Beosboxboy, if you have time could you help? :) UPDATE: RESOLVED see last post!

[trl]

Over the past day or so my game has been acting goofy. I enter a lot that I play every day and there are no issues while playing. The problem occurs when saving. If I simply save my game, intending to stay on the lot, it saves and saves with that darned tooting blue screen (blue screen of death) and never stops. I am unable to get to task manager to end task and/or shut down safely. I must hold my computer button in until it shuts down. If I am quitting the game to save, I end up with a black screen (the grim reaper of screens lol) and again cannot access task manager to end process/shut down. When I save game and return to the neighborhood, it will save on occasion (no blue/black screen) but when my neighborhood screen appears it will shake back and forth over and over. I am able to exit the game from there safely. I entered another neighbor hood and didn't seem to have this issue. It seems it is only with this particular one which I always play on.

I have deleted groups cache and cigen and I have removed the few things I have downloaded since this has been happening and even a few days before this has been happening to be sure.
I don't have problems with my computer other than this.

Here is a bit of info reguarding my computer and games:
Here is a link on my cards info
I have a GeForce 7300GT 512 mb graphics card (not overclocked)
I use AVG 7.5 Internet Security (not free) updates daily and deletes cookies/unwanted stuff daily so it doesn't appear to be a virus.

GAMES: Sims2 base, Uni, NL, OFB, GL, and  Pets none of which are new installs.
The only new hack/mod is Squinges Toddler pose but, as I figured,  removing this didn't solve my issue. The other mods/hacks are few, Crammy, Quaxi censor remover ,InSimenator, hula and more of which all, I believe, are correct versions for my game.

*attached image removed*

[ancienthighway]

My first inclination would be to look at your hard drive.  You may be out of space or the write could be hitting bad sectors on the disk.

If you haven't performed a disk cleanup or defrag lately it might not be a bad idea.  Tools for those can be found in the Start Menu/Accessories/System Tools.

[trl]

I went to another neighborhood and it did this again. This time I got the black screen but was able to get to my desktop to view my error message.



Apparently it has to do with my graphics adapter and could be one of several things according to NVidea/GEforce troubleshooting:  not having latest miniport drivers installed to the motherboard, other drivers updated such as chipset, video, sound or reinstall latest Direct X. We did recently take off the GEForce card and put my ATI Radeon, then took the Radeon off and reinstalled the GEForce (LOL, don't ask ) so we may have left some ATI stuff on inadvertently or not updated/installed all NVidea drivers. We are now going to start over, remove all drivers and such, and reinstall the GEForce. I appreciate the help ancienthighway! By the way I have Total 143gb/Free 102 and I defrag/clean up every week or so.  I will edit this when we get it right! Thanks again!! *hugs*

[ancienthighway]

Well, the video card and drivers were my second inclination lol.

With the crash only happening when you're saving, I thought disk right away, but the blank screens that you were stuck on does sound like problems with NVidea cards and drivers.

[trl]

Well since I posted last I made sure all my drivers were up to date. Then when I would change my graphic settings it crashed to the blue screen. Again I was unable to see the error message. I then decided to see if it actually was a problem with the card so I uninstalled all NVidea drivers and took out the graphics card. I then put my ATI radeon back on with all drivers up to date and no NVidia stuff on the computer. Went back in the game and still have this issue I have not had these problems with either of my cards before the last few days. I am now assuming my problem is not graphic card related. I am really puzzeled by all of this.
I am wondering now if somehow my game or a neighborhood has been corrupted somehow and if a specific neighborhood is corrupt:
1. Is this typical behavior of a corrupt neighborhood?
2. Would it affect all neighborhoods or only the corrupt one?
3. Would a corrupt neighborhood allow the game to even load?
Is it now time to reinstall my game or should I first remove my downloads, saved sims/neighborhoods that aren't maxis etc and see if the problem persists? Any advice would be appreciated. I am simply out of troubleshooting ideas. *sigh*  :boohoo:  Thank you!

[ancienthighway]

You could test the corrupted neighborhood theory by moving all of your neighborhoods to the desktop, then running the game.  Neighborhoods will be recreated and you can play around with it a bit, then do the save.  Same with possible bad CC.

I'd check both of those possibilities out before reinstalling.

[trl]

I removed the suspicious neighborhood to my desktop (it was a custom neighborhood) and   was able to play and save. YAY! Hopefully all is resolved. I believe the culprit was a lot I downloaded but not from here.  Unfortunately it was my InSim neighborhood! Y'all are troublemakers, lol, but will now get new homes. Thanks again for all your help.

[daytonaraceway]

TRL I have the same problem with my game as well but I only play Pleasentview, and when my game crashed with the graphic display error it actually crashed my card. I had to reinstall it. Did you have to do the same?

[trl]

Well I uninstalled one card and put my old card back on to see if it was a card issue. That is how I realized it was not due to my cards. It would happen with both cards.I don't think it crashed my card but I couldn't read any error messages but the one. I would get the black screen and then my monitor would turn off and I would turn it back on and it would turn off again.

 I have only played for a bit yesterday and it seemed ok but I will see the next time I play. Which may be awhile, I have been troubleshooting for 4 days straight, I am in a contest and didn't want to drop out, but I am just plain tired of sitting for hours at my computer. I just had all sorts of goofy things going on. I would try to move a sim and they would become invisible, many strange things like that. Both the graphics cards I have are well above the min and I had never had trouble before. Very strange. if I find out anything more I will pm you. Good luck. I tell my husband that I think there is subliminal messages in the game that addicts us to it. LOL I would never keep at something as frustrating as the SIMS 2 but for some reason I just can't kick the "habit". LOL  Again good luck!

[daytonaraceway]

When my card crashed it did the same thing, my monintor went on standby and I couldn't get it to turn back on. Do you have a lot of CC? PLay large lots? I found that my game ddaoes it morer when I play big lots with loads of CC than small Maxis lots.

[trl]

Hmmm...so when the monitor was turning off that is the video card crashing? I thought it was just my game crashing. As far as the CC, I have tons of it, lol,  but I haven't been downloading much as I have been trying to get rid of stuff I don't use. Also my game, neighborhood and lots load rather quickly. I was playing on a big lot but the house isn't real big, it has also been in my game for a long time and I have never had trouble with it.
 After removing the 4 things I had  D/L that week and posting here I remembered that I downloaded a lot from *cough* the exchange *cough*. Now I never download from there but I saw it in someones contest pics here and grabbed it, it was a cool lot. I removed the lot and checked my files using clean installer and didn't find anything unusual. I keep thinking that the lot corrupted my neighborhood somehow. It didn't say it required Seasons, which I don't have but I wonder if it indeed did need Seasons. I don't think I am ever going to know what actually happened. I am going in game tonight so I will see if all is ok still but I fear my short bit of playing the other night was just lucky.

[trl]

Ok, now I have issues once again. Since I last posted, I have been using my ATI Radeon 9250 256mb card and have had no issues. Five days ago I thought I would try my new GE Force 7300 GT 512mb (?)card once again (system info is in the first post) since I was finished with all my contests. I created a new neighborhood as well as a related downtown neighborhood. I have 2 lots in the entire hood. I was furnishing a med. sized community lot using maxis items for easier game play and my computer once again went to the black screen, I was moving a maxis toilet stall when this happened.  As usual when this happens I was unable to get my windows screen to come up to end task. I shut the computer down holding in the button, turned it back on and went back to the lot. A while later I was moving a maxis chair and it happened again; black screen. This time I did nothing as the light on my computer was indicating it was doing something. All of the sudden I got blue dots all over the screen and then for a moment my game came back and the screen quickly turned black again. I waited again and for a minute my monitor message came up saying "mode not suppoted" then went black again and nothing happened after that.
My question is this: What the heck is going on, lol! I am assuming that it isn't my game crashing since I got the screen back for a moment and my game was intact. What is crashing; my graphic card, my monitor or my game? I am unable to get any error message from whatever crashed because of my black screen. I sort of looks like my monitor turned off but the light on it was on. I really want to figure out what the issue is with this card because my game is much quicker. I believe we have the latest drivers installed. Again any ideas would be so greatly appreciated! :sad4:

[caffeinated.joy]

If it doesn't happen with your old ATI card, but does with your new GE Force card, then it's possible the new card is faulty.

[trl]

I thank you Caffinated Joy for your help! It is appreciated.
I found a thread started by Dese that seems a bit similar but she didn't respond if the problem had been resolved. Her thread can be found here .

Quote Beosboxboy from Dese's thread:
Dese - you will need to disable hyperthreading in BIOS it seems

Beosboxboy, could this be my problem as well?
 Also, is this my card crashing or my monitor? I am very frustrated with this issue. I feel that it is my monitor crashing because of the things I mentioned in my post above Caffinated Joy's response but I really don't understand all this stuff. There isn't much technical support from this manufacturer that doesn't invole phone help for a fee, that I can find. My monitor is by MAG Technology. I attached more pics with info that may or may not be related about my monitor. I have tried changing/updating monitor drivers but there wasn't one for my model available. I know I may have to stick with my ATI video card but I really would like to use this GEForce if I can figure this out. NVidea hasn't been a lot of help either. I am sorry to keep posting on this issue but I am getting desperate! :smt106

[kathy]

TRL have you checked your connector wire from the monitor to the pc.. try wiggling it a little and see if it goes to black. I have had that problem with a monitor and jiggling the wire would cause it to flick back and forth as well.