If you follow the link to where he got the initial info, it gives specific instructions on where to find boot.ini, so you can get there easily.

Here is the part you need to know, as a quote from that page:

"Now look at your boot.ini to make sure that the command /usepmtimer is there, by right clicking on My Computer go to Properties, click on the ADVANCE tab, then under Startup and Recovery click on Settings, then click on EDIT....make sure your boot.ini has the /usepmtimer in there (located in the last line), if NOT then just copy and paste /usepmtimer in there. (NOT the entire boot.ini example)

Note: If you have an AMD dual core and installed the AMD drivers, the /usepmtimer would be inserted into your boot.ini for you."

Follow the instructions, and you'll be up and running in no time.

Well, you have to remember that Aspyr had a hand in your game, too. Which is on top of what MaxisEA did to it before it was given to Aspyr to port to the Mac. So you may have fewer problems on one hand, and more problems on the other hand -- all depending on what Aspyr did to the code before porting.

It really isn't so much about being awesome as being willing to read what awesome people write. You can pick up a lot of understanding and know what to avoid, etc, just from hanging around and absorbing.

I make no claims to being awesome, since I have no experience with programming. But I have some understandng of concepts about the inner workings of the game, because I have been educated through forum posts by those in the know. Keep reading, and you'll catch on.

Is that her freshly updated (within the last couple days) wood frig, or her old (made before Seasons) frig? If it was the old one, then Seasons did a lot of things to the frig -- so all of the old ones you have, regardless of modder, should be updated.

edit: Might be nice to let her know about the chair, so she can maybe fix it. I can tell you right now, though, that not everyone is having a problem with the chair. I use it in all my castle houses, all the time. I have mods, mods, and more mods. But I have never seen this glitch. Shrug.

Why not just pop in a "no school anytime" mod, and pretend you are homeschooling. It would work for summer vacation, also, but might be a hastle to have to restart (after taking it out and putting it back in, seasonally).

The mod I have is from Carrigon, who is now over at Simlogical (Inge's revived site), but you have to register to see her stuff, otherwise she's invisible. Carrigon's no school mod for Pets is officially verified as working in Seasons.

I agree it would be nice to have a mod that automatically excused the kids for the summer, but I don't know how that could be implemented. I'm not sure it would be possible to season-link it. (And some people think summer vacation is unnecessary coddling of children -- at least those who are no longer required to go out into the field to work on crops from dawn to dusk, which is why schools used to be closed for the summer.)

You said,"I personally think buying a card just because it supports DX10 right now is pointless since even Avalon1 runs DX9.1 and it'll be a while for games to use DX10."

Well, now that all depends. I'm not a young thing, and although I am still learning and still willing to learn, I am not looking for a new vocation. I have no desire to become a programmer, and no desire to start building computers from an empty box to completetion.

I cut my computer teeth on a Mac, way back in 1984. I am used to cutting edge technology, and not having to worry what is under the hood, because it just runs. You don't mess with a Mac box. You happily use it until it is time to upgrade. So swapping out cards is not something I am accustomed to doing.

I got involved with PCs around the time Windows 95 was running. But that was on Virtual PC. It wasn't until a few months before Sims 2 first came out that I got my first PC box, primarily to play Sims 2, since I have and will always do most of my computing on the Mac.

So, as a subconscious expectation, I still think the PC will run and keep running without much intervention on my part. I was rather horrified to find out I practically needed to become a programmer to understand how to simply protect the silly computer from attacks. The existence of Winrot was another shocker. But I learned, sometimes the hard way. So now I know what I am doing in that area.

However, unlike most savy PCers, I do not quickly and easily crack open the box, for the sheer joy of messing with its innards. Instead, I would prefer to have a well built box, stable and steady, that I can pretty much ignore for the expected life of the PC. So it is important that whatever card comes with the box will still be a valid and useable card until it is time to buy a new PC. And since my daughter bought this for me, it needs to last for years not months. She bought me the latest greatest Dell, which didn't come cheap. I can't ask her to do that every year.

Also, because of the way Vista handles graphics, etc, eventually everyone will be moving over to it. That may be a couple years off, but I will still have this new computer at that time. It is a comfort for me to know that my grahics card was actually built to take advantage of the Vista capability, because the card won't be outdated as soon as programmers catch up to the changes in Vista. And I won't have to face changing out a card, and not being sure if my power supply, cooling system, motherboard, etc can handle the load that the new graphics card demands. In short, I probably won't need to learn how to build a box, just to stay current with the Sims 3.

NVidia is putting out new drivers for Vista 8800 practically every month. Improvements have been made, on a regular basis. They'll get it right, eventually, probably about the time I am ready to switch to Vista. [If I live that long.] So that doesn't concern me, at the moment. All I really care about right now is that Sims 2 runs well on XP, and I have read only good things about that. Nothing negative on the 8800 and Sims 2 on XP, so far.

My AV is Norton, which may be invasive and unwieldy (as well as being annoying, at times) but I know how to use it; and my computer has been safe since installing it. I could not say the same with the previous AV. So for now, I'll stay with Norton. And Ad Watch, and Adaware, and Defender, and Wintasks -- and my long in the tooth XP pro.

Wow, that sure was a long and windy way of saying I disagree with your statement.  LOL

I think I should probably go finish configuring a new copy of Starry Nights on my beautiful 24" iMac (Orion should be peeping over the horizon right about now), before starting up the Sims 2 on the PC .... that should keep me out of trouble for a while. 

That's good to know about how the monitor needs to be set. Since I have been running two monitors on 256 and I will soon have 768 on each card, running off one card shouldn't ever be an issue. In fact, I don't even see the need for the second card with how I currently use the computer, except for it *might* be needed for Sims 3, and then I would be glad I had it. However, dual cards came as a default (and only) choice with this computer model, so I wasn't going to snub my nose at it.  LOL

(Thinking ...) Can I have SLI turned off all the time, and have each monitor pointed to its own card? That way, I would actually be using two cards (even though it certainly seems like overkill). If I have both monitors pointed to just one card, then isn't the second one sitting there like a veal, not being used for anything? I wish I knew more about this (feeling very stupid about now) but I've never had occasion to learn about dual cards, since I've never had them before.

I know the virus and spyware programs, themselves, run off the processor. I was talking about the popup windows that call for a screen refresh. I'm playing along and suddenly my game is shoved to the background so that I can see some little window that tells me I'm protected from an outbreak. My first thought is, "I better be." My next thought is "quit bothering me with the obvious -- I'm trying to play a game, here." I had hoped more graphics card power would mean I wouldn't be interrupted. Sigh. Unless, since you say it is being run completely by the processor, does having three cores not being used for the game mean there is hope??

My particular computer still comes with XP pro intstalled, and only "Vista ready." That suits me to a T. I don't want to touch Vista for at least a year, and maybe more. But I will have to eventually move to it, so I am glad to have a card that is specifically designed to run on it.

Getting back to the fix ... Once I get all my stuff moved to the new computer, I can experiment with the fix on the old computer. If it goes well there, I'll put it on the new one. If I mess up, it won't matter because I'll be wiping the drives on the old computer and reinstalling factory settings before my daughter puts it up for sale, anyway.

This is interesting. Is the SLI mode disabled because it caused problems for the Sims 2? Does disabling it solve the blue screen issues, etc? Is it disabled selectively and only for the Sims 2 game, leaving it intact for other things while I am running Sims 2 in windowed mode? If so, then my background processes (like my Desktop Plants on dual monitors, and virus/spyware protection) are still being run off both cards while playing the game, so I would still be picking up efficiency that would give the game more access to available power on the single card. Or am I thinking wrong, here? 

Even if I am using only one 8800 card just for the game, I suspect it will still be lightspeed ahead of the 6800 I'm using now. And the quad core has to be faster/more efficient than the Gen 4 dual that I have now. So I think I'll still see some noticeable difference in the game play. Especially since I'll also be doubling my memory. 

I never knew about your fix, and from what I am understanding, I should have already had it on the Gen 4 dual XPS I've been running. Since I was satisfied with the performance of the game up until Seasons, even without the fix, then I'll probably really enjoy the game on the new XPS 710 H2C. But I would like it to be as optimized as possible. I just hesitate to mess with something brand new, unless I know I should.

Thank you for the driver info. I suppose I'll try running what I get out of the box, and not change drivers unless I experience problems. But I would like to at least be informed of the most stable drivers, so I know where to turn if I do experience problems. Is there some website that would likely have the latest info for this, as it applies to Sims 2? Or is this site about as good as any other?

I don't have them for YA and Adults -- only teens. I've never seen the option of adult/YA separates. Strange.

That is interesting about the names of the breeds not showing up in non-USA English games. I had no option, of course, because they were just saved in the game format for my language. Maybe breeds saved in UK English would not show up with names in my game, either. You would think they would all be coded for all languages. MaxisEA, MaxisEA, the shortcuts you took ....  (shakes head)

I have an important question, regarding this fix.

I just received a surprise email from my daughter, which was a confirmation of an order she had placed for a new computer she bought for me. It is a Dell XPS 710 H2C Black. That is a Core 2 Extreme QX6700 (8MB,3.2GHz Factory overclocked), quad-core processor, with 4 GB internal memory and a terabyte raid 0. Can you believe it? (What can I say -- she loves me. She's always been my little gift from God.) My new XPS has an estimated ship date of the first week of April.    [doing a very excited happy dance]

So, I it seems I suddenly need to know if this fix will work for a Core 2 Extreme (quad instead of duo).

I also need to know the best driver for the dual NVIDIA 8800 GTX, 768 MB. I know nothing about that card, but I read that someone else had it a few months ago and said the Sims 2 played good on it. However, it has been out for a while longer now, and I'm not sure which driver is the most stable.

I'm still a little weak in the knees with excitement ....

In my game, these are not available as tops and bottoms, but only as all in one outfits. I was surprised to see them as separates.

... or a lot of somethings in my game.  LOL  I've got mods, mods, and more mods. So yah, it could be just my game.

I'll bear that in mind, when I write the tutorial. 

about the link:  Try clicking on it again. I just did, and it still works. But I have been getting some "page not found" and "can't open that address" type messages just trying to open More Awesome Than You website, every once in a while. I just keep trying again until it opens. I think it is because this is a very busy site whenever a new expansion comes out.

Not exactly, in my experience, anyway. It worked that way in the default MaxisEA created hoods, but not in custom hoods.  In my Pets game, the breeds were randomly generated for each new custom hood, using the files in the Breeds folder. Even before I used the "empty pets template" I was able to get a whole new batch of ugly MaxisEA pets in each new custom hood. So, at least there was some variety. The names were always the same, but the animals differed from hood to hood. That was why it was possible to put your own breeds in the Breeds folder and get the game to randomly generate only pets you personally chose for your game, in each new custom hood, once the MaxisEA breeds were removed.

Now, since Seasons, you have no control over the automatically installed sims that infiltrate each new custom hood. Before I could opt out of adding a subhood with its attendant critters; but I could not opt out of the Season's "undercover subhood critters." And the pets/sims for each new hood are exactly the same. They are not generated, but are instead from some templates hidden away in the game's innards, where they are difficult to find and/or change. It was like MaxisEA was *forcing* you to have identical black, gray, or black and white ugly pets -- no matter what neighborhood you used. No color, no variety. The only way around it was to create pets in CAS and join them to a family. So adoption was not even a possibility, if you wanted a nice pet.

But, with the fix for Seasons (still works like an empty hood, but is a bit different in how it does it), you not only rid yourself of the templated ugly and colorless pets, but you also remove some very serious problems with the identical families that recreated themselves in each new custom hood.

I don't view the empty hood for Seasons as a choice, like the previous expansions. I think it is a necessary critical type "fix" due to the problems with the potentially hood-breaking pregnancy/parenthood issues of the characters that spread from new custom hood to custom hood like a virus.

But, regardless, the point is moot. I will be stating in the upcoming tutorial that I cannot guarantee the method works unless empty templates are used for all expansions. That will likely cover upcoming expansions, as well. People who want control over the generation of pets would probably want control over the generation of townies, also. I can't imagine it would be too much of a imposition to require the empty templates.

Well, a fish that hangs from a Sim's shoulder down to his knees when caught, magically becomes just large enough to fit on a small tophy mounting. If cooked, it also magically makes exactly one portion on a plate (when cooked for one) -- or magically expands to make six of the same sized portions (when cooked for a family).

But this should come as no surprise, because dozens and dozens of large fruit and vegies fits into one small juicer bowl, apparently with no problem whatsoever. 

MaxisEA logic is a thing of wonder .... LOL

I was making a lot I intended to use as a commercial lot, but was building it first as a residential lot. Before I changed it to commercial, I wanted to play it and find any little glitches. I decided to have the "guinea pig" Sim do some fishing, in order to get trophies to hang in the bathroom.

Once the "guinea pig" Sim caught the jumbo fish, I took the fish out of inventory, and put the fish near the outside wall of the building to make it turn into a trophy, which it did do. I left it there, temporarily. (I intended to put it into the bathroom, once I had all of the trophies I wanted.) Then I went back to Sim mode, and the trophy and fish completely disappeared. It wasn't in inventory. It wasn't on the building's outside wall. It was poofed. Fascinated, I tried it again, with each type of fish. Each time it poofed.

Then it dawned on me that the outside wall of the building I was using to make the trophy was a greenhouse glass panel wall. When I tried to make a trophy on the outside of the building that was not a greehouse wall, it worked (although the trophy moved to wherever it wanted, and I had to hunt for it). So there is something about outside walls that is glitchy for trophies, and something about the glass panel greenhouse walls that poofs trophies.

My "guinea pig" Sim had a gold badge for fishing, and a gazillion jumbo fish to spare, so it made no difference to me how many fish poofed. But if that had been my Sim's first jumbo fish, I would have felt really bad about poofing it.

It's worse than that. If a Sim cooks for himself, only, he will eat a whole jumbo fish in just one meal. But you can direct him to cook six servings from either a small fish or jumbo fish, and then put what your sim doesn't eat  into your inventory or in the frig as leftovers. How full he gets will depend only on the type of fish meal, not the size of the fish. It makes no sense whatsoever -- but we are talking MaxisEA here, aren't we .... 

I have been busy with Seasons, and let this little project slide. 

In a way, it is a good thing, because things have changed a little. Since Seasons, it will not be possible to have only custom pets in the game UNLESS you use the empty templates for the Seasons expansion. If the empty templates are not used, *every single new neighborhood you make* will automatically put the same ugly MaxisEA default pets into the new hood. The ugly pets are all black, or gray, or black and white. No variety, no color, no beauty. They are not coming from the Breeds folder. They are hardwired into the game, so you don't even get variety within the ugly MaxisEa breeds -- you just get the identical ugly pets each time. And you also get the same buggy Sim families from Seasons in every hood. There is no way around this except to use the empty template for the Seasons expansion.

Go here, if you want to clean your game of the trash pets and buggy Sim families:
http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php?topic=4306.0

Once I get my Seasons game stabilized with all my mods and cc, I'll turn my attention back to this project. I will need to do more testing before I can write the "how to" with any degree of certainty.

I wasn't one of the people who was begging for weather. I didn't even know if I would like it. But, surprisingly, Seasons is my favorite expansion. It makes the game come alive. Things change, in a constant pattern of existence, the ebb and flow of life. You get immersed in a whole virtual environment, while you play. It seems so much more satisfying, relaxing, enjoyable.

Yesterday, while my Sim grilled some freshly caught fish on his indoor castle BBQ, I could hear a dog barking outside. The cat meowed, and then curled up for a nap. The fireplace glowed, and I could hear the rain outside. As my Sim sat down to eat, I realized I was content. No matter what things are like IRL, in this little world everything has finally "come together" and it is wonderful. It feels like Sims 2 is complete, now. Seasons did that, for me.

Oh. Well, that isn't what I would call running out of lots. In a brand new game, fresh installed, I have had lots that would not install properly and stayed in the teleport folder. Other lots would install. It doesn't matter how many lots are already in your bin. You could have no lots in the bin, and have the same thing happen. Some lots, I think, just don't get saved correctly by the game.

I had more problems with this back a few expansions. Things from before OFB can still be problematic. Since OFB, my lots (whether my own or downloaded) have a much higher number of successful installs.

But I don't think this is what Mr. Pescado was talking about. Well, I don't *think* it is. He hasn't explained further, so no one can be sure, can they ....

The babies crying too much is an admitted MaxisEA glitch that they are "working on."

I just read in another thread that people were getting really upset with having nothing but weather/season related wants -- some of them totally inappropriate, like wanting to do snow angels in the summer and ice skate in the early fall, or something like that.

Since I get no unusual amounts of pet wants, even when I would like to have them, and since I am also not experiencing the spam of weather/season wants -- I'm guessing it all has to do with what kind of Sims you play, and maybe even your Sim playing history.

I am playing fun Sims, almost exclusively, right now. And I am getting lots of variety in wants, all fun things, of course. Except for the misguided cat lady, who just wants love and relationships with Sims, while ignoring her cats. Grump, grump, grump.

Well, they are going to be laying around for quite some time. LOL

I wonder how many more penguin visits I will get .... I did wonder why the menu says "shoo." Maybe the little rascal can get really annoying. Oh joy. And I used to like Penguins. 

The penguin showed up in my game *in the middle of the summer.* He waddled up the walk, into the house, and then over to stare at the fish trophy on the wall. Then he waved at it, leaped in the air in front of it, and wiggled all over, as if delighted. Either that, or he had extreme frustration with not being able to eat the thing. LOL  He went on to do the same show at each of four fish trophies. They were all the jumbo variety of fish, if that makes a difference. He left, he came back and did it again. He left, and came back again. On the first trip, my Sim petted him. Perhaps that triggered return visits. Or maybe he was super bored in the middle of summer. But why wasn't he getting heat exhaustion???  LOL

Well, I tried installing PC expansion versions of the game over a Mac base game, and it didn't work for me. It refused to install. (Shrug)

He backs up his lot folder.

But that isn't the issue, as far as I can see. Packaging does more than merely saving houses. Just saving the lot folder won't necessarily fix the problem if a lot is in the process of corrupting, for instance. And if you are confined to only saving the lot folder,  it precludes even the possibility of downloading someone else's houses.

I am still waiting to hear a further explanation from Mr. Pescado. He has been noticeably silent, regarding this thread. This is a serious matter, and I think it deserves serious answers to my questions.