd list my PC specs and all but I think it's a moot point because when I uncheck the HD Pack ESMs, this problem stops completely, so it's definatley something going wrong with the inclusion of the texture packs. FYI - I have ZERO mods installed (other than this Bethesda DLC) and no custom tweaks to my .ini files.

PC specs?

if your not running x64 windows... it appears that's a major contributing factor to why people are CTDing.....

I'm running Win7 32-bit to maintain backward compatibility with some of my old favorite 'never will uninstall' games. But for giggles, I'll pop in a spare hard drive I have and build it up with Win7 64-bit and see what happens. Will take a day or two.

Same problem here... is it really Windows 7 32 bit that is causing this issue?

I think for now, it's speculation only.

It's not speculation. Vista and 7 have better memory management so could probably be more stable. it would be interesting to see how Vista 32, WIndows 7 32bit holds up under the same load.

You mention corrupted graphics, try verifying the integrity of the game cache.

Do you have a gig of Video Ram? My card has half a gig, so Im not downloading high-rez until I upgrade.

I have this problem too. I used win 7 32 bit so this is the cause ? When I unchecked the 2nd .esp of HD patch everything ok unless I check all I shall crash.

I use WinXP 32b with max RAM and 1GB VRAM, and when I use both BSA, I crash to desktop. Sometimes it's just after loading a save, sometimes a dozen of seconds later, but it CTD.
I tried with one BSA at a time, and it seems to work. I didn't test it extensively though.
I backed up the files and re-downloaded them, for same results.

I have another thread here that I started yesterday about this. I get about 30 seconds of play time before the crash. Game runs great. Frame-rate is great. Preformance is great. It's not a hardware problem that I can tell. But I can't play the DLC without a CtD.

I have Vista 32-bit.

PC:

Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600
Memory: Dual Channel 4 MB DDR2
Graphics Card: NVidia GeForce N250GTS Twin Frozr 1G
Monitor Size: 19" (playing at 1280x1024)

Skyrim Options:

Antialiasing: 2 Samples
Anisotropic Filtering: Off

With the HD Pack loaded.. the game pretty much emediately jumps to about 2gb ram usage with whatever you have used for vram.

This is essentially the breaking point for windows vista/7/xp users that are running a 32bit obsolete OS, short of turning on PAE to see if you can squeeze a little more out of it.... it's game over until you upgrade to a modern 64bit OS.

If you go into your computers properties where it shows a few things about your vista/win7 score as well as your ram/os/cpu type and amount.. you'll clearly notice that your ram is listed as whatever you have installed.. however there will be brackets that show "useable" which should in most cases with a 512mb video card, about 3.2gb useable, 1gb video card, 2.75gb and if you have a 2gb video card, 1.75gb of useable ram.

This is extremely problematic.

Worse yet if you have say more than 1 video card.

I had a customer that was calling me repeatedly about having issues installing his crossfire video solution, everytime he installed the 2nd card, the computer would refuse to boot into windows.

After trying to figure out what he was doing, his system specs, etc and so forth and he swore up and down that he was using a 64bit OS...... found out he was trying to install 2x 2gb video cards (4gb total) resulting in windows 32bit having absolutely no useable physical ram to use.. actually negative as the os couldn't even completely allocate the amount on the video cards.

*sigh*.... long story short, he was running 32bit windows, and was forced to upgrade to the 64bit... since then no issues.

Several skyrim mods basically require 64bit windows due to playing with the 32bit caps, even i have causes the program to crash on a 64bit system due to the game being unable to use anything beyond it's own 32bit limits even though it has twice as much useable untouched ram to use and does use, it uses it all up and CTDs if i don't keep mods in check for useage.

This game is an EXCELLENT example of the real requirement for 64bit native games.

Just to show my lack of knowledge here, how exactly would I go from 32bit to 64bit? Does that require a whole new PC? Granted mine is almost 4 years old (I upgraded the RAM and added the card) so a new PC certainly is an option (and I've hated Vista from the get-go).

If your machine is 4 years old.... it's pretty much a guarantee that it supports 64bit..

however it requires but one thing.

Wipe and reinstall of windows using 64bit version of windows.


You don't need to buy a new copy of windows if your using vista or windows 7.... all you need is a copy of the 64bit version of the windows you currently have. Using the same cd key without issue PROVIDED that on a vista machine, you MUST use either the Retail ~> Retail or OEM ~> OEM copy .. you cannot mix a retail cd key with an OEM disk... or vice versa.. this is the only stipulation.

Some countries or situations are have this also apply to windows 7...

If your not sure if your using OEM or retail, the simple way to determine this answer is to know if you purchased the computer from a major retail place such as hp/dell or a place like best buy or whatnot. Typically these are OEM installs, with the sticker slapped on the outside of your case somewhere with 5 groups of 5 alphanumeric cd key.

Retail copies are usually always purchased, come in a neat Microsoft windows box with all the fancyness.

If you happen to know someone willing to either loan you a copy of windows 64bit in the flavour you currently have, OR burn you a copy of the disk (copying the disk isn't illegal as the product isn't duplicated, the product your buying is the licence to use the software, NOT the software itself as you can't use the software without the cd key).

Best thing to do is backup everything you have to cd/dvd/external hardrive or USB flash drive.. ensure you have everything you need.. and either you can do it yourself which isn't entirely difficult but if it's your first time, be prepared to take a good day or 2 maybe more to install it and properly setup your computer like a new computer. This is a good learning experience and will most definitely empower you. It's not hard, it's just time consuming the first time as you learn a few things. The installation of windows vista/7 is a very simple and straight forward task, and doesn't take long, it's the installation of things afterwards that most people ignore that can be a little frustrating.

If your already familare with Video Card Drivers and how to keep them up to date by downloading/installing them, your already way ahead.. you just need to do this for other components of your system after installing windows by going to each parts manufacturers website and downloading the required files and installing them.

Having done a good number of windows installs... it takes me doing a thorough and not rushed job, about 2 maybe 3 hours at most to install windows.. all the updates.. all the necessary drivers and the typical software i use. Most of the time waiting is windows updates. lol.

I'd suggest taking a look at this topic for a good sense of understanding as I've gone over a lot of this and explained it... http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1335394-windows-7-clean-install/page__fromsearch__1http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1335394-windows-7-clean-install/page__fromsearch__1

Thank you for the detailed message. Considering the age of my machine it may make more sense to just buy a new one though (mine was a BestBuy machine). Seems the cheap machines out there are better base units than what I have. If I just make sure I get a quad processor and V-card better than what I have I should be good. The machines I just checked on line all have 6+ RAM which is already better than I have.

Now the hardest part ... convencing the wife that we need to have an upgraded PC in order for FaceBook to keep working ...

I'm really not a fan of the prebuilt machines.. specially the new ones that claim to have "more more more" and better... but considering your current machine is likely of similar quality build... which isn't exactly great stuff.. no offence... it's likely by no means terrible either.

It would be a good learning experience.. and in the end, with a clean install of 64bit windows.. may actually perform a hell of a lot better. Actually i'd bet it would be a hell of a lot better.

The people that have tried out a fresh install and know how to do it now, would buy a new computer from any of those places, and the moment they unpack it would wipe the drive and install 64bit windows fresh.. EVEN if it already has it... just to get rid of the bloat/ads/crap that comes with 99% of the machines which seriously bog things down.

So it would be (just as a suggestion) a good idea to try someone out on the old one first.

Likely a new one won't have as good of a video card, so you could move the current one into the new one if you did... lowering the cost a bit in the process...

Yes I have 1.5gb video ram.

This problem is definatley caused by the HD video pack DLC because I never crashed before I had this DLC. Also, when I uncheck the Video Pack ESMs, the crashing stops and I can play. All arrows and flashing neon signs point to problems with activation of these HD ESMs.

I don't have my Masters in Skyrim yet, so I'm not going to bother with trying to troubleshoot this, I just unchecked the ESMs and I am continuing to play. Even if I had my Masters in Skyrim, I barely get enough time to play let alone troubleshoot a game.

I hope next time around Bethesda doesn't get hooked on a super-cool marketing release date and 'cooks' their game a little longer to make it more stable. The release and every patch so far, culminating with this DLC, has introduced new problems.

....new problems for some, fixes & improvements for others.

Well I'd like to have some feedback from devs on what's going on, if 64b is an absolute requirement for this DLC, and why their application crashes rather than restrict itself from eating too much RAM when near the limit. Also crash handlers help to understand what's the problem.

I'm not arguing that the patches haven't fixed things - they have which is good. But it's also true that new problems have been introduced with each patch as well as this HD Texture Pack DLC which isn't a good thing.

I'm guessing that the vast majority of problems with using the high-res texture pack are down to limited system resources.

Not sure how old these games are but im still rocking some from 2000-2002 on my win7 64 so im not sure why you cant try it. It may be time to build a new rig and keep the old for those games. You can do this forever if you want to play on.

Some of my games go back to the 80s!

I'd love to build a new rig. It's just that my money tree in the backyard is having a bad season...

I have a genuine arcade machine running early 80's games.

You realize that you can load windows 7 x64 professional and then install windows xp 32bit (comes with win 7 pro) in a virtual machine and it'll run those dos programs/games beautifully.

I've setup numerous businesses with win 7 x64 pro with windows xp 32bit running programs from 1981 and potentially older with very little issue... actually you can run anything with the built in windows virtual pc mode in win 7 pro x64.... anything...