stuttering graphics

ok ive a few issues with fs9 lately.. Im going to have to reinstall as soon as I find the CDs.. but anyway I cant adjust any of my graphics.. in the graphic settings menu the tabs are greened out, and unclickable, and the one menu screen I can see, all the sliders are stuck at 0% and I cant move them.
with all that the sim is still usable, but it stutters every 10 seconds or so for a few seconds.. My system is more then able to run the game, I have a dual core processor, geforce 8600 with 512 mb ram, and 2 gb system ram, in win xp
I hope all I need to do is reinstall but I need to find the CDs first.. anyone kno how it would get like that to begin with?
with all that the sim is still usable, but it stutters every 10 seconds or so for a few seconds.. My system is more then able to run the game, I have a dual core processor, geforce 8600 with 512 mb ram, and 2 gb system ram, in win xp
I hope all I need to do is reinstall but I need to find the CDs first.. anyone kno how it would get like that to begin with?