https://www.reddit.com/r/skyrim/comments/55b1vw/so_is_this_my_graphics_card_dying_or/

I posted this over on reddit, but so far haven't gotten a response that could affirm that this type of issue is related to a dying card or something entirely different.

Basically, the issue is that *sometimes*, I will experience these bright colors - like crossed lines, or pixellated squares of color, that could cover the entire sky. Other times they just cover a particular item, or NPCs' faces. It's usually when exiting a location to the exterior, and it pretty much always is followed by a freeze and/or CTD.

It doesn't look like the purple "missing textures" stuff, I think - I've seen that before (and it also leads to a CTD).

This issue also doesn't seem linked to any mods in particular, although it does seem more common when more mods are active. The screenshot linked had relatively few mods running, none of which are (I think) very graphics-intensive:

Of these, I suppose ELFX, or perhaps Bonemold Expanded (since it adds a guard near Tel Mithrin, where this shot was taken, who is wearing some of the new armor).

The card is an NVidia GeForce GTX 560 Ti. It came with the computer, which I bought 5 years ago. I'm guessing a bit of upgrading is probably in order, just given the passage of time.

But I'm also aware that I haven't done all of the optimizing things I could have done modding-wise. Haven't installed ENBoost or the SKSE memory patch ini tweak, for example - in part because stuffishard/excuses, in part because I'm not sure that's my issue.

Appreciate any advice here!

It looks like graphics memory corruption. Although this could be a failure of the memory hardware it seems too isolated to groups of textures. For example it mainly looks like LOD textures from the screenshot. If it was a memory chip problem it would most likely affect large areas of the screen and would be more random. For example the entire top 25% of the screen would have a checkerboard pattern.

Your graphics card could be inadequate to run said mods/texture packs or it could be a configuration issue.

I'm not an expert with mods, but from a technical standpoint, this is what I believe.

It is hard to say.

ENB or ENBosst would likely not do anything for you since they are more beneficial for newer and higher end cards.

Do you have issues with other games, or with other programs.

Does it happen with a vanilla game without the HD DLC.

Another possibility is a failing PSU - it may not be able to keep up with heavy demand from the graphics card any more.

Have you been getting error messages and TDR (timeout detection and recovery) faults? Do you monitor your GPU temperatures?

Oh, I can't even run the game with the HD DLC.

So there's that...

I haven't noticed this issue with other games, but then my other games tend to be older anyway (Oblivion, Morrowind, Total War games from 2006ish and prior). The newest game I run is the 2014 Thief game, and that works surprisingly flawlessly, as far as I can tell.

I'm not monitoring GPU temps, and haven't been getting error messages like you mention, Gator Country.

Reinstall the game and delete Skyrim files in the My Documents\My Games\Skyrim directory.

I've seen something similar to this when a card was overheating.

You might try easy stuff first, like checking temperatures, cleaning out dust that may be in the case, and checking to see whether the card's cooling fan (assuming it has one) spins up properly.