Wierd. I finally got it to work last night after renaming my InstallShield file to InstallShieldold.. dunno why or how it worked, but it did.

Updated Peggy hair is still going strong with no crashes since installing 2 days ago, even after updating to the new patch.

interesting. I do have a RAID, if that makes any difference.

my attempts to install the patch are giving me a lovely "installed version of the application could not be determined" error, most likely because its installed on the E drive, and such newfangled super advanced things like having 2 drives is way too much for EA to comprehend.  no clue how to fix it though.

Her updated version does seem to fix whatever the problem was. I installed it this afternoon and played for a few hours with no crashes. I'll let you guys know if I do run across one though.

As others said, heat won't cause an immediate shutdown. The nature of playing a game itself will cause problems to show up that you aren't going to see just browsing the internet. If its a heat issue, which can also be tied to the death of a card, then activities which will be taxing on the card are going to start to act up. Also something to consider, the overheating issue is one that will often show up the longer you play. Eventually you'll end up with with the computer just restarting itself or failing to recognize the card entirely, but artifacts are the first sign theres a problem.

Its not really an issue specific to a certain card really.. these things just happen for one reason or another.. questionable manufacturing, malfunctioning fans, poor airflow in the case, dust clogging things up, or just a wonky card or a card showing its age. I've had brand new cards arrive DOA, other cards sputter out like this after a year, and others running strong after 3 years...all makes and models, high end to low end...its just a risk you take. It can happen to any card.

I would suggest opening up your case and checking things out in there - get some compressed air and clean out the dust, ensure your fans are all spinning, particularly the video card fan. Take off the side of the case and see if you can get things a bit cooler in there. I have in the past, in dire circumstances just pulled the side of my case off and stuck a great big portable fan beside it to keep my card cool until I could get it fixed. If you catch heat issues early, you can avoid having to replace the card entirely, but if it continues the damage is probably already done. On the bright side, your card is about $39 bucks new at newegg if you wanted to replace it.. no sense in getting anything fancy if you're just going to be upgrading in the near future and limited by the mobo/ram anyways.

I've been playing on my boyfriends supa-computer while I'm here for the summer, and its definately not lower-end by any means. Hes tests new hardware/builds computers for a living.. his current box is top of the line.. ddr3, solid state, the whole shebang.. it'd be hard to find better.

That said.. lower end computers are definately not the cause of the crashes - I crashed to desktop everytime I zoomed in/out or went into buy mode with it installed on this machine, which is better than what probably 99% of people are using.

looks like a heat issue to me honestly, or the last throes of a dying video card.

i downloaded it a few hours ago as per the instructions and it was crashing my game to desktop at random intervals and in buy mode. removed it and the crashing has stopped entirely. makes me sad, cuz i really loved it..it was perfect for my selfsim!

im registered/logged in/the whole shebang and it still won't download properly for me. don't waste your time, its making the game unplayable for alot of people.. new crashes and bugs left and right.

Interesting. This might be a driver/video card issue then. I still have the blocky shadows with everything maxed. I'm running an ATI Radeon HD4870x2, latest drivers. I'll have to try it on my boyfriend's computer and see if theres a difference.

Like others have said, I think its just shadows. For whatever reason there is positively no difference between low and high shadow settings -- on high I still get the same pixelated, blocky edges. You can see an example of it on the shoulder of the sim in the screenshot I posted, as well as around her lips and nose. My video card has 2GB ram, so I doubt that has anything to do with it. Really sounds like a bug to me.. hopefully we can get a patch soon.

The comparison shot I posted was with graphics all set on maximum.... like i said in my original post. Theres no slider to increase - everything is as high as it will go. It is very zoomed in and played on an extremely high resolution - from afar, the smudgeyness isnt as noticable. I also noticed when playing on my sisters laptop, which plays on a much lower resolution, the difference isnt as obvious because the CAS sims dont look as good to begin with. Dunno.

 My video card is an ATI HD4370 x2 and my computer is godly, so its certainly not a hardware issue. All drivers are up to date. I suppose i can play around in catalyst a bit and see if anything changes.

Also, these arent default skins.. again. They are HP's replacements. Great looking in CAS, FAR superior to default.. turn to blurry smooshy messes in live. The defaults are way lower quality, so there isnt much to ruin when it comes to cas vs live there. It seems the better the original texture, the more it gets destroyed in live vs cas.. it blows at rendering fine detail.

It wouldnt be hard to have a decent slider for textures/lighting. There are alot of people with gaming computers that could more than handle a much higher graphical load than max-setting sims 3 in live mode currently offers.

I have a REALLY hard time believing this is an issue of "get better hardware". I'm running with 8GB corsair dominator RAM and ATI Radeon 4870x2 gfx card on 1680x1050 res, everything maxed and running perfectly smooth. I have hardware to spare.

Regardless of all of this, my once lovely looking CAS created Sims go from looking fantastic and remotely human and attractive by Sims 3 standards, to Miss PlayDough '09 the second I load them up in game.

Case in point:



gross. In CAS they're infinitely cleaner and crisp looking and you can actually make something that looks good. In game they turn to mush even at full settings, and the shit-tastic lighting that miraculously turns every skintone into some horrific shade of mystic tan day-glo orange doesnt help. Its pretty similar to the blurring that covers every bedspread, fabric, or texture when actually placed in-game. Sims 2 looked worlds better, which is pretty pathetic.

I use HP's replacements for the record... like everything else, they're great in CAS and way better than the defaults, but the second you go ingame it looks almost worse because of the game's apparent inability to handle detailed textures, which results in a smudgey mess that makes my sims look like zombies or burn victims. Lets not even go into toddlers/children. That shit is the stuff nightmares are made of.