I just bought Skyrim (legendary edition) for pc and installed it and right away I was having huge issues with my frame rate being very choppy. I set everything to 'low', and it's still pretty choppy. Is this normal? Can someone tell me how to fix this? Any help is appreciated. I don't know if this is important, but my pc is a 2tb hard drive, 4gb memory, intel core 2 duo, and windows 7. I don't know what any of that means, but I've been reassured it's more than sufficient for Skyrim. Thanks in advance.

Post a dxdiag: http://help.ea.com/en/article/how-to-gather-dxdiag-information/

Please use spoiler tags. In the edit window, click the button to the left of the Font dropdown. Select spoiler and paste the dxdiag in the textbox. It is a long report.

for something to try right away:

your game will likely be set to your screen's resolution. a dual core won't be able to handle that.

i've been playing skyrim on a dual core myself most of the time (meanwhile moved it to the new fo4 machine though),

with geforce gt240 and later gt730 graphics cards, which are both, well, better than an onboard chip. but not actually that much.

you didn't say anything about your graphics now, but the highest resolution i could run on above machine (with view distances about 80% and most other settings high or ultra) was about 1360*768.

also, on slow machines, it pays a _lot_ to turn off vertical sync for the game (you can still do that in skyrim without messing up game timers, other than in fo4) - except if you still use a crt monitor, you'd need vsync on these.

edit: ah yes and also be sure to turn off all the background thingie bs there were tons of running on every win7 machine i've ever seen ,-)

V-Sync might be a personal matter for me I have to have it for every game even if I am only getting 30 FPS without it I usually wind up with headaches and I have a greater chance of getting a migraine. It is not so much on the timers and such but more for the stable frame rate. My eyes and to an extent the brain that controls the vision notices the slight differences in frame rates. Also without V-Sync you have a greater chance for screen tearing especially if the frames are all over the place. I am one that can not stand any screen tearing.

As for the OP we will need more information on the system and will need the dxdiag report.

well i'm shortsighted like a mole, so i might not exactly be a measure , but i never noticed anything like that except an occasional flickering of the bottommost pixel row.

but it's just a checkbox anyway, easy to try, easy to discard

I'm really new to all of this, so if' I'm not doing it right please tell me. (Also I'm not entirely sure how to use spoiler tags, sorry)

According the dxdiag report, System - OS = Win7 64 bit, Processor = Intel® Core Duo CPU @ 3.00GHz (2 CPUs), memory = 4096MB RAM, Display - Chip Type = Intel® 4 Series Express Chipset Family, Display Mode = 1360x768 (32bit) (60Hz)

Nope, not enough info. The loadout of the dxdiag will be hundreds of lines of info. Follow the instructions at the link in jasper's post exactly.

Open the dxdiag report in notepad after you save it. It is a text file. You can copy and paste it to the spoiler window.

Sorry. How do I post it as a 'spoiler', I'm not seeing a spoiler window option. Pretend I'm a noob... because I totally am...

Ok guys, sorry. I think I got this now. And thanks for your patience with me. I'm mostly a console gamer and this is all really new to me. Here's the dxdiag report. I edited out my machine name for security reasons, but the rest is the same.

i'd figure the crucial info is mostly this

in relation to this

i'm not dxdiag though

looks like your running onboard video rather than a dedicated video card.. which isn't good for gaming

So basically what I'm getting is that I need to upgrade to a better graphics card. Any suggestions?

Yep old system. Depends on hardware specs, motherboard, case space, power supply, slot availability, budget, etc.

Are you planning on doing more PC gaming?

I do want to do more pc gaming. I bought the pc as a refurb, got a good deal on it, but knew right away I'd want to upgrade it. I was planning on upgrading the memory first though. I'll have to find out what's compatible with DC7900's, graphics wise. Like I said, I'm very new to this, so I guess it'll be a learning experience. Thanks for your help.

I would not focus that much on the video card since it will be bottle necked from the CPU. Also you will likely need a new Power Supply if you want a beefy video card. I believe the best choice would be Nvidia GTX 750 ti. I have one on my bare bones ACER PC I got on sale last year and I am happy and you do not need a new power supply. It might still be a bit costly but it is likely one of the best video cards that does not need extra power.

Would have to check to see what the main specs of the board in regards to the max ram.

That's the exact card I was looking at online. Not sure what my power supply is (need to look at it) but I found this one on Amazon I was thinking about getting. http://www.amazon.com/EVGA-Continuous-Warranty-Supply-100-W1-0500-KR/dp/B00H33SFJU/ref=pd_bxgy_147_2?ie=UTF8&refRID=1YAQJHWEDZQ8ERV750RP

For low-end PCs like yours, this PSU will do the job just fine...so a good choice for a low cost PSU.

Then you need a GPU. Don't go with the GTX 750Ti, as the GTX 950 is a newer generation chip, and faster then the GTX 750Ti as well.

It will cost you ~30 bucks more, but it's worth the extra money.

You can get one with rebate for $127.99 -> http://www.microcenter.com/product/454827/GeForce_GTX_950_2GB_mini-ITX_Form_Factor_Video_Card

..otherwise you can go with the GTX 750Ti for $94.99 -> http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KHUE0MC/?tag=pcpapi-20

The GTX 950 is recommending at least 350 watts so if the OP does not upgrade the power supply his PC might not have enough power since a lot of the named brand ones only came with a 300 Watt. If going for a power supply then I might want to look for something better than the GTX 950. The 950 would make a better card than the 750 ti if short on cash and will be looking to save some money to get a better card in a year, but then again the CPU will be a concern.

We take to account that the OP will buy a new PSU. It would be really stupid no to buy one, as the price for that particular PSU is very low (with PSU standards),

and it will give him the possibility to upgrade his RIG with better parts in the feature...

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Yes his CPU is quite old, but i don't thing that the GTX 750Ti or the GTX 950 will bottleneck in any way a E series dual core CPU.

Of course that RIG is not indented for heavy modding anyway, that's obvious...i guess.

If he is sort of money, he could buy the GTX 750Ti, but a new PSU is a must in his situation.

Even so, i would give the 30 extra bucks to acquire a better GPU, as people that doesn't have enough money are not in the fortunate position to buy a new GPU often.

...that's only my personal opinion of course.

Thanks for all the good info here guys. I'll just have to wait to play skyrim on my pc until upgrade it I guess. In the meantime, the creation kit is running fine, so I can build mods at least, I just can't play them.

Well, be patient until you get those upgrades. Then everything should run properly...