TES:V Skyrim on PC experiencing serious lag?

[Deafosho]

Anyways, in short, I'm experiencing unplayable lag on my HP Pavilion. All of my settings are set to low, and I still lag in windowed mode.
Takes about 3-4 minutes to load quicksaves or even to switch scenes, and overall gameplay is choppy as well as the mouse movements. The characters mouths never line up with their voices and I'm playing in a windowed mode with the lowest settings.

If it's my video card that's killing me, can you please leave some good video card suggestions that are compatible with Skyrim and my laptop? I'm willing to pay a decent amount towards a new card just to get this game up and running.

Windows Edition: Windows Vista Home Preminum
Model: HP Pavilion Entertainment PC
Processor: AMD Turion(tm) X2 Ultra Dual-Core Mobile ZM-82 2.20 GHz
Memory (RAM): 4.00 GB
System Type: 64-bit Operating System

I'm kind of a serious newbie when it comes to PC gaming, so please explain in a way that's explainable for a n00b like me.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Gman450]

Yes, this is a problem with your video card.
The integrated GPU just doesn't seem to provide enough performance for Skyrim.

And no, you can't upgrade the IGPU of a laptop.
So, best bet for you is to buy another, decent laptop.
Or to put it in a better way, build a good desktop PC.

How much were you willing to spend on a new GPU?

 

[Deafosho]

What kind would you suggest? I'm not looking for amazing graphics or anything, just for the in-game lag to go away.

 

[marquis]

this guy should get a cheap AMD build .. it would rock his world while not costing that much ... ( i'm talking desktop ) i'm thinking phenom II line btw ...

 

[neal0790]

I think its a combination between his graphics card and his cpu. Skyrim loves having 4 core to play with. His dual core just might not be enough. Plus his graphics card isnt really helping. Even if you could get a graphics card to work, your better off with a better cpu. Ive noticed skyrim doesnt use my graphics card actually that much but it seems to suck a good amount of juice out of my i5.

 

[Deafosho]

i was scared to hear that.. i'm not playing on a desktop so fixing any possible video chipset problems is out of the question.. also, getting an entirely different cpu JUST to play skyrim on pc seems silly. i like the game but not that much, thanks anyways i guess

 

[neal0790]

yeah skyrim is a great game if you got a desktop but you really need a top of the line laptop if you want to get it to run properly. Even then for the price its just not worth it. Only real option is to build a computer that can run it cause your laptop is just not gonna cut it unfortunatly.

 

[bystander]

I think its a combination between his graphics card and his cpu. Skyrim loves having 4 core to play with. His dual core just might not be enough. Plus his graphics card isnt really helping. Even if you could get a graphics card to work, your better off with a better cpu. Ive noticed skyrim doesnt use my graphics card actually that much but it seems to suck a good amount of juice out of my i5.

Skyrim only needs 2 cores and doesn't hardly make a difference with 3 or 4. Look at this, where the 2 core phenom is within 2 FPS of the 6 core phenom. Skyrim only needs 2 cores and they need to be fast.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/skyrim-performance-benchmark,3074-9.html

 

[Gman450]

I don't think Skyrim needs more than 2 cores.

If you're willing to spend at least $500 for a new machine,
Then you can go for this one
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/diy-gaming-pc,2970.html