Freezing up entire PC

[Schnappy Turtl]

I've done a lot of research on the subject and still cannot come to any conclusions.
My problem is Skyrim will randomnly freeze, but not just the game, my whole computer quite frankly ♥♥♥♥♥ itself and i need to do a hard restart.
I run skse.exe and a few other mods such as Skyui, alternate start, immersive weps/armour. Just the standard mods. I don't think it's one of those but it could be, i don't know.

Any help would be immensly appreciated. Thanks for reading.

[Bomb Bloke]

When the freeze occurs, what are the exact symptoms? Does audio keep playing - either normally, or as a stutter? Do any errors appear, or does your display stop moving? Go black? Or is it simply that you lose control of the system, and things continue to move around on screen?

What happens when you hit Ctrl+Alt+Del? Any response at all?

[Schnappy Turtl]

Thanks for your reply. Nope nothing at all, no sounds, no movement Ctrl+Alt+Del has no effect. Can't even Alt+F4. I just need to hard restart my comp.

[Bomb Bloke]

So to be clear on this, Ctrl+Alt+Del doesn't even take you to the screen offering you the task manager and so on? If it's not getting that far, then that indicates the whole computer is indeed stalling - in which case the game isn't directly to blame.

More likely than not it'll be related to a driver - next most likely answer is a failing component in your system, but hopefully it's something more straight-forward.

Any patterns? Is it more likely to occur if you've been playing for a while, or can it happen at any time? Does the system ever have trouble starting up again once it happens (eg, do you have to leave it off for a while before rebooting), or does it always seem fine when restarting? Does it seem related to what's happening in the game (eg, swimming, combat, spells, going into a town, etc)?

When did this problem first start? Has it been in effect since you first started playing Skyrim, or was there a time when it didn't affect you?

A list of hardware specs could be handy.

[Schnappy Turtl]

Sure thanks again.
i7 4770 3.4 GHZ
8g RAM ddr3
And i have a 750ti GFX

All my drivers seem to be up to date unless i'm missing something which I've double checked just to be sure. Skyrim is the only game this happens on I'd like to add. I play more CPU demanding games for longer periods of time without this happening.

It started about 6 or so months ago, i couldn't give you specifics sorry i can't quite remember.

Also, it seems to freeze into about 2 or so hours of gameplay. When i start the comp up again it seems to show no signs of slowing down and I can open it up straight away again.

I have not noticed any pattern in the crashes.

[★Kelvy★]

Have you removed your saves and started new game

[Schnappy Turtl]

No i haven't - Would that help and how?

[Bomb Bloke]

No part of the save data of a given game (Skyrim or otherwise) should contribute to your entire system freezing.

Probably not the hardware, I'm thinking. Is this a laptop with dual graphics cards? If so, what's the other one?

When the game freezes, do you notice any change in system temperature? Usually this can be spotted by listening to your cooling fans - they may spin down (becoming quieter) if it's cooling, or spin up (making more noise) if the system starts getting hotter. You may need to leave the system in a frozen state for a few minutes before you can tell one way or the other.

Does Ctrl+Alt+Del work when the game is running normally?

It's a long shot, but it may be worth taking a look at your Windows audio settings - can't say I've heard of them taking whole systems down, but Bethesda games are known to freeze if they encounter configs they don't like, and I suppose with certain sound cards the effects could be rather more... pronounced. 24 bit, 44100Hz (Studio Quality) is "ideal".

[★Kelvy★]

Firstly try a save after leaving cave at helgen if ok exit and keep trying save further up the run if no ctd try again until it happens. Do not save any of these play throughs. You may fine it might occur later in game play (go back one save) then you can then remove those saves above it and restart game from the save and save it. You may have a corrupt save.

[★Kelvy★]

I have have total freezes as well and found it to be this or mod.

[Schnappy Turtl]

You guys are great thanks a lot for the feedback!!

I don't feel like it's my system temperature. Speccy reads 42 degrees going up to 55 or so max. i read that 125 is the temp it'll usually shut itself off.

It could be a mod. I will clean my computer and get back to you guys. Again - really appreciate the help.

[Bomb Bloke]

Originally posted by Cycs:

I don't feel like it's my system temperature. Speccy reads 42 degrees going up to 55 or so max. i read that 125 is the temp it'll usually shut itself off.

I agree that heat isn't likely to be contributing, but what I'm getting at is that your temperature may change after the crash occurs - indicating either that your system has got itself in a loop (in which case it'll continue to heat up once it freezes - probably quite quickly and to the point where your fans have to run flat out, if that's the case), or has halted its CPU activity (cooling down, because it's no longer trying to run the game).

Be wary of removing mods. Many incorporate scripts which get embedded into your save files, which can cause further issues if the mods they control no longer exist in your installation. You may need to start the game from the beginning if you chop out the wrong ones.

If it is related to a mod, ENBs are the ones with the most chance of triggering a whole system freeze. The actual "cause" will lie elsewhere.

[Schnappy Turtl]

Ok so i've just cleaned my comp from head to toe (oh boy that was a lot of dust) I am going to remove all my saved files and start from scratch. I will report back with results.

[Schnappy Turtl]

So it's still freezing. I deleted all my previous saves and started anew. However this time it froze right when i pressed the hotkey to sleep. So maybe the problem is linked to a mod? Any ideas?

[ARmodder]

Unsubscribe from Steam mods, and deactivate any Nexus mods via NMM, and one by one reactivate them, launch the game and see if it freezes repeat this process until you find the mod that could be causing it, and just don't use that mod. If it still freezes the only thing I can think of aside from verifying the Integrity of your game cache is a complete uninstall and then a clean re-install.

[Schnappy Turtl]

Yup that's what i think is the best bet too. I think it was the script extender for Skyui but only time will tell now i guess. Thanks for all your help guys.

Still if there's anything you can think of it'd be greatly appreciated.