Spontanous reboot

[KellyQ]

Seeing how many wonderfully technically knowledgable people there are at MATY, I thought I would ask this here. I hope I have posted in the right section.

The night before last while playing the Broke family, my entire computer froze up and I had to do a hard reboot. Everything ran smoothly after that. Just to be safe, I ran a virus and spyware scan, both found nothing.

 Then last night, just after loading the game, while I was mousing over the neighborhood, trying to decide which lot to play, my computer rebooted. After it finished reloading, a box popped up saying "Windows has recovered from a serious error" yada yada yada. I looked at the error message but it was of course a code of numbers and letters that meant nothing to me. I loaded the game and played for a couple of hours after that.

The only things I have added to my game in the last few days are updates from MATY (macrotastics, BYU, etc.,) and a userstartup file. In the userstartup file I have the useshaders (I think that's how it goes...I'm not sure, I copy and pasted it from a post here.) and I have been noticing some graphic glitches.

So my question is, is it possible that the useshaders is causing the graphic glitches and/or a system reboot? I just bought this computer last year after having my old computer constantly reboot and get the BLUE SCREEN OF DEATH (turned out to be an over-heating issue), so I'm hyper-paranoid about having this happen again.

I have 1 gb of RAM, AMD Athlon 2.0 processor and nVidea GeForce 5200 video card. I'd give more specs but I'm at work and can't remember the rest.

[jsalemi]

I have 1 gb of RAM, AMD Athlon 2.0 processor and nVidea GeForce 5200 video card . I'd give more specs but I'm at work and can't remember the rest.

I'd say that may be your problem right there -- OFB, especially since the patch, has a problem with nvidea cards with the latest drivers.  Have you updated the drivers lately?  If not, then I'd say turn off the usershaders thing.

[dadditude]

Also, the spontaneous reboot could be a power supply issue. If you added the card yourself, the power supply that came with your machine might not have enough juice for it.

[KellyQ]

Also, the spontaneous reboot could be a power supply issue. If you added the card yourself, the power supply that came with your machine might not have enough juice for it.

No, I didn't install the card myself (wouldn't have the first clue), it came with the machine.

Jsalemi, I haven't updated the drivers for awhile...do you think that could make the computer reboot?

[ZiggyDoodle]

If your system ran fine until you added the MATY gizmos, then why not move them out temporarily and see if the problem crops up again. 

That seems a logical start to the sleuthing.

[jsalemi]

Jsalemi, I haven't updated the drivers for awhile...do you think that could make the computer reboot?

Probably the combination of the drivers and adding the usershaders command to your startup. I'd take the usershaders out first and see if that solves the problem.

[ZephyrZodiac]

The exact same thing happened to me, but when I checked with the windows troubleshooter option, I was immediately given a link to Nvidia to update my drivers, and everything has been fine since (apart from the missing fish issue, that is!)

[KellyQ]

Yeah, the missing fishies is why I put it in. I actually hadn't even noticed they were gone until I saw a thread about it here. I will update the drivers tonight when I get home, take the useshaders out and see what happens.

I appreciate all the responses I have gotten.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, My NVidia is a GEForce FX 5200, so it sounds as if they are similar, but when you install the new driver, you may find that for some wierd reason, instead of uninstalling the old one, which it didn't, it uninstalls your DirectX.  However, when I went to reinstall DirectX, I had far more Hard Drive space than before, so the loss of the old one was probably a good thing as Windows was presumably just adding more and more files each time I upgraded my DirectX!

[KellyQ]

hmmm, yes that's the same video card I have. I will have to keep that in mind. How did you know that it uninstalled the DirectX?
I'm always nervous uninstalling and installing drivers, I'm terrified I'll remove the wrong thing or go about it the wrong way and totally muck things up.


edited because "nervous" only needs one "e".

[ZephyrZodiac]

Well, before I installed the new drivers, my directX was working fine, after I'd installed them I went to play the game - and the game told me they it wasn't there!  In fact, I think there were files there, thousands of them, but obviously not the important ones that the game could use, so I just got rid of everything that was left and installed the most up to date version from Windows.  My Hard Drive had about 3 more GBs of space afterwards.

[ZephyrZodiac]

The drivers solved it, and my RAM should be OK, but I shall be thinking about upgrading it soon, anyway.  Besides, it was the infor I got from Microsoft, and it was pretty definite, and took me directly to the page at NVidia I needed, so it must be a common problem.

[KellyQ]

So I updated my drivers Friday night and removed the useshaders from the startup file but I didn't have an opportunity to play until Saturday night. So far, my computer hasn't rebooted (crossing my fingers) but now my game is running soooooooo slow. Could this be due to the new drivers?
Driver version is: 8.4.2.1 for the Nvidia GeForce FX 5200.

[DrBeast]

Have you checked to see if the game settings are as they were before updating? Also, try running the game WITH useshaders this time. If you still get random reboots, I'd say forget the useshaders cheat and roll back to your previous drivers.

[ZephyrZodiac]

My game actually runs better now, although I still have a problem with level 10 businesses, I don't think my PC can handle at least 10 customers, 4 staff plus my sim all at once, so I spend half the time click the debugger to unfreeze visitor motives!  I may need to check out my paging file and make it a tad bigger!

[KellyQ]

Have you checked to see if the game settings are as they were before updating? Also, try running the game WITH useshaders this time. If you still get random reboots, I'd say forget the useshaders cheat and roll back to your previous drivers.

I checked the settings when I noticed how slow the game was running and everything is the same as it was before. I thought perhaps it was because I was playing a large lot (the Goth house, the ghosts really can slow my game down sometimes) but even playing a smaller lot, it was extremely slow. If the game had played like this when I first bought it, I would have been so turned off by the lag I would have never continued playing.
I'll have to try your suggestions sometime this evening after I get home *stupid work*.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Kelly, go to simWardrobe and read the article "Windows Game Optimization Tips".  You may not want to try everything suggested there, but there could be one or two things which would help, and it's very easy to understand!  (If I can understand it, anyone can!)

[pamysue]

Been there, dealt with this.  Look at the size of your graphics card and then check the wattage of your power supply.  If it's 200 or 250, you will need to replace it with a larger one to handle a bigger graphics card.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Pamysue, KellyQ has only updated her drivers, she has the same graphics card.  You may well be right that there is a problem with the power supply, but if so, she's had it a while.  I remember having a problem with mine, but it wasn't just the power supply, it was the motherboard and the CPU as well, and it starts to get expensive if all those need to be replaced.

[Stitches]

In case all the other stuff doesn't work, you might want to monitor your video card's temperature. nVidia cards have a neat "feature" that causes them to shut down if they overheat to prevent total frying, especially as they get older. I've been dealing with what you describe for about a year and a half now due to poor ventilation in my laptop which is exasperated by living in dusty hills with three longhaired cats.

There's standard PC maintenance type stuff you can do to help if that is the problem, and you should do even if it's not. Clean the case out regularly with pressurized hair, keep pets out of the room, vacuum the room frequently, don't place towers on surfaces that readily conduct heat or in areas with direct sunlight, don't leave your computer running for prolonged periods, and keep an airfilter near by. There are other less standard stuff like replacing fans, applying thermal paste to the CPU, and installing heatsinks.

[pamysue]

Pamysue, KellyQ has only updated her drivers, she has the same graphics card.  You may well be right that there is a problem with the power supply, but if so, she's had it a while.  I remember having a problem with mine, but it wasn't just the power supply, it was the motherboard and the CPU as well, and it starts to get expensive if all those need to be replaced.

True.  Not saying to run out and buy anything.  Just look at your graphics card and check the minimum wattage required to run it.  The majority of people look at neccasary RAM, OS, but never give a thought to power.  If her card requires a bigger power supply, she needs to take care of that.

[ZephyrZodiac]

True, but what she has sounds similar to mine.  I think the biggest problem is having too small a paging file.

[KellyQ]

So last night I rolled the drivers back on my graphics card (back to version 6 something, sorry I'm at work and can't remember exactly) and that cleared up the lag tremendously. I only had time to play for about an hour so hard to say if the rebooting will reoccur or not, but so far, so good. I really think it was probably the useshaders cheat that caused it to reboot but I could be wrong. (And I'm really sorry to not be able to use it because not only did I get my fishies back when using it, I noticed a lot more detail to some objects such as the swimming pool, then I had before  )

I have two more quick questions (especially for ZZ or anyone who has the same type of graphics card): has anyone else's ghosts disappeared? I've been noticing that I have a decided lack of ghosts on the Goth lot despite having all the headstones.

Second question: how much tweaking should one do with the refresh rate for the game? It is defaulted on my computer at 60 but I have my computer refresh rate set at 75 and it runs just fine at that setting.

[ZephyrZodiac]

Mine's always been at 60 in game, I think I tried it higher but it didn't help any.

I haven't noticed a lack of ghosts, but I don't visit the Goths very often.  I think I saw Darleen once or twice, but that may have been before the new drivers.

[jsalemi]

Sometimes if you change something (usually a patch or new EP/SP, or even sometimes a major hack), the ghost timer gets reset.  Normally, ghosts don't show up until 2-3 days after they died. If the timer gets reset, all the ghosts again wait for the 2-3 sim-day period to start haunting again.