The Sims 3 Problems

YungJoshy

Just bought The Sims 3 yesterday and all was going well while I was installing it. Before you start telling me my computer isn't strong enough to play Sims, it is as I checked it out on canyourunit.com.

Anywho, when I was installing it, little things started popping up saying "file can not be found", or some ****e like that. Anywho, I clicked retry and all was well. So eventually I got into the game, and might I add the graphics are absolutely ****e compared to Sims 2! It's not as smooth as before and it's very laggy. For people that have played Sims you will know what I mean.

So I stuck in with the lagging part and so on. But all of a sudden my screen went black and you could hear that noise when a message or warning pops up on your computer, yes you know that noise that everyone hates? That one! So my screen stayed black and when I tried moving my mouse around the screen starting flicking different colours, as if you were trying to tune your television on.

Well that's my problem, anyone else having these? I've browsed Google and alot of people are having problems with Sims 3.

kenon

The graphics are far superior to the sims 2.

I think your computer is creating all the problems your experiencing and not the game.

YungJoshy

kenon wrote: »

The graphics are far superior to the sims 2.

I think your computer is creating all the problems your experiencing and not the game.

I've looked up the computer requirments and they say you need a 128 MB Video Card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0. I checked mine and I have a 256 MB.

kenon

What about memory? CPU?

You got error messages aswel so the game might not be properly installed.

Have you updated the graphics drivers, sound drivers etc...

I played the game a while back and was quite impressed with it and I didnt have any problems with it.

YungJoshy

kenon wrote: »

What about memory? CPU?

You got error messages aswel so the game might not be properly installed.

Have you updated the graphics drivers, sound drivers etc...

I played the game a while back and was quite impressed with it and I didnt have any problems with it.

Would you recommend uninstalling it? and then installing it again?

In relation to your memory question, I have got buckets. I searched the requirements in order to have Sims 3 and mine were all up to scratch.

dollydrops

Reading this thread with interest.

I am having the same problems with Sims 3.
Got extra memory before installing the game and I updated the video card as well but I am having the same problems as you in regard to the graphic.

The screen goes black and different colours when moving the mouse. The speed of the game is fine so I have sufficient memory. I think it is still the video card that I am having the problems with.

Not a computer whizz kid so any tips I would appreciate.

humanji

dollydrops wrote: »

Reading this thread with interest.

I am having the same problems with Sims 3.
Got extra memory before installing the game and I updated the video card as well but I am having the same problems as you in regard to the graphic.

The screen goes black and different colours when moving the mouse. The speed of the game is fine so I have sufficient memory. I think it is still the video card that I am having the problems with.

Not a computer whizz kid so any tips I would appreciate.

You may need to just update your display drivers. Right-click on the "My Computer" icon on your desktop and from the menu that appears, select "Manage". When the computer management screen appears select "Device Manager" from the list on the left. A list of all your hardware will be shown. Click the plus symbol beside "Display Drivers" and it'll show you your video card. You can either right-click on it and select "Update Driver" or you can go to the website of whoever made the graphics card and download it from there (sometimes you may need to do this if Windows won't update your drivers automatically).

This may or may not help, but it's not going to do your PC any harm anyway.

kenon

dollydrops wrote: »

The screen goes black and different colours when moving the mouse. The speed of the game is fine so I have sufficient memory.

Definetly sounds like you need to update the video card drivers.

jennifer_

I am also having problems with this game, every time I play it it shuts down unexpectedly after about 10 or so minutes, no error message comes up at all, the computer screen just goes to a blank screen. I left it the first few times but nothing happens and I have shut it down using Task Manager. It is really annoying and I have no idea what to do, it is very frustrating as I have only just bought it and want to actually use it.

kenon

The Sims™ 3 Minimum Hardware Requirements
FOR WINDOWS XP

• 2.0 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
• 1 GB RAM
• 128 MB Video Card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
• The latest version of DirectX 9.0c
• Microsoft Windows XP Service Pack 2
• At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space with at least 1 GB of additional space for custom content and saved games

FOR WINDOWS VISTA

• 2.4 GHz P4 processor or equivalent
• 1.5 GB RAM
• 128 MB Video Card with support for Pixel Shader 2.0
• Microsoft Windows Vista Service Pack 1
• At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space with at least 1 GB of additional space for custom content and saved games

For computers using built-in graphics chipsets under Windows, the game requires at least:

• Intel Integrated Chipset, GMA 3-Series or above
• 2.6 GHz Pentium D CPU, or 1.8 GHz Core 2 Duo, or equivalent
• 0.5 GB additional RAM

FOR MAC OS X

• Mac OS X 10.5.7 Leopard or higher
• Intel Core Duo Processor
• 2 GB RAM
• ATI X1600 or Nvidia 7300 GT with 128 MB of Video RAM, or Intel Integrated GMA X3100.
• At least 6.1 GB of hard drive space with at least 1 GB of additional space for custom content and saved games
• This game will not run on PowerPC (G3/G4/G5) based Mac systems, or the GMA 950 class of integrated video cards.

Windows Supported Video Cards NVIDIA GeForce series

• FX 5900, FX 5950
  6200, 6500, 6600, 6800
  7200, 7300, 7600, 7800, 7900, 7950
  8400, 8500, 8600, 8800
  9300, 9400, 9500, 9600, 9800
  G100, GT 120, GT 130, GTS 150
  GTS 250, GTX 260, GTX 280, GTX 285, GTX 295

ATI Radeon™ series

• 9500, 9600, 9800
  X300, X600, X700, X800, X850
  X1300, X1600, X1800, X1900, X1950
  2400, 2600, 2900
  3450, 3650, 3850, 3870
  4850, 4870

If people meet these specs and are still having trouble they should update:

• Directx
• Graphics Card drivers
• Sound card drivers
• Maybe even use windows update.