Skyrim failed to initiate renderer

[vgamer56]

Hi, I have been playing skyrim without fault for months and all of a sudden it won't start at all and just says failed to initiate renderer. I have checked on google and am unable to fiund a working solution, it won't even start with all mods disabled. Could someone please help me?

[Rayblue]

Can you tell us what video card you are using?

 

1.) Make sure you have installed the recent drivers for your video card, whether it's ATI or nVidia.

2.) Is DirectX installed? DirectX 9.0c can even be installed and used under Windows 7 64-bit.

 

[rolling1000ton]

Remove Skyrim.ini and SkyrimPref.ini and let the game rebuild them (open default launcher via Steam).

Also let Steam verify the game cache, see if it is perhaps missing files.

 

Hope this works for you.

 

[Ark of Truth]

Remove Skyrim.ini and SkyrimPref.ini and let the game rebuild them (open default launcher via Steam).

Also let Steam verify the game cache, see if it is perhaps missing files.

 

Hope this works for you.

 

This issue is nothing to do with the ini and pref files this is something entirely different. If it was those files the game would start but would get to the logo and crash. If the game was missing files it would simply just not start and wouldn't me giving out a rendering error.

 

If you game is displaying a message which says that it is "failed to initiate render" then your graphics card drivers or even your graphics card are at fault. I had this problem in the past as my graphics driver become corrupted.

 

 

This is what you will need to do, your not going to like some of it but it's the only way you will fix this without causing more issues.

 

 

1. Backup your Skyrim using the Steam Backup feature, don't copy and paste the game somewhere else as that will make the problem worse.

• Go to your game library.
• Find Skyrim and right-click it.
• Select "Properties"
• Select the "Local Files" tab
• On that tab select "Backup game files"
• A list of installed games will now appear, Scroll down until you find Skyrim. It should be selected already.
• Select "Next"
• Steam will now ask you to choose a backup location, I have mine set to place backups in "d:\steam\Backups".
• Select "Next"
• Select the file size, I just use DVD.
• Select "Next"
• The game will now back up all vanilla game files. This may take a while so try not to use your PC while it is doing it.

 

This backup can be used to restore your Skyrim game in the future without having to download it all again, it will contain all your DLCs as well. For me using the backup can will restore my game in about 5mins instead for waiting ages for Steam to download it.

 

 

2. Uninstall Skyrim completely by selecting it in the library and choosing "Delete Local Content", Make sure you back up your mods or have a copy of them stored somewhere.

 

3. Delete the Skyrim folder in the following location: My Documents/My Games/Skyrim  Don't forget to backup your saves from there!

 

4. Download the drivers for your graphics card and place it on the desktop. If your using ATI make sure you download Catalyst Control Center as well.

 

4a. Run Windows Update and make sure you have the latest DirectX.

 

5. Uninstall the drivers for your graphics card. Restart your computer. You must restart however wise your old drivers will not be fully removed.

 

6. If you are using Windows 7 Windows update should automatically redownload your drivers if it can. If it doesn't, run the installer for your drivers and reinstall them.

 

7. Restart your PC again to make sure that your PC is using the new drivers.

 

9. Restore your Skyrim backup.

 

• Open Steam
• On the menu bar, select "Steam"
• Select "Backup and Restore Games"
• Select "Restore a previous backup"
• Select the folder containing Skyrim, should be something like "d:\steam\Backups\The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim" if you left it as default.
• Select "Next" and wait as the backup is restored.
• After the game is restored run Skyrim through Steam so loads the launcher it rebuilds the INIs.
• Launch the game, hopefully the render message should now be gone.

 

9a. If it is not gone, post back here.

 

9b. If the message is now gone you should be safe to start moving all your mods back into your game.

[vgamer56]

So there would be no way to backup my mods, I use Nexus Mod Manager?

[Ark of Truth]

Youc can back them up by just copying and pasting them into a folder. However if you still have the files you download (The rar, zip and 7z) you wouldn't need to back them up as you can just unpack them and copy them back.

[vgamer56]

It actually was fixed when I verified the integrity.