Seasons is crashing
ZiggyDoodle:
Quote
I read the other post on the problem with the ATI drivers. Hmmmm
My ATI's working super. That last poster is working with a new system. Sweet graphics card but no mention was made of the OS. Could Vista be involved?
Cons:
ZiggyDoodle
She said she had put in the latest ATI drivers or the new system came with them. So could be they aren't happy campers. Which one's ar you using?
I finally changed my Nvidia drivers as I said and I played for 2 1/2 hours tonight. Checked the ram before I quit and it was up to 239 meg open. That's a major improvement.At the 2 1/2 hour time before it was down to 70 meg and would start the audio stammering and crash.
After reading EA's readme on video card issues, that's a known issue with a 6600 card, which I have. (Audio stammering that is). That's why I changed the drivers. The link I gave earlier in this thread was pretty specific about why you get an Access Violation error.Game bug or Drivers. I have shut my graphics down some, no shadow (I don't like them anyway) and I don't display the neighborhood houses(I never did before in Pets either, game seemed lag in rotaing the houses if I had that on) But that's all I have turned off.
So unless this game goes south over the next few days of play, I'm reasonably sure it was a driver issue with the video card. Surprisingly the 93.71 drivers are working quite well. I chose those because they came out in November and I felt those were the one's Maxis used when they were making the Seasons expansion pack. That being said if I were running a Nvidia card and having graphics issues or weird crashes that gave you the Access Violation in the log file, then I'd switch to that driver and see if I had an improvement.ALso make sure your sound drivers are up to date.My graphics overall are damn good in the game. And yes I can see the fish in the ponds.
Got fingers and toes crossed it's a wrap with this game. But I have seen posts where people have played for a week and then started having crashes left and right. Guess we'll see in time.
Thanking everyone for their input in this thread. Appreciate it.
Lorelei:
Warning: I am not technical. This is opinion, and I won't be bothered if you choose to ignore it.
That said, if you're stuck with a laptop and it has an NVidia card, none of the NVidia drivers or tweaked drivers out there will work, you'll have to nag your laptop manufacturer instead, and probably have to use IE rather than FF, Opera, or NS/Moz to get it.
Old news to most of you, I'm sure.
When asking for driver/card help, I mentioned I had a laptop, but got advice which would have been great for a desktop, but it did not help me because I was using a different set-up. If you're following all the excellent advice and getting no result, even after checking for User Idiocy Issues, and you have a laptop, then voila, that may be the main problem right there.
Also, EA will use the fact that you are brazen enough to use a laptop in order to refuse you tech support, even if the issue you need help with has nothing to do with your machine type. Too bad I need one for grad school. Lugging a desktop back and forth isn't feasible.
If you do manage to load your game in and up the settings graphics-wise, the game may not immediately barf, and may in fact run like a dream for a while, but eventually you will get a barf-up blue screen. The Unofficial Sims 2 Tech Guide (not updated past OFB) has in-game screenies that will help you decide what level of detail you can or can't live without. Some of the highest settings improve very little past medium settings. Why stress your card if the payoff is so inconsequential?
I CAN run on highest settings for a couple of hours (on a good day) but see no real difference visually lowering most of them. And that usually means longer gameplay time.
Cons:
Lorelei,
Laptops are different critters. They weren't ever built to play these type of games. Wasn't their purpose. They do use different video cards in them than in desktops. Laptop processors and Video cards are special because of power issues.Even the HDD are different. If your ordering parts for them they have to be "Laptop" parts.
Everything put in them has to be able to use low power. After all they have to be able to run on batteries more than a few minutes. You buy a laptop because you want to be able to take it with you and use it anywhere. That means places where there are no outlets.
Gaming rigs are special critters, even for Desktops. Not every desktop is created equal either. Many buy
straight off the shelf units expecting them to run any big game out there and find they fall flat on their face.
Many of those have good enough processors, but fall short with the video cards and Power Supplies and amount of ram. Big video cards are power hungry devils. Those running crossfire or SLI most certainly need huge power supplies. Not to mention 3 or 4 Hard Drives,maybe 3 CD/DVD ROM burners, huge processors and large amounts of ram.Super sound cards and the list goes on.
A real gaming rig will set you back mega bucks.Go to Dell or Alienware and check the price of one or go to Newegg and price all the components seperately. Whew!
I just have a beefed up run of the mills desktop. By saying beefed up, it has a decent video card, decent amount of ram, and a decent processor and a fair sized HDD in it and a PSU that should be able to handle everything under a load. When I upgrade I will have to buy a bigger meaner PSU to accomodate the new
power hungry componets. Which will cost me big bucks because elcheapo PSU's aren't worth a flip.
EDIT: Dell has a gaming Notebook. The XPS M1710. Nice pricetag with it and I assume the XPSm2010 is capable of running games also.
MutantBunny:
For whatever it's worth:
Cons, your problems sound exactly like what I've been having--well on my sons PC. The reset at cold booting, the sound issues, etc. Sound worked fine in headphones, but the desk top speakers wouldn't work at all or there was so much static, it was worthless. I looked and looked for conflicts, reinstalled drivers, went thru the BIOS, etc etc.
I was playing the 'why why why' game for 3 weeks! Happened across a bbs where ONE guy said: EAX and sound blaster hate each other. I don't even know what EAX is. But I had seen it in the hundred driver installs I'd done trying to fix the problem. I run Xp SP1 only with a sound blaster live card. Creative has recently stopped supporting this card as it's old old. The last driver set they offer bundles with the EAX shit.
That one post directed me to a page with kX drivers. I unistalled everything Creative and installed the kX stuff. Ta da! No resetting, great (for an old card) sound. Everything is fine.
So maybe your problem is similiar? Hope this helps somebody.....
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