Laptop Frustration! Need Help!

watermelon88

I've tried a few other games, some work but most skip a bit. Have tried it when there's nothing else installed bar sims 3 & what's already on windows & still nothing.

watermelon88

This is the laptop I have now. Apparently it should run sims 3. But it won't. Even when we format it & try it with no other program's installed etc

http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/document?cc=uk&dlc=en&docname=c02550718&lc=en

gonzo127

well yes it should run it as said previously on low detail settings, the main thing whihc has got me wondering is you mentioned earlier that it also skips on normal video's and these should not be demanding enough to make a system skip, which makes me think its something else, but not sure what that could be

watermelon88

It doesn't skip on all videos, just some. Even when we stream them to our ps3. We tested the files that skipped on other laptops & they all worked fine.

Best pc world could offer was that the graphics card was over heating too fast.

warwick_hunt_2

Be very careful running Sims 3, this game, thanks to my son, has cost me 2 video cards in seperate machines. It has no option for Vsync ingame so unless you tether it through Nvidia Control Panel or similar, your video card will run flat out and overheat. I've had FPS figures in the high 800s.

watermelon88

I've never had a problem with it before I got this laptop. Ran fine on my old one, until it died of old age lol

warwick_hunt_2

watermelon88 wrote: »

I've never had a problem with it before I got this laptop. Ran fine on my old one, until it died of old age lol

There lies the problem though, the newer/faster your machine is, the higher the FPS rate will be and the hotter it will get.

It's a well documented problem with the game that EA refuses to fix.

Google 'sims 3 overheating'

watermelon88

Just had a look. I didn't realise any of that.

So, how can I find out how many fps my sims 3 is running at?? & on one of the google links it said you can get programs to force it to run at 30fps, where do I get them??

It also said about vsync to make it run at 60fps... i dont understand any of that lol.

warwick_hunt_2

To establish what your FPS is you'll need a program called FRAPS which can be downloaded here fraps.com will display your Frames Per Second (FPS) in the top left corner of your screen.

Anything under 60fps should be OK.

Turning Vsync (sychronising your monitor refresh with graphics card output) on can be done quite easily in the 3D settings control panel with an Nvidia card, however with an ATI one it can't.

This needs the 3rd party add-ons you mentioned which are explained in more detail and can also be downloaded from here moreawesomethanyou.com/smf/index.php/topic,15585.0.html

Good luck and hope you get it working, however, if I were you I wouldn't be putting it back on, especially on a shiny new laptop. As I said earlier, this game's already cost me £300 in blown graphic cards.

watermelon88

I will definitely be putting it on the new laptop. I've spent loads on the game, it's my favourite game.

I'll just research first on what I can do to stop it killing my laptop.

I'm still toying with the idea of a desktop, the only thing is that means extra costs on getting a desk and chair lol