Solution to Skipping/Hanging/Stalling/Rubber Banding

I had extreme skipping.
On a powerful system.

1 GB DDR 400, A64 3000+ overclocked a good deal, 6800 GT, etc.

I first suspected the overclocking was the issue - it wasn't.
Also tried different video drivers. Nope.

Turned out to be Fast Writes.
So far...

I odn't even have the game yet, I just have the client (Collector's Edition is in the mail!).

I took a peek at it to see what it was like, hear the music, etc. I had extreme hanging. It would start after about 30 seconds, and then hang for 5, go for a plit second, hang for 5, etc.

DISABLING FAST WRITES IN MY BIOS SOLVED IT

I have no in-game experience with this, however.

If you have tried everythign else, you might as well try this.

Also, when you experience this problem, look at the power button on your PC.
Is there a red dot that turns on or blinks excessively while it's frozen?

If that's happening, you should turn down some graphics options, defrag your HD, or possibly get more RAM (512 would be minimum in my eyes).

I don't know if this solution has been posted before (I'm sure osmeone has suggested it). But I just figured it would be best if I shared my solution too.

Stupid question: Can you explain how you turn off fast writes? I've seen this mentioned a few times, but I don't know how this is done.

It's in your BIOS.

To access your BIOS, hit Delete or F1 or F8 or somethign while your computer is booting. It should flash quickly and tell you when you have to do it.

Once in your BIOS, navigate with the arrow keys, and use enter to go into menus. Escape will take you back a menu. Once you find Fast Writes (Different place in every BIOS), disable it.

Then go to the main BIOS menu and do Save and Exit Setup. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE CHANGED NO OTHER OPTIONS unless you know what you're doing.

I have determined that the major ruberbanding issue is something that cannot be fixed. It just happens randomly possibly due to may things

I found lowering the "Max Frames to Render Ahead" in the Nvidia control panel from the default 3 to 2 helped smooth it out a bit, but it's still noticeable.

I tried disabling fast writes, and it did nothing whatsoever to help with the "stalling". I did see this same suggestion on another, board, though, so it may be helpful to some people.

I will try disabling fast-write to see if it helps.