Game freezes at 5:59pm

[Kukes]

I haven't been able to find any prior instances of this problem with any kind of solution. Basically, the majority of my Pleasantview lots the game will freeze at 5:59pm, requiring Ctrl-Alt-Del to close the game. Since the age bars add days at 6pm, I've assumed it's something to do with that. I recently had NPC flooding in a lot, but moved the family out, bulldozed the lot and deleted the extraneous gardeners with SimPE. Other than that I haven't had any major issues in this neighbourhood (excluding those which have been fixed by Pescado and twojeffs). Any suggestions as to what's happening to Pleasantview?

[syberspunk]

Sounds like something is majorly fuxored.

Does it happen on all lots, or just particular lots? In these affected lots, are there Age Transitions that are about to happen? That's the only thing I can think of. 6:00 PM I believe is the typical Age Transition time...

Did you try removing all your hacks and seeing if this issue still occurs? I'd try the ole Clean Installer sweep, hack removal and then gradual replace, test, rinse, repeat cycle.

Ste

[Kukes]

I'd say there's about fifty inhabited lots, and I've tried about fifteen of them (due to time... damn Uni essays!) - but in none of them is an age transition taking place. I always grow them up the day before, anyway, but I have had age transition problems before (in another neighbourhood, with too many iterations). I'll use Cleaninstaller, etc. and see what happens - though I tend to be quite pedantic about what gets into my game, it's possible something's corrupted/conflicting.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Before deleting with ctrl-alt-del, did you first check the CPU Usage?  If it's stuck on 100%, you could try waiting to see if it comes down to a reasonable level by itself, in which case the game should still be working and the lot unfrozen.  If it stays fixed at 100%, maybe the problem is your CPU itself?

[Kukes]

I'll check it, I rarely notice these things. But if it's something to do with RAM and the like, then I don't really understand why it's suddenly happened, since I've had the base game and Uni since they were released. I have a suspicion that the overflow of gardeners may be preparing my game for a fiery explosion, visible from space.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Do you have the daily gardener hack?  I know this caused someone a problem a while back, but I believe it's curable, and so your game needn't become a bfvfos!   You need to fire the normal gardener before you hire the daily one.

Also, I've noticed that, the longer you play a hood, the quicker the RAM gets used up, so although I have 1GB, it's no longer really adequate!  However, the CPU is a different matter, it's what controls virtually everything and if it isn't powerful enough, it can take forever for some RAM-intensive thing to happen.  (The same thing applies to the power unit, the one I used to have just wasn't powerful enough for everything running off it, and my PC just kept crashing, even before Windows had loaded!  Luckily it didn't happen every time, so I was able to save most of the stuff before I got everything upgraded.)

[Kukes]

Is the daily gardener hack useful against spawning gardeners? I didn't realise that; when it was first released I thought it sounded good but then forget about it, thinking how many gardeners I'd have to fire... That was lazy of me.

I have noticed that Pleasantview is running much slower than its clone (in the N005 slot), so the CPU could be having an effect. I have 1GB as well, and my computer is 3.2GHz (only a year and a half old, which is nice). I've been thinking of doing a full reset, but keep putting it off because of - again - the laziness factor. The reset is mainly due to blue screens of death plaguing my computer when I connect to the internet (but only if I open Outlook Express before MSN Messenger - which I can't remove because it came installed and somehow locked-in! - has unsucessfully attempted to sign in). Maybe my computer is just clogged from... whatever and really needs the reset.

[ZephyrZodiac]

That's the trouble, there's so much stuff comes with Windows that you never use, but can't get rid of!  And anti-virus programs are another pain, you think,I've pulled the plug on the net, so it's ok to turn the AV off, but although you exit, if you check in Applications, a lot of it is still running and using a heck of a lot of RAM.  So usually, I don't bother to go offline while I play, it isn't worth all the effort just for a few extra MBs!

Are you getting a spam of bartenders as well - if so you could try the nonpcspam fix.

[Kukes]

I don't have any bartender overflows, but who knows what the future may bring?  Since it's an experimental, I think I'll wait until I get the problem.

[gali]

I have the Daily Gardener hack, right from it's issue - and my game doesn't freezes at all. My first action when I enter a house is, to call service for maid and gardener. So far no problems at all.

But, JM said something about "bomb" ,  when you use pre-made Uni houses. Perhaps this is the problem.

I have built and packaged my own resident house, and I move ALL the pre-made families to this kind of house,  installing it over and over, buldozing their old one. Then I buldoze almost all the houses, or moved them to the lot bin. So far my game runs smoothly very long time. I play with all neighbourhood pre-made characters in Strangetown and Pleasantview - no freezes at all.

[Kukes]

Hmm... I don't think that premade houses are the problem, mainly because I've had Uni since it came out and while I've experienced many other bugs, I've never had this one. The only premade houses in my game are ones from the base game, and I used all of them in Pleasantview last September (before I got used to the new building tools). Thanks for telling me, though - I wasn't aware of this Uni house business. 

Edit: Whoops, forgot this bit: ZephyrZodiac, I tried again with three different lots and (for whatever reason) I can no longer Ctrl-Alt-Del to get out of the game. It's now a rebootable issue.  So if it's to do with CPU, I have no real way of finding out.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Do you know anyone who is into PC specs who could take a look and give their opinion?  I'm lucky in that respect, my friend's partner owns his own PC maintenance and building business, and he does all my upgrades for me now - since he doesn't charge me for his time, and I get the parts at cost, I know he isn't just trying to sell me an upgrade!

Maxis guidelines are useless in this, you look at the back of the Sims2 box and it says you can play it on windows 98 - I had trouble with XP until it was upgraded!  There may be a few 98 systems around that are powerful enough, but not many!

You could still try the nonpcspam fix - it was beta when JM first uploaded it, but it's been around a little while now and loads of people have used it to good effect.  If it doesn't work, or causes problems, remove it.

[Kukes]

Well, my computer's pretty up-to-date - I don't really know any extremely technical computer people, I'm fine with the usual stuff (like software) but don't dabble much in the hardware. I think I'll try removing the downloads folder tomorrow as syberspunk suggested, and if it doesn't work I'll reset the computer. Hopefully that'll narrow it down (and maybe it'll work! *crosses fingers*). I'm just surprised it isn't happening in other neighbourhoods; Pleasantview is probably the largest but its only got 500 character files, most of my others are average 300-400 at the moment.

[ZephyrZodiac]

500 should be okay, really.  Have you run a check for unsolicited hacks in your downloads? for instance, from a downloaded lot?

[LK]

I am just thinking out loud, so y'all can ignore me if you want: Doesn't it get dark in the game at 6:00?  Perhaps your computer isn't able to handle the transition from day to night.  Again, this may be totally off-base, and it probably is, but it's here anyway.

[ZephyrZodiac]

I think that would be easy to check out in build mode, just use the day/night toggle and if everything freexes, then that would obviously be the solution.

[veilchen]

Well, Laurenke might be on to something there though ZZ. My game experiences an awful lag changing from 6 pm to the darkness at 7pm, but when I toggle the day/night button, it doesn't lag at all. And the RAM issue is certainly true. Although I only wish I had 1 GB, do have sevenhundred something, (I know they come in 256 increments, I'm too lazy to do math :D), and still the lag occurs when changing from light (6pm) to dark (7PM)

[ZephyrZodiac]

V, from what I understand from Tim who built my PCs, RAM works better in pairs, so if you can afford to change to 2 x  (same manufacturer) 512MD you would probably see an improvement in that lagginess.  I know there was a marked improvement in mine when I moved up to 1GB, and I don't think it was just the extra RAM, it was more than that.

[clem]

I dunno about the switch to dark, gang, although I thought of that at first, too. I have nearly the same specs on my CPU as Kukes and even less RAM (512 MB), and mine only hesitates for a moment before transitioning to dark. Not trying to shoot anybody down, but trying to generate more possibilities. Kukes, what about your graphics card? What kind and what kind of memory do you have?

And yeah, as ZZ suggested, I would check out usage. If you've put in other software recently, it might be taking more power than you realize by running in the background. Do you close down other power hogging programs before playing?

Okay, gonna shut up now.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Just as an example, I installed the Microsoft Antispy programme, and you wouldn't believe how much memory it was hogging!  And if I let it run a scan, it took about twenty minutes and never found a darned thing!  So now I stick to the Yahoo Anti-spy, takes 40 seconds, I can do it while I'm surfing, and it finds stuff!  But it wasn't easy uninstalling the Microsoft programme and I'm pretty sure there's a whole lot left in my registry!

[veilchen]

I have to look into that ZZ. Surely you can never have too much memory. My computer came with McAffee already build in, and boy is it a hogger. It takes a very long time for it to scan my files, and in all the time I've had it, it found one trojan. I'm grateful it did mind you, but if I found security software that works and is smaller I'd sure go for it. I don't know if I could uninstall the pre-installed software though. It came with a pre-installed Quick-Book version, and I can't get rid of it.

Clem, you aren't shooting anyone down, the more suggestions the better. What I know about computers can comfortably fit on the back of a matchbook cover, so I'm certainly always eager to learn. So keep on suggesting, it's called bouncing ideas around; it's actually a good thing :D

[ZephyrZodiac]

I prefer McAfee to Norton, but all Anti-Virus programs seem to hog memory, but even McAfee looks miserly when compared to Microsoft Antispy!  And since I'm on Freeserve, I get a fair amount of protection built into that anyway.  Also, if I go to a new site and find it loaded with dodgy pop-ups and stuff, I tend to steer clear in future.  Maybe I miss some good downloads, but I've got more than I need already!

[J. M. Pescado]

If the game is locking up at 17:59, check to see if debug mode exhibits a repeating error, probably in an object's main or init routines. If it does, send me the log.

[Bane~Child]

Kukes,

This is also the time that all the lot lights come on before it gets dark.  Do you have lighting in or around your house, including pool lights that could be contributing to this, in conjunction with your game performance settings?  You could try different combinations of settings and lights and see if this helps.

You're lucky, if this was the official site, the EA techs would be telling you to do a manual uninstall and then reinstall the game without hacks or mods and only after updating your video drivers. ~wink~

[witch]

There is a programme you can run named winxp lite. I used win98 lite for years, it cut IE out of the core operating system. (IE was only added in to the OS core because MS wanted to dominate the Internet when Netscape was a threat.) I assume winxp lite works pretty much the same. I'll have a hunt for some links later at home. That might be worth a go. It makes a stripped down OS.

I have 1Gb RAM but still like turning winxp services off before playing games, I just like a faster response. Some services you can turn off permanently. My next project is to make a batch file sort of thing, to turn off all the services I don't want in one hit. Have to get the b/f to show me how but am willing to share this knowledge once acquired, if anyone is interested.

Norton Antivirus 2005 & Norton Internet Security & MS Spyware are all system resource hogs and don't play well with other programmes in the playground. Particularly Norton. I have been using AVG free antivirus tool for months and am very satisfied. No Norton, no more.

I know the sims 2 hates being fragmented on the hard drive, sometimes just a good defrag will help. Have you got much room left on your hard drive? Over a certain percentage full and you'll get 'thrashing' as the windows swop file tries to move data around and put it on the hard drive temporarily.