I have a fairly fast Internet connection. But lately while playing Skyrim, I have been encountering phases lasting for many minutes where things literally begin to c..r..a..w..l along. I've tried reducing my Video Options to Low with no noticeable effect. I also ran Malwarebytes to see if some spyware, adware, or malware is getting in the way, dragging down my PC performance. I _do_ have quite a few mods installed, but if that were the culprit, then the game would/should always slow down to a crawl. Elsewhere on the Internet, everything else proceeds at the normal pace.

This situation reminds of back when America Online started up. The service was so popular, its servers were overwhelmed. So much so that clients started to "park" their connection by logging on and then NEVER logging off or turning off their PC. I'm wondering if Steam has gotten to that point overall, or if it may just be the Skyrim servers that are being overwhelmed.

It could be just a single, badly made mod that is causing this - if it only happens when playing Skyrim, that is.

But for that to be the case, then EVERY time I play Skyrim, it should drag in slo-mo mode. That is pointedly NOT the case. I can be playing for several hours (which includes a fair number of CTDs, but since following your advice, restarting after a CTD is quicker and more tolerable), but then the slo-mo starts up for no apparent reason. And since the slo-mo is happening only in Skyrim while the rest of the Internet runs at normal speed, it suggests quite strongly that the problem is happening at Steam.

It has gotten to where the game literally makes me sick, as in nauseous. Mouse movements make the screen roll around like a ship on rough seas. Aiming a weapon is like ranging fire, first too far this way, then readjust to too far the other way, and constantly shifting back and forth until I finally get the aim point to where I want it. And trying to hit a moving target is simply a case of "Ferget about it!"

All this started when I went to Dawnstar to take out a masquerading vampire, at Isran's behest. Since then, just changing screens by going through a door from one location to another takes @3 minutes.

If anyone has experienced anything similar, please let me know. I've been enjoying the game content quite a bit, but this new visual irregularity is making me think I'll have to stop playing, if only to avoid vomiting. If it's a _bug_, otoh, I can hope they will issue a patch to correct the problem.

Have you tried starting/playing with a new character just to see if the problem persists?

I'll give that a try and see what happens. Later.

Doubt this has anything to do with Steam or with your internet connection. Steam uses your connection to verify you are you before you start the game, and then you're off on your own. There's no streaming of data or anything like that. Only for the friends list, chat and achievements Steam is in touch with its servers but the amount of data required for that less than your average session on MSN or Skype (the text part).

Sooo, it's not Steam. It's not my Internet connection. It's not my PC. It's actually quite powerful --should be, considering how much I paid for it!) It's not spyware, adware, malware. What's left that it could be? And why would the condition come and go with no rhyme or reason?

What mods have you got installed? It could be that one of them is affecting only one region of Skyrim and when you go to that region, the game slows down?

Yup, that's stretching it, but it is the only thing I can think of at the moment - unless, of course, the problem disappears with a new character.

Well, The last big drag was happening when I was in Dawnstar, and continued to Galdur's Monument (West of Whiterun). [That's when I wailed about getting seasick.] The next day I was at both locations, but the molasses effect had totally cleared up. So I think your long-shot theory doesn't apply.

Got any other "outside of the box" ideas to consider? I've long since run out of ideas about what is happening.

It smells like a memory leak.

Could you elaborate? What is that and what causes it? And, of course, how does one correct it?

It can be related to certain events, or areas in a game, or related to you playing a single character much longer than the average person perhaps would. It could be caused by a single mod, a combination of mods, or it might not be a memory leak at all.

Things you describe might indicate a memory leak, but it might also be something else, just tossing in options. I've had games and situations in games where there was reportedly a memory leak and it makes everything crawl and go sluggish. Patches would normally fix it.

Just throwing in a possible cause for your woes. Dammit Jim, I'm a gamer, not a PC doctor!

Some years ago I used to sometimes encounter games that inefficiently utilized RAM. The RAM would fill up and the program wasn't "flushing" the RAM cache to make room for new, current data, forcing the program to operate directly off of the hard drive. The data swapping back-and-forth and the inability to call back recurring functions from the Ram memory cache would reduce game speed to a crawl. But as my current rig has _8 Gb_ of RAM, I can't see that being the case for the base program, Skyrim. I _could_ see a mod interfering and knocking the program off of proper RAM utilization (not caching recurring processes to RAM, but rather to the HD), causing the dragging effect, but I would then expect that the game would always drag. Also, as I am playing Skyrim with the Dawnguard add-on, and what I am currently engaged in is the main DG quest, I would then expect there to be a flood of complaints about dragging from people playing DG. It seems apparent that lucky me is the ONLY person experiencing this kind of problem, so I am inclined to excuse DG as being the cause.

One great thing about Logitech's G19 Keyboard is that it has an LCD display that I can switch to show the RAM and processor utilization. It makes it easy to see if the RAM starts getting filled up when I'm running a game. Skyrim had some problems with RAM usage in the beginning, but I haven't noticed any over the past few months... However, my gaming sessions are usually relatively short and these problems usually start to show up when you play very long sessions.

(with HD graphics add-ons etc. circa 6GB of my 8GB are being used when it is running, making it possible to run a browser etc. at the same time, but not much more)