Vista/XP Advice please!!

caprilicious

Hi all,

I've just bought a new laptop recently (Acer LX.AU50X.247) but kinda specifically so I could play Sims 3 on it.
I misunderstood the GHz requirements as some had told me if you have a dual core CPU then its double the power.
So I thought when I bought a 2GHz dual core I thought that meant I actually had 4GHz :o

Changing laptop isn't an option as I only have this one 3 weeks, I'm just wondering, the game requires a smaller processor when running XP instead of Vista.
Would it be possible for me to change the OS to XP or would that be a big no no?
I'm conscious that if I change OS I might invalidate the warranty on the laptop which would be a bit of a concern!

The spec of my laptop is Intel Core 2 Duo processor T5800 2.0 GHz, 800 MHz FSB, 2MB Cache.

The system requirements for Sims 3 with Vista is 2.4 GHz P4 processor or equivalent/1.5 GB RAM,
with XP is 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent/1 GB RAM

Any advice would be greatly appreciated, as the game is released tommorrow so I'd love to suss out a way to play it!

Thanks,

C

Installing XP shouldn't void your warranty as the warranty only covers hardware issues rather than software. But here's the bad news. The Aspire 5735 only has onboard Intel graphics which is rubbish for gaming regardless of the OS.

caprilicious

Thanks for the info Karsini, I'm not well up on the techie end of things, hence the bad choice of laptop for the purpose!
When you say its a rubbish graphics card, do you mean the game may not run/run well or would it just be low quality res?

Thanks again for info & please excuse my ignorance, I generally avoid techie forums due to my complete lack of knowledge on the subject

caprilicious

caprilicious wrote: »

Thanks for the info Karsini, I'm not well up on the techie end of things, hence the bad choice of laptop for the purpose!
When you say its a rubbish graphics card, do you mean the game may not run/run well or would it just be low quality res?

Thanks again for info & please excuse my ignorance, I generally avoid techie forums due to my complete lack of knowledge on the subject

No problem, we all have our good and bad pieces of knowledge.

About the graphics card, it's possible that the game will not run at all. If it does run, it might run slowly or look jagged or blurry.

Alanstrainor

The processor should be fine, but as said it's the graphics card that is the problem, i would not recommend a downgrade in OS to xp, it wouldn't be worth the hassle IMO. I think the game might struggle tbh, the graphics card or lack of dedicated graphics card is the real issue.

caprilicious

Thanks Alanstrainor. Are graphics cards expensive or would it be a worthwhile spend?
I'm not a bit gamer, truth be told Sims is the only game I would really play on it.

Alanstrainor

caprilicious wrote: »

Thanks Alanstrainor. Are graphics cards expensive or would it be a worthwhile spend?
I'm not a bit gamer, truth be told Sims is the only game I would really play on it.

The thing is that you will not be able to upgrade the integrated graphics card for a better one on that laptop. It's a bit unfortunate but that's the way most laptops are unfortunately. Sorry OP but i think you might be out of luck ....