Need some advice or Help....Please

[Amberyl]

I have the most up to date drivers for DirectX and video card....I reloaded all 3 games, Sims 2, University, and Nightlife. I didn't put in any hacks or recolors or newly designed items. I go into the game fine, but when I make a sim (male or female) and just take the one that comes up, and hit "6" and just randomly pick turn on-off and aspiration, I ckick on the check mark.....and it freezes.....

Anyone have any idea?

I have ran spybot, adware, ccleaner, antivirus programs....and nothing....

Desperately missing my sims....

Amberyl

[eaglezero]

How much memory does your computer have, and what type of video card? My game used to freeze all the time when I was stupidly trying to run it on 256 mb RAM. That could be your problem, or it could be something else like the installs being bad or something. *shrug* Without more information it's impossible to know.

[Amberyl]

I have 640 ram and using a Nviada (sp?) Geforce FX 5500 OC with 256 meg ram on board.  I have just about given up on the game.....it worked fine until i had a major hard drive crash and then i got new hard drive and it won't work......

Thanks for the help anyway

[eaglezero]

It could be that you have a corrupt install, so if you haven't already tried reinstalling, you could do that.

Also, I seem to recall that there have been some problems with more recent drivers for Nvidia cards. I'm using that same graphics card and my driver version is 6.6.9.3 and it works fine. So if you think that may be the problem you could try downloading those drivers instead.

Errr, yeah, I'm not that great at solving these types of problems but thought I should reply since no one else had. My advice is to just mess around with things until the game works. I mean, hey, if you can't play it as-is, it's not like you're going to do any damage. Hope you manage to get it working again.

[RainbowTigress]

A new hard drive shouldn't cause the game not to work.  If you had to do a clean reinstall of Windows, it is most likely a driver issue as eaglezero suggested.  Do you know where you got the video drivers you were using before?  Did you get them from Windows Update?  Did you have a CD that came with your video card?  I know there have been some issues with nVidia cards and TS2, especially with the latest drivers, in spite of Maxis always telling us to update our drivers.   

I have a Radeon card I got a few months ago, and I had to install the drivers off the CD that came with it.  The drivers that Windows installed for it didn't work with TS2.

[Ambular]

Nvidia cards have notorious trouble handling TS2 with the most recent drivers installed.  I rolled back to version 7.7.7.7 and it straightened out several problems I was having.

[Amberyl]

My driver I got from the Nviada web site and its version 8.1.9.8, March 2006 I think.....I might try an old one.....the one with the video card was 8.1.2.4 I think.....thanks I will try an older version......

I appreciate all the help....


I have installed the games and uninstalled the game now 8 times in two weeks....thanks though...I might try it again after I get the old drivers...

Amberyl

PS the funny thing is that my spouse has it on the same machine and it works fine....

[akatonbo]

Are you sure you really have 640MB of RAM? That's a funny number to have, though certainly not impossible (128MB stick + 512MB stick).

I'm puzzled as to what you mean by this, though:

PS the funny thing is that my spouse has it on the same machine and it works fine....

Do you mean literally the same physical computer? Because if that's the case, then it's not a problem that uninstalling and reinstalling would fix -- if it's working fine for him and not for you, ON THE SAME COMPUTER, then your problem is something specific to what you are doing -- my first guess would be a program that you have running in the background and he doesn't.

If you don't mean on the same computer, then what do you mean by that statement?

[Amberyl]

Yes, lol, the store only had 2-256 ram so I got it and placed a 128 (of the same type) to get 640....

My spouse's machine is separate from mine (another computer), but we have the same motherborad, hd, os, everything....and it works fine on his.

[Amberyl]

Okay I went and got an old video card driver from Nviada, put it in per their instructions....installed sims 2, went into th game fine.  Went to build a family, took a default female, gave an aspiration and......no hang ups....worked fine.......

Then....went and made a female, with different hair, face, makeup, clothes, etc.....clicked on the check mark and immediately freeze up.......

There are no hacks or extra downloads in the game......

Amberyl

[Pegasys]

Have you recently added new RAM? I've heard people talking about crashes from RAM "timing issues" when newly installed RAM doesn't have the same timing as the old RAM.

Also is your RAM seated firmly in the prongs (or whatever they're called)? It might have gotten dislodged with the install of the new hard drive. Or maybe your RAM is failing. For some reason I suspect a RAM issue.

Or possibly a problem with the new hard drive - a bad install or bad sectors. Let's think - what is being accessed when a CAS is being saved - is it RAM or hard drive?

[Amberyl]

new ram checks out fine....yes I did add some new one.....and it is seated properly...hard drive is fine too

[phyllis_p]

J.M. or Kellinjar or probably a dozen other people (at least) are more qualified to address this than I am.  However ....

..... Someone more tech-savvy than I once told me that there can be problems when you install RAM cards of different, er ... denominations.  Not different speeds, as someone already suggested (because I asked the person about this specifically).  Cards with different amounts of memory on them -- like 256 + 256 + 128. 

I have no idea whether this is true.  But .....

.... what if you took out the 128 and see if you still had the freezing/crashing problem?  Couldn't hurt, could it?

Okay, I stand ready to get my lips ripped if I'm spouting total inanities.  I'm just repeating what someone told me.

Phyllis

[Amberyl]

YEAH!!!!!

My sims are back!!!!

Thanks you Phyllisp.....

I took out the 128 meg and it works......so far...need to test all my downloads and hacks...

[phyllis_p]

Oh, yay! I hope that solves it and it's not just coincidence!

Phyllis

[Amberyl]

All hacks all downloads are in....and it's doing wonderfully....thank you thank you

[phyllis_p]

Yay! 

[Amberyl]

 
Guess what.....it's stopped working.....

here is the easy info....

Your System Game Requirements
Operating System (Get Updates) Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1 (Build 2600) (refuse to use SP2 due to LAN issues) Windows XP/2000/98/ME
System Memory 512.5 256.0
Processor Speed 1460.8 1000 MHz
DirectX Version (Get Updates) 9.0c 9.0c (newest drivers from Microsoft)
Display Device (Get Drivers) NVIDIA GeForce FX 5500 (newst driver from Nvidia)
Display Memory 256.0 32.0
Display Driver 6.14.10.8421
Sound Device (Get Drivers) SB Live! Wave Device (newest driver)
Sound Driver 5.12.01.3509

anybody have any ideas?

[Hegelian]

If the computer locks up completely it is a hardware problem. There are several possibilities, none of which can be diagnosed without having physical access to the system.

The motherboard could be defective or going bad (yes, motherboard problems can develop, or become symptomatic, some months after installation).

There could be another defective component, like the video card or one of the RAM modules.

The power supply could be going bad, or the motherboard power connectors are not seated firmly (however, power problems usually result in spontaneous reboots rather than lock-ups).

The CPU could have a problem (less likely than the other options).

nVidia drivers are evil.   

A few things to try:

Run with just one RAM module. If you can go a few days with that one, swap it out for the other one and try the same thing. If one works and the other doesn't, you've probably found your problem. If they both work singly, but don't work when installed at the same time, it may be that one of the RAM sockets on the motherboard is bad. Another thing to keep in mind is that some motherboards require RAM to be installed in "banks," so that modules need to be installed in pairs; or if you have more than one module, they may need to go in specific slots not necessarily next to each other. In many cases, each RAM socket on the motherboard is one bank, so this is not always an issue. The motherboad manual is good for this kind of information, but if you don't have one you can usually download a copy from the manufacturer's Web site.

If you have or can get an old PCI graphics board, try running that instead of the nVidia board you're using now. If the PC/game runs fine with that, then there's probably a problem with the graphics board or the AGP (or PCI-E) slot. Also, this is too obvious I know, but if the graphics board has its own Molex power connector, be sure to have a power lead plugged into it.   

Do you have the most recent chipset drivers for your motherboard?

When you installed/changed the nVidia drivers, did you completely remove all previous drivers first? I believe nVidia has a driver-removal tool, but unlike ATi's removal tool on its Web site, nVidia's is well-hidden. Or maybe not. You may need to use a third-party driver-removal utility since nVidia's own Uninstall routine is known to be less than thorough. Try one of these:
http://www.3dchipset.com/utilities/nvidia/driver_removal/index.php

Does your motherboard have integrated graphics? If so, is it turned off in the BIOS?

Have you checked the BIOS to see if the RAM timing settings are overly aggessive? Are you overclocking the CPU or memory bus? If any of these are true, reset them to their defaults.

In any case, it is unlikely that a driver problem would cause a hard lockup that requires a manual restart. Except for nVidia drivers, which are notoriously bad.

If you need information about your processor, motherboard, and/or RAM modules and timings, this free tool is quite useful.

http://www.cpuid.com/cpuz.php

I don't understand your comment about not using WinXP SP2 for LAN reasons. I've had SP2 since not long after it was released and I've been running a LAN at two different locations with several different machines running a combination of XP Pro, XP Home, and Win98 SE with no problems.

Although some motherboards have specific configuration requirements, it is not true that as a general rule you can't run RAM modules of different capacities. What you do need is RAM modules of the same type (i.e., PC2700 or PC3200; DDR or DDR2, etc.) preferably of the same "grade," that is, with the same timings. It may be possible to mix PC2700 and PC3200 modules on the same motherboard, but some motherboards are more finicky in this regard than others, so it's best to avoid doing this. That said, if you're motherboard is capable of dual-channel memory operation, you probably need two identical RAM modules in the appropriate RAM slots on the motherboard for dual channel to work. If you want 1 GB of dual-channel RAM, you need to 512 MB modules.

The safest approach is to use modules from the same manufacturer, although I have mixed Crucal and Corsair modules in the same machine. Several of the name-brand manufacturers have memory-configurator applets on their Web site that will show you what exactly is compatible with your motherboard; the one at www.crucial.com is easy to use (and Crucial RAM is usually a good value for the money).

[Amberyl]

Okay, cpuz...here are the results

CPU-Z Report
CPU-Z version 1.33.1.

CPU(s)   
Number of CPUs   1
Name   AMD Athlon XP
Code Name   Palomino
Specification   AMD Athlon(tm) XP 1700+
Family / Model / Stepping   6 6 2
Extended Family / Model   7 6
Package   Socket A
Core Stepping   A5
Technology   0.18 um
Supported Instructions Sets   MMX, Extended MMX, 3DNow!, Extended 3DNow!, SSE
CPU Clock Speed   1460.8 MHz
Clock multiplier   x 11.0
Front Side Bus Frequency   132.8 MHz
Bus Speed   265.6 MHz
L1 Data Cache   64 KBytes, 2-way set associative, 64 Bytes line size
L1 Instruction Cache   64 KBytes, 2-way set associative, 64 Bytes line size
L2 Cache   256 KBytes, 16-way set associative, 64 Bytes line size
L2 Speed   1460.8 MHz (Full)
L2 Location   On Chip
L2 Data Prefetch Logic   yes
L2 Bus Width   64 bits
 
Mainboard and chipset   
Motherboard manufacturer   MICRO-STAR INTERNATIONAL CO., LTD
Motherboard model   MS-6330,
BIOS vendor   Award Software International, Inc.
BIOS revision   6.00 PG
BIOS release date   12/19/2001
Chipset   VIA KT133A rev. 03
Southbridge   VIA VT82C686 rev. 40
Sensor chip   VIA 686A/B
Graphic Interface   AGP
AGP Status   enabled, rev. 3.0
AGP Data Transfer Rate   4x
AGP Max Rate   4x
AGP Side Band Addressing   supported, enabled
 
Memory   
DRAM Type   SDRAM
DRAM Size   512 MBytes
DRAM Frequency   132.8 MHz
FSB:DRAM   1:1
DRAM Interleave   4-way
CAS# Latency   3.0 clocks
RAS# to CAS#   3 clocks
RAS# Precharge   3 clocks
Cycle Time (TRAS)   6 clocks
# of memory modules   2
Module 0   SDRAM PC133 - 256 MBytes
Module 1   SDRAM PC133 - 256 MBytes
 
Software   
Windows version   Microsoft Windows XP Professional Service Pack 1 (Build 2600)
DirectX version   9.0c

Power supply is practically new, 400.  motherboard is old...still uses DIMM PC 133.

The problem with SP2 is I still have systems in my LAN that use Windows 98.......not 98SE......

The ram I have is correct according to the manual for my motherboard.....
I will try and remove a stick of ram and see what happens.......

Thanks....any help is appreciated....

Amberyl

[Amberyl]

Guess what....I followed your advice and removed ram and switched and everything was fine with 1 256 ram.....placed one in the second slot and bammmm.....nothing....no computer system....nothing....then I went and put one 256 in the first slot and one in the third slot and lo and behold....I am operational again......at least with Sims.....

Thanks for all the wonderful help.....

Amberyl

[VyeOlin]

You can also buy "bad" RAM, make sure that RAM you purchase comes with a lifetime warranty.

[Hegelian]

Glad to hear you seem to have isolated the problem. I'm still dubious about not being able to run SP2 on a LAN with Win98 machines; I had SP2 before I upgraded two Win98 PCs to Win98 SE. It's true that it's easier to get the XP machine to see the Win98 machines than the other way 'round, but I could/can do basic file transfers and all the machines have Internet access through a router.

[Amberyl]

Slowly we are upgrading, but my motherboard is going.  I have the last slot go last night.....so....save up for a motherboard.....

Thanks for the help....

Amberyl