I wonder what kind of reinstall the techy did.

At this point I am for your idea of getting Vista. I think a REAL INSTALL of an OS is the only way to fix it at this point. Who knows what jumbled amount of OS back and forth is there between Xp to update VISTA back to XP.

I wonder if a real format was ever done on this drive.

IF you do decide to get vista, I strongly suggest the cold hard format the disk option when you start the install process. Better to lose everything now then to get something half assed up and running only to crash again.

Witch is right.

Course I was tired too when I was typing. Generally it is wonderful practice to have some version of the OS around. If this is a bought pc you might have a reinstall on a different part of the harddrive. In that case (talking like dells/compaq so on)you should have special instructions when you boot to get to that part of the harddrive.

Usually comes up during post (the beep when it turns on).

If all else fails a new OS disk of whatever flavor should work. NOTE if this was vista and you get something other than vista to install you are looking at a full format (lose all data) to get that OS on there.

boot disk in old days was floppy disk that gave you a bit of OS to get you moving (so you could install other things..oh like an OS)

Technically if you have the original xp cd..just pop that in the drive and go. Most OS cdroms are bootable
You may need to load into bios to make sure booting from CDROM is enabled.
(usually press delete right after post beep)


If you pirate .. you need to read up on how to make a bootable cdrom for the OS you are burning to disk. This can be easy or difficult depending on the OS on the computer you are making the burn on.

-necroing-

Note for those who have not seen.. the new 8.5 drivers for ATI did fix my not showing TV/Computer screen issues

I installed patch and crack.. I did not have a "active" neighborhood when I did so. I am not having any trouble. If you have a dedicated neighborhood that you wish not to be borken, you might wish to wait.

Just a hunch.

Soo true Jsalemi..

and Jelenedra--
to be honest no idea, if it is silver or gold. I haven't gotten a sim that high in sewing yet. I was using the given examples in the thread of gold badge level.

I forgot how I found this.. I know I found it a long time ago. I didn't feel the desire to log in till whenever the heck it was. I have always enjoyed the biker bar mentality here. It felt down right homey.

Course my distinct desire not to get involved warring with my desire to blather on for no apparent reason often shows in my posts. That is when I post.

See someone said ..oh we can make this work faster by saving these new skins to the skins.package. Then didn't tell QA.
QA probably only ever tested originally to see if "yes" the new clothes appeared on a gold badge. Probably by just giving a gold badge and trying to sew.
My hunch is that the QA at EA is outsourced. They probably get a list of "this is what we changed" with no additional information about what those changes may or may not hook into. Why would the testers need to know that?!? If they knew the "details" they would be developers right?

The "darn" testers only need to know what to test and test it. The direct result of this thinking is exactly what we see here. I would bet they never tested the patch on a game that had been running in process to have multiple long term families. Who wants to lay bets that they often use a testing environment. Possibly half the game, one lot. They can only test whatever is to be tested at that moment in time. I can also guess that if they spend time messing around doing things other than what they are to test they get in trouble.

Gold badging a sim, making clothes then testing the patch is not obvious. The number crunchers may never have thought about testing it.

Installing ..........

and thanks er... Baaaa

update--
there is a sticky at maxis that indicates they are aware of the issue.

now if we get a fix is entirely different

custom fridge?

come to think of it..
the only time I got the option was when they grew up on their own...
Family - male start, got option at the adult->elder stage when I forgot he was due.
Son of same male , 3 kid friends child-teen, was busy and he aged, all three were on the list.
same sim teen->adult, pushed him a day early. No options. He still had his now "teen" friends, and a few others.
both his younger family members were forced aged a day early .. neither got options.
I rarely use the cake.

Food for thought.

You know.. to be honest I think that couple were a reversed set. The guy was Family/Knowledge.. she was Knowledge/family.

-ponders- They were the start up for a farming neighborhood. With all the hobbies it becomes much easier to amuse non "electronic" sims. The only problem I found in THAT pattern was if one of them decided only blogging could give them happiness. I need to learn how to update CC for freetime so I can get some typewriters blog-able.

you got "tier 1" tech support there...
just keep plugging either they will get annoyed or you will get someone who has a clue

Oh?
Never had it happen before, course I just may have ignored the concept. All together I am happy about it even if it is old news.

Wierd...
isn't that part of this..
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,11317.0.html

or something different?

wait science is borked?
Where did I miss that?
I had troubles getting the guy traveler to go to work at all. Took two promotions before he started going on his own. I wonder if it was cus his mood was off. I wasn't paying attention.

Dangit this makes me have to pay much more "micro" attention to these simmies.

Their OTH is different. It just happens that His is Nature.. she was forced into farming (yay semi legacy stuff) and thus managed to max nature as well.

heck in all truth she should be one bolted to this guy... the only thing about him that is compatible is the sign. He tends to be running around in his undies , and I think they are also in the swimming outfit bin. So this would count for the second bolt.
It is my less than awesome guess that if two folks max a hobby they will be more attracted. I can say this is completely true IRL. If this is what I am seeing, this is very awesome.

I have two sims ..new neighborhood
One has no turn ons that correspond to the other(female)
the male has one (hair color) , they are compatible on signs thus started with a double bolt relationship
now over time this has become triple bolted
yet the second turn on the guy has for women .. easy to get (deliberately so) has not been fulfilled by his wife. (6 in cooking)
she still has the original turn ons/offs (swimwear/formalwear) she came with
It is possible the double bolt came from the custom clothes he was wearing , there is no reason I can see for this triple except..

they both have one hobby maxed together
Nature -due to farming.

Now I thought from various rumors and lies that there is no attraction modifier for that.
The tight pants involved is the ACR hack.

Anyone else seeing anything similar?

Petitions tend to piss off the companies. A well written or technical trouble ticket may do more for our position.

That's a negative there.
I can see the computer screen for "desktop" interactions (bloging /chatting so on) but if it has to play the .movie file no luck. black screen of doom.

-sigh-

I suspect SIMS players have annoyed the hell out of them...

8.3 was released today. I am installing to see if it fixes.

I was never able to get the hang of the sync timer. I have a very hard time remembering things. I really should learn to use it.
As it is I play in 1 week rotations on double speed. Thus the boring isn't THAT boring. I number each house in their "about this family" box in the neighborhood view thus if I am on 12 -goth I know that either Goth hasn't hit monday yet, or (which happens sometimes) I load find they ARE on monday, and then can go load whoever is going to be 13. Game sims who start out mid week get no break. Everyone is saved 5am Monday morning ready for the week.

College get sent in batches because college makes my brain bleed. I ram rod them through as fast as possible, get them back into the sim bin and add them to rotation after a full neighborhood rotation. That provides the "they were gone" time.

the randomizer effectively rolls the dice you see when you are in CAS. These sims never get "saved" perse but instead move the standard sim rotation forward.
first born effect.. same personality , same genetic combination from the parents so on
this is what it fixes. It is possible to still get very alike sims, but the rerandomizer keeps it from happening every.. single ..time.

I am all for complete removal of the diary writing. They get stuck in the "omg people watching me write ..noooes!!!".
Annoys me to no end.