Skyrim crashing and freezing

[acurbis1]

I got Skyrim about December of last year and i have had problems with crashing before but nothing like this. I start the game with the Steam Launcher and i get to the main screen perfectly fine. When I load a save it goes to the loading screen then all of the sudden it CTD's. It happens with every save I have, even the autosave the game makes before character creation. When I try to start a new game it freezes when your character is in the carriage with the three other prisoners. Anyboy know how to fix this?

Just in case this helps, here is my rig:
CPU: Intel Pentium 4 3GHz
GPU: NVIDIA 7600 GS
RAM: 2 GB DDR 400
HDD: 500 GB 7,200 RPM Western Digital
Windows XP

 

[AntiZig]

do you have any mods installed? if yes, uninstall/disable them

 

[Diddly]

what graphics settings are you using?

 

[acurbis1]

Best answer selected by acurbis1.