My Game is Bork, but I'm pretty sure it's not my fault.

[Gastfyr]

RAM can also go bad, you might have to throw away your current RAM.

Yeah, that's what my husband was saying.  Sorry for not being clear.  He said the computer has all the sticks of RAM it can fit, but he's going to throw away the two oldest ones and try putting "bigger" sticks in the same slots.  Something like that.  I have heard about the whole mismatched RAM thing; my one brother tried to explain that to me once.  I hope my husband understands it better than I do.  lol  Research like you said is a good idea; considering how much money all this computer stuff can cost, there's no sense spending money on stuff that won't work.

As to if we've changed our RAM configuration recently, I'm not sure.  Well, I'm not sure how recently counts as recently.  One of the RAM sticks is newer than the other 2.  The newest thing, though, is the video card; my husband replaced the old one so he could run Obilvion on this computer.  Of course, at the time, he didn't know about any nVidia crasch bug.  I honestly don't remember if the Sims 2 crashing has been worse since he changed to nVidia for the video card, because I know it used to crash anyway.  It's been an ongoing problem that just seems to get progressively worse over time.

[cwykes]

your problem sounds way over my competence level - backing up now sounds critical to me too though!  

DK if this will help much, but I just wondered whether you had other stuff running while you were trying to play sims.....   If there is anything running that you can close down, you might gain some playing time before that BSOD hits from other causes.  It's not just closing applications you know are running like virus checker, e-mail, msn etc, but using Ctrl Alt Del just before you load the sims to clear out less obvious stuff like quicktime,  msoffice quickstart etc...  Clearing stuff out of startup is a good move if you play a lot of sims and then there are the Windoze services you don't need.  Black Viper's list of what they all do is the one I know.  Then there's the question of paging files - size of file required and available contiguous HD space are both issues.  There's a "how to" at MTS2 and Paladin has a more advanced set of instructions at SimWardrobe.  

[Yecats]

Zazazu:  I have years and years of photos on my externals, along with music, movies, important documents, university lectures and other stuff that I need for future reference.

 In a fire, I wouldn't have time to carry my huge heavy computer out to a safe place, but I can fit both hard drives into the pockets of my jacket and run.  They're insured, but that can't bring back the memories.

[dragoness]

Yup. Memory errors. Thought so.

The "mismatched RAM" thing is this: Your motherboard has (from the sound of things) 4 slots to put RAM sticks in: A B C D. They are grouped into pairs, AB and CD. If you put just two sticks of RAM total into your system, you need to use AB, not AC or AD, and the two need to be identical. If you put four sticks total, then the pair in AB need to be identical, and the pair in CD need to be identical. Most of the time AB can be different from CD, in my experience, but there's a possibility of buggeration if AB and CD are not identical to each other as well. (Note that AB and CD are not necessarily the two slots next to each other on the board. Often it's the first two of each pair, and the second two of each pair. Your motherboard's manual will tell you which two need to be used together.)

However, I am not familiar with mismatching RAM sticks (as I do not do it) and I don't know if memtest would throw errors because of it. From what I've learned the system should just not load at all, or work very poorly (windows only running for 4mins at a time, or some such), rather than you only having a problem when running a memory intensive game. It suggests much more strongly that there is a serious problem with one or more of your RAM sticks.

Replacing sticks is a good idea, but it isn't necessarily the old RAM causing the problem.

You can diagnose the problem by removing the two new ones and running memtest to look for errors, then removing the old and putting in the new and testing for errors.

Or, you can remove all 4 and replace them with new, which, while costing more money, is far less of a headache.

[jolrei]

Zazazu:  I have years and years of photos on my externals, along with music, movies, important documents, university lectures and other stuff that I need for future reference.

 In a fire, I wouldn't have time to carry my huge heavy computer out to a safe place, but I can fit both hard drives into the pockets of my jacket and run.  They're insured, but that can't bring back the memories.

I think what Zazazu means is that, depending on where you are in the house, and what time of day it is, and how far advanced the fire is when you notice it and have to flee, you may not be in any position to take hardware with you, regardless of how much you might miss the photographs.  If I'm asleep and the fire alarm goes off, that means that the fire is already advanced enough to create significant smoke (dangerous) and may be burning quite well.  I'm thinking I would likely grab the people and kitteh and just go.  It's sad to lose the memories, but I'd rather be alive to miss my photographs than the alternative.

[witch]

So anyway, my husband thinks we need to buy more ram.  He seems to think more ram might fix the problem entirely.  Doesn't sound like a bad idea to me, since I don't think it's possible to have "too much" RAM.  lol

Actually, it is possible to have too much RAM. Each version of the Windoze operating system is capable of seeing and handling more RAM than those that came before but has its own limits. I think it was Win98 for example, that could only see/use a maximum of 768MB (I think) of RAM. I'm not sure of the limit for WinXP. (And too lazy to google). Each OS also needs more RAM. Vista is touted to run best with 4GB RAM.

[Zazazu]

Zazazu:  I have years and years of photos on my externals, along with music, movies, important documents, university lectures and other stuff that I need for future reference.

 In a fire, I wouldn't have time to carry my huge heavy computer out to a safe place, but I can fit both hard drives into the pockets of my jacket and run.  They're insured, but that can't bring back the memories.

I think what Zazazu means is that, depending on where you are in the house, and what time of day it is, and how far advanced the fire is when you notice it and have to flee, you may not be in any position to take hardware with you, regardless of how much you might miss the photographs.  If I'm asleep and the fire alarm goes off, that means that the fire is already advanced enough to create significant smoke (dangerous) and may be burning quite well.  I'm thinking I would likely grab the people and kitteh and just go.  It's sad to lose the memories, but I'd rather be alive to miss my photographs than the alternative.

Precisely. Get out of my head, Jolrei! I have personal experience with this.

[dragoness]

So anyway, my husband thinks we need to buy more ram.  He seems to think more ram might fix the problem entirely.  Doesn't sound like a bad idea to me, since I don't think it's possible to have "too much" RAM.  lol

Actually, it is possible to have too much RAM. Each version of the Windoze operating system is capable of seeing and handling more RAM than those that came before but has its own limits. I think it was Win98 for example, that could only see/use a maximum of 768MB (I think) of RAM. I'm not sure of the limit for WinXP. (And too lazy to google). Each OS also needs more RAM. Vista is touted to run best with 4GB RAM.

I have the win32 version of XP and mine seems to be capped at 3GB of RAM. I know 4GB is installed. It doesn't hurt to have too much RAM, but if you're over what the system can use it does you no good.

[HomeschooledByTards]

This link details why you can't use more than four gigs of ram with a 32 bit operating system (not CPU). VERY interesting read.

http://www.dansdata.com/askdan00015.htm

You can install at least 4Gb of memory on most motherboards today, but apparently you shouldn't install more than 3Gb if you're not running a 64-bit operating system.

Why?

Can't a 32-bit version of Windows (or Linux, or whatever) address 4,294,967,296 bytes (two to the power of 32) of memory, by definition?

When I open Task Manager and click the Performance tab, I see the memory limit is way more than 4Gb. I understand that includes the swap file, but if Windows can handle 8Gb or whatever of total memory including swap, why can't it handle 4Gb of physical RAM?

Steve

----

The executive summary: Yes, a plain PC running a 32-bit operating system - and if you're wondering if that includes your PC, then it almost definitely does - shouldn't have more than 3Gb of RAM (as I mentioned in passing in this Ask Dan), if you don't want to waste quite a lot of the last gigabyte.

If you install 4Gb, there is no way to make all of the RAM between 3Gb and 4Gb available without installing a 64-bit OS, which you can't do unless you have a 64-bit CPU. And even then it won't necessarily work.

So, to avoid hassles on current systems, it's best to stick with 3Gb or less.

[J. M. Pescado]

The "mismatched RAM" thing is this: Your motherboard has (from the sound of things) 4 slots to put RAM sticks in: A B C D. They are grouped into pairs, AB and CD. If you put just two sticks of RAM total into your system, you need to use AB, not AC or AD, and the two need to be identical. If you put four sticks total, then the pair in AB need to be identical, and the pair in CD need to be identical. Most of the time AB can be different from CD, in my experience, but there's a possibility of buggeration if AB and CD are not identical to each other as well. (Note that AB and CD are not necessarily the two slots next to each other on the board. Often it's the first two of each pair, and the second two of each pair. Your motherboard's manual will tell you which two need to be used together.)

The actual reason this occurs is not that the RAMs need to specifically be identical, but that different RAMs have different timing characteristics. If the RAMs are timed wrong, they will fail to function correctly. The computer's BIOS normally autodetects these timings, but when your RAMs are mismatched, they may read the timings from the "fast" RAMs. The slow RAMs cannot keep up with this rate, so they fail. The solution is to pull up the BIOS and set your RAMs to the speed of the slow RAMs. Of course, finding out what those timings *ARE* is an adventure in itself, and not for the dumb.

Sometimes they're printed on the RAMs themselves, sometimes they're available from the manufacturer's websites, and sometimes you just have to plug and pray.

[Dark Trepie]

I had a stick of RAM go bad on me recently.  So here's what I would do:

1:  Download Memtest86+ and burn the ISO to a cd.
2:  Reboot computer with the cd in the drive.  This may require you to go into the BIOS setup and set your cd drive to boot before the hard drive.  (get techy husband to do this.  you don't want to mess willy-nilly with the BIOS)
3:  Let the test run for a few minutes.  If you see errors pop up then you have some bad RAM.

Now comes the fun part:

4:  Open your case and take out all but one RAM stick.
5:  Turn computer on again and let Memtest run for a few minutes.  If you see no errors take out the RAM stick and put another one in.
6:  Repeat step 5 for all of your RAM sticks.
7:  Take the RAM stick (or sticks) that had errors and throw them in the trash.  Put the RAM sticks that didn't have errors back into your computer and close the case.
8:  Enjoy your game with slightly less RAM.

[snowbawl]

Crucial.com will scan your computer and tell you exactly what kind of memory is compatible with your motherboard.  Other than that, follow the advice of installing your RAM in pairs that match and do not install more than your system will recognize and utilize.  Never mismatch your memory.  If you replace one stick, replace the other.  Remember the rule of two.  Way oversimplifying, I know, but it works.

[J. M. Pescado]

1:  Download Memtest86+ and burn the ISO to a cd.

Don't do that. That program is way too small to fit on a CD. You would waste an entire CD doing that!

[Dark Trepie]

I would've put it on a floppy if, you know, I had a floppy drive.  :/

Besides, I have a mountain of blank cds and nothing to do with them.

[seelindarun]

This link details why you can't use more than four gigs of ram with a 32 bit operating system (not CPU). VERY interesting read.

http://www.dansdata.com/askdan00015.htm

Not only that, but unless the app itself is also 64-bit it won't use more than 2GB.  Even with a 64-bit CPU+OS, TS2 only uses half of my available RAM.  The rest is available for OS overhead, and other apps like browsers, chat, music players, etc.

[Gastfyr]

1:  Download Memtest86+ and burn the ISO to a cd.
2:  Reboot computer with the cd in the drive.  This may require you to go into the BIOS setup and set your cd drive to boot before the hard drive.  (get techy husband to do this.  you don't want to mess willy-nilly with the BIOS)
3:  Let the test run for a few minutes.  If you see errors pop up then you have some bad RAM.

Now comes the fun part:

4:  Open your case and take out all but one RAM stick.
5:  Turn computer on again and let Memtest run for a few minutes.  If you see no errors take out the RAM stick and put another one in.
6:  Repeat step 5 for all of your RAM sticks.

Well, we did this, but the Memtest86+ program found no errors.  Which is weird, since the thing we used before which my husband says is called "MemScope" came up with 700+ errors.  Now I have no idea what to believe.   

I do know my game still crashes whenever I try to play.  lol

[witch]

What about with all of your RAM in together?

[Gastfyr]

We tried with all the RAM together, and then each stick individually.  It showed no errors either way.