My specs:
-Intel Core i5-2450M CPU @ 2.50GHz
-Nvidia GeForce GT 540M
-6 GB RAM
-Win 7 x64 SP1 (using classic theme)

Drivers are up to date and I'm running the latest version of Skyrim. I' currently running the game on high settings (texture/shadow/decal quality set at 'high', radial blur at 'medium', FXAA disabled, antialiasing set at 8 samples, anisotropic filtering set at 12). That said, the game WILL still crash even if I disable antialiasing and anisotropic filtering and use medium-low settings. I bought the game 4 months ago and didn't install any mods until last week, so that's not the problem.

The game will crash between 2 seconds to 1 hour after I load a save (doesn't matter which save file I load), though typically it takes 1-30 minutes. The picture freezes and the sound gets really loud and "screechy", although sometimes it just slows down considerably or plays as normal while the picture is frozen, and other times the screen goes black after a while (usually if the game has already crashed 2-3 times already). This can happen anywhere in Skyrim. I usually have to press ctrl+alt+del and end the game that way, though a lot of the time I have to turn off my laptop before I can get anything to work. Sometimes I get an error message saying “display driver stopped responding and has recovered" after I end the game, yet this is exclusive to Skyrim and doesn't happen when I play games with higher requirements.

I can't pinpoint the cause of the problem, and it's starting to really get to me. Mostly because I have to save all the time, and the save files are taking up lots of space. I've tried every basic "fix" I could find, but so far no luck. Any suggestions?

> Sometimes I get an error message saying “ display driver stopped responding and has recovered " after I end the game, yet this is exclusive to Skyrim and doesn't happen when I play games with higher requirements. <

See here:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2665946

When you save I hope you are making a new save and deleting the older ones as your go along. This will free up a lot of space.

You might want to try the mod "Simple Borderless Window" from Nexus. It lets you play Skyrim in windowed mode but at full screen view, which greatly increases the game's stability.

@Mark41

My display driver is up to date, I don't run anything aside from Steam when playing, and I've adjusted my laptop for best performance. And like I said, I can run more demanding games than Skyrim. Not really sure why I get that message (and I actually didn't get it the first couple of months I played Skyrim), but I don't think it's the problem.

@entreri3478

I create a new save file about every other minute, I don't delete my saves until I create a new character. I obviously could take the time to do that, but I'd rather not have to save all the time to begin with. I'll try the mod and see if it makes a difference.
(Edit: The mod didn't help.)

have you overclocked your GPU ?

Nope.

• Have you crashes with other games too ????

• Have you tried the papyrus0.log file ????

• you said you didn't installed any mod's until the last week. So you play with mod's for one week then, Have you tried to disable those !!!!

As for the link: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2665946

I don't know what you have read, but i would suggest you to try that out:

Increase the GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) processing time by adjusting the Timeout Detection and Recovery registry value.

Timeout Detection and Recovery is a Windows feature that can detect when video adapter hardware or a driver on your PC has taken longer than expected to complete an operation.

When this happens, Windows attempts to recover and reset the graphics hardware.

If the GPU is unable to recover and reset the graphics hardware in the time permitted (2 seconds), your system may become unresponsive, and display the error “Display driver stopped responding and has recovered.”

Fix: http://go.microsoft.com/?linkid=9805447