Sims 3 Problems

Hey all,
(I hope i'm posting this in the correct section)
Today I bought the Sims 3, Ive installed it and it all seemed fine. I had been playing for about 10 minutes and all of a sudden my laptop just cut out (i've got a Dell XPS M1530 - had it about a year and a half)
So i restarted it, tried playing again, and exactly the same thing happened... I really don't know whats up?
Can anyone help or know what the problem may be?
Thanks

 

One of the many known issues with TS3, no doubt. Not much official word yet. Keep watching the forums...
http://forum.thesims3.com/jforum/forums/list.page

 

I have the same laptop and have had zero performance issues. Well, except the time the icons disappeared from the map view screen (a restart fixed that). Oh, and the time my kitchen caught fire due to waffles being left on the stove. But that was because my sim was late for work.

If you are playing with the disc in the drive might I suggest Daemon Tools? Works like a charm.

 

I have a problem that when I save (not all the time, it's random), the game crashes and my save file is corrupt. So I have to revert my game to the previous save.

 

How annoying!!
Well its funny, since i've played it for longer than 10 minutes and its been fine :S
Really strange!
What are Deamon Tools?

Also, I dont know if you're all experiencing this too, but even when you've set the time to seed right up - does it still seem slow to you? i.e. takes ages just for 1 hour to go by in sim time.
In TS2 when you speed up time, the hours fly by, but in this theres not much difference between 2X speed and 4X speed - if you understand what im getting at :S

 

Known complaints... still no official word.

 

My sims works like a charm.. no crashes yet

 

Daemon Tools is a software app that emulates your CD/DVD drive to enable playing games without the disc. Better and safer than hunting down 'nocd' cracks.

However, in terms of this forum, further discussion of these types of solutions falls into a grey area. So I'll leave it at that. Google and specific gaming forums can provide you with more info.

 

Thanks for the info

 

Ive just got in touch with EA, and they sent me a link to check if my Dell XPS M1530 can run TS3 and according to that, my laptop cant run it (which i find off)
Apparently my CPU's not strong enough (2.0GHz core 2 duo)
and i also dont have enough RAM (2GB)

Which I find odd :S

 

who said that wasnt good enough to run it? not sure I understand what your saying...

what video card is in there? if oyu have a sucky one the rest do need to be beefier than that.

 

What GPU do you have? If it's the 8600M then it should run it with ease.

9200M over here runs the game well

 

I think the m1530 should run perfectly fine. Even with 2gb memory and 2.0 GHZ duo processor, shouldn't it be enough for TS3 at the least for its minimum requirements? Maybe the game is bugged...

 

Heh. Assuming you have a dedicated GPU at all, you should be able to run it without a hitch. I can get it work fine with minimum settings all around on a black Macbook with an X3100, though it lags worse than a pickled sloth in a jar of liquid nitrogen.

 

I used the 'system requirements checker' on the sims 3 website

http://www.ea.com/games/the-sims-3

I found it odd that my laptop couldnt play it, its only a year and a half old and when i bought it back then, it was high spec at the time :S

I personally think its something to do with the game, but i've played it with all settings on low, and still nothing, it just cuts out after about 15 minutes of gameplay.

So now im at a loss with what to do next as theres nothing else I can really do. Does anyone know if theres an update to be released from EA, because that might solve the problem.

 

The minimal requirements are as follows:
OS: Windows XP SP 2 / Windows Vista

Processor: Pentium 4 @ 2 GHz / Athlon XP 2000+

RAM: 1 GB (1.5 GB Vista)

Video Memory: 128 MB (GeForce FX 5900 / Radeon 9500)

Sound Card: DirectX Compatible

DirectX: 9.0c

HDD: 7 GB

Got the idea ? It's not so demanding. I've said it before - it uses Sims 2 engine so no worry about it. Probably the problems is not in your or others computers. It's new game and probably rushed to the market. Soon would be a patch / update or something for sure.

Just don't worry that much if you've not ordered the game or have it in original. If not - just try a crack fix or something. There are plenty of them in the Net.
Good luck with this game I've had a pleasant experience with Sims 2. Don't have time and HDD space to test it out, mainly busy.

Editing: Also would add that S2 runs smoothly on Athlon XP 2500+ /512 RAM/ ATi R9600 and if I free some hdd space I'll pirateload it on my PC just to see if there are any complains as those above mine.

NRC

 

Have you checked the o/s power management settings? Ensure it is on 'Performance' otherwise system resources will be throttled.

 

Yep, that was one of the 1st things I checked - and it was set on 'high performance' - strange I know.
Like Zeerax says, it could due to the fact it was rushed to the market and an update on its way will hopefully iron out the issues!
Its just annoying in the mean time though
Im just trying it on my mum's PC to see if it works on there or not.
Fingers crossed!
Thanks guys

 

You should have got the Product (red) 1530. Red = fast.

 

Yeah I like the 'red' one, but that wasn't out when I was looking for my laptop