"blinking" Problem with new Radeon 9830

[angelyne]

I just bought a Radeon 9830 to replace an aging Nvidia 6600.  I had an issue with textures becoming fuzzy with my Nvidia that no amount of fiddling with cards settings would fix.  So I decided to try an Radeon.

Textures are sharp as anythings, but I'm having an incredibly annoying problem.  When I am playing, the game "blinks"; everything disappears for a split second and then reappears.  Not the entire LCD, but just the game itself (I play in windowed mode).

The second problem, which is probably the same issue, is in build/buy mode.  When I do anything there i.e add a wall, a window, paint, delete a wall, etc....the game will blink again, but this time it takes around 2-3 seconds to come back.  When that happens all the walls, objects etc disappear for a few seconds, leaving only the tiles or ground textures. Then everything blinks back.  This happens also in buy mode, but not for everything.

Anyway it's driving me crazy.  Anyone has seen anything similar ? 

[Zazazu]

1. Did you update drivers? Even a new card might be out of date by the time you get it.
2. What's your system specs, and what is the voltage of your power supply?

[leaths]

This seems to be a common problem with Radeon cards. I had it and quickly switched to an Nvidia because no amount of driver updating helped. As a temporary fix, adjusting the slider for smooth edges and changing the pixel settings from round to square seemed to help. Here is a recent thread about it.

[angelyne]

That's exactly the problem I'm having Leaths, thanks for the head's up. 

[morriganrant]

Are you sure that you do not have multiple drivers installed?

[angelyne]

Yes, I always remove drivers before installing a card, that is pretty much standard procedure for installing that type of device.

[morriganrant]

Yes, I always remove drivers before installing a card, that is pretty much standard procedure for installing that type of device.

Only asking because I do not know you, and I had run into a similar problem before on a friend's computer. Their in game "blinking" was caused by multiple drivers. They never properly uninstalled the others. I had an odd problem that was similar that I was able to fix by lowering the smooth edges settings. Strangely, smooth edges set on high also cause several maxis objects to be transparent on my machine, as well as a kind of "blinking", the base game cheap crib's bedding, and NL's Dj booth. I have a RadeonHD3870.

[witch]

Strangely, smooth edges set on high also cause several maxis objects to be transparent on my machine as well as a kind of "blinking", the base game cheap cribs bedding, and NL's Dj booth. I have a RadeonHD3870.

Ah ha! I've been meaning to suss out that problem. I removed a whole lot of nursery recolours but hadn't gone any further. I've just bought and installed an HD4870. I don't get the blinking but I've had transparent crib bedding, plants and other miscellaneous bits.

[morriganrant]

Strangely, smooth edges set on high also cause several maxis objects to be transparent on my machine as well as a kind of "blinking", the base game cheap cribs bedding, and NL's Dj booth. I have a RadeonHD3870.

Ah ha! I've been meaning to suss out that problem. I removed a whole lot of nursery recolours but hadn't gone any further. I've just bought and installed an HD4870. I don't get the blinking but I've had transparent crib bedding, plants and other miscellaneous bits.

That was the other thing I noticed, the plants. Glad I could help someone. This caused me great aggravation. I removed all nursery items, then everything in downloads(by batches), then everything stashed in Bins, I finally uninstalled everything, became pissy when I realized that I had deleted some of the isos after install, instead of moving them over to my external first. Managed to get everything reinstalled. Everything works, I go back to adding in the bins folder and adjusting my settings, then Lo! I discover my issue was a graphics setting. Mouth agape head meets desk over and over.

[angelyne]

Well I didn't go with a in-depth removal of the previous nvdia driver, just un-installed it.  But before trying an earlier version of the Radeon driver, I did a more thorough job, uninstalled, removed the inf and the registry keys.  So I'm probably fine.

Which driver was your friend upgrading from?

[morriganrant]

Well I didn't go with a in-depth removal of the previous nvdia driver, just un-installed it.  But before trying an earlier version of the Radeon driver, I did a more thorough job, uninstalled, removed the inf and the registry keys.  So I'm probably fine.

Which driver was your friend upgrading from?

Same card as mine, (There was a thanksgiving sale :p) I want to say that it was 8.8 maybe. The issue was that they wanted to update to 9.2, well, there were like three other drivers files still there.

[SpaceDoll]

Thanks to the advice in this thread, I set smooth edges to low and got the crib bedding back.  I had fought with that for weeks and could find nothing.  Now, however, I get the flickering.  It goes away if I set the edges back to high, but so does the bedding.  Damn!

[angelyne]

I tried three versions of drivers and none of them fixed the issue, so I fixed this problem the old fashioned way.  I returned the damn card to the store and got an Nvidia instead

[LynnMar]

 I have a raedon and I was having the same problem.  When I would try to build a house and place an item in it, it would disappear and come back in a second.  I was advisded by someone to go to an older driver and I have not had a problem since.

  Mine is not as fancy as yours,  I only have an ATI radeon  HD 3450  but I went from a 9. something driver to 8.4930.

  That is what worked for me.   Good luck.   

[angelyne]

I replaced the card with a 9800 GTX.  I had to pay an extra 65$ as it's a more expensive card but it works flawlessly.  I can now enjoy again sharp textures instead of fuzzy ones.   Aikea Guinea stuff looks sooooo good with this card.  I've even started ditching some of the more crappy cc that simply does not look acceptable anymore.

My next step is to try bigger houses to see how much my card can handle.  I always had to restrict myself to little lots in the past.

This new card is making the game fun again.

[morriganrant]

I replaced the card with a 9800 GTX.  I had to pay an extra 65$ as it's a more expensive card but it works flawlessly.  I can now enjoy again sharp textures instead of fuzzy ones.   Aikea Guinea stuff looks sooooo good with this card.  I've even started ditching some of the more crappy cc that simply does not look acceptable anymore.

My next step is to try bigger houses to see how much my card can handle.  I always had to restrict myself to little lots in the past.

This new card is making the game fun again.

Heh, that's what I did, I always used large lots, but kept the settings down. Aikea really does do some good work, but I did find outfits by other people that I loved but had to ditch when I saw them with the new card. Mainly people who couldn't figure out bump mapping, what it was, how much was too much, and that the clothing item that they used as a base had it while the new recolor that they did on top of it did not.

[angelyne]

My eyes are bleeding trying to imagine this 

[Avi]

Which is better the 9800 Pro or GTX?  I had a Pro before, but it got messed up so I had to get a new card.  Forgot about all the issues with nVidia cards and Sims 2 and got an nVidia 7800 GT and have not been able to run the game well since I got it though I've updated and rolled back the drivers multiple times and not at all since February without it crashing during play (or before play as in loading the neighborhood) . . .  So I'm probably going to get another 9800 card.  I don't have anything but the regular PCI and AGP connectors in my motherboard because it's an older computer, so would like to get the best card that would work with my system.  I don't want to run into any other problems though like this blinking thing . . .  I don't think I ever experienced that with the 9800 Pro.