My game freezes for no apparent reason.

[Budgie]

A few weeks ago, I installed The Sims 2 (with all EPs and SPs) on a laptop I just got. Now, when I try to run the game, it freezes at random times, and I have to use Task Manager to close it down. Most of the time, it freezes when there's something loading/about to load, but it will do it randomly in the middle of playing, and it isn't at any specific time of day either. I've tried taking out my Downloads folder, tried using a different neighborhood, different sim, different housing, but nothing has changed. I even tried reinstalling the game, but it still freezes. I also tried running the hack conflict detector, but there's nothing it has a problem with. I'm not sure what else might be the problem, so I'm asking you guys. Anyone got any suggestions?

[GelatinousSubstance]

I could be something specific to your laptop. What are the specs?

[Budgie]

I'm running Vista Home Premium, 4 gigs of RAM, 285 gigs of hard drive space, Intel Duo core Processor, Intel graphics card. It's a Dell inspiron 1720... I'm not sure what other information might be relevant, but I'll look for it if it might help...

[GelatinousSubstance]

The Intel video cards are notorious for crashing. Have you attempted to see if there are any updates for your card? Also, check what's running in the background and try setting the CPU affinity to one core (this helps some people).

To set the affinity to one core, you'll have to start the game; then hit Ctrl+Alt+Del.

Click on the Task Manager (the last item in the list), and when the new widow pops up, click on the Processes tab.

Look for Sims2(EP9 or whatever number of EP you're running).

Right-click on it and select Set Affinity...

Then uncheck CPU 0 or CPU 1, and leave only one of them checked, and then click on OK.

The downside to this method is that you'll have to do it each time you play the game.

Also, it might help to change the graphics settings for the game within the game. Make sure that reflections and graphic effects are off, and play with the other settings until you meet a happy balance.

[Budgie]

Okay, I'll try messing with my graphics settings and see what happens. I didn't even think of that.

Edit: I updated my graphics card, then went ingame to try to fix my graphics settings there. I changed some of them to a lower setting, and it froze on me again. I've also tried changing the affinity of the process, with each core, and it did nothing to help. I still have to shut the game down using task manager.

[Crash]

Check if there are any programs or processes running that could interfere with the game. What inter graphics card is it? It's possible that some cards are just not compatible. I know for my nvidia card I had to download a fix for vista - maybe there's something similar for intel?

Check if you need to update drivers for your motherboard. That usually includes drivers for RAM and the Hard drives.

[GelatinousSubstance]

A couple of other things to try as well are to check and make sure that you've removed SecuROM, and to make sure that all your EPs are patched.

Other than that, the other option would be to return the laptop for a replacement if you're still within that window.