Problem with new vid card

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Ldyvamp:
I can only play my sims 2 game for so long before the monitor turns completely blue and the game stops responding. I got a geforce 6200 vid card today and don't know if the way that I have my color options set within it is causing this. Can someone help me figure out what settings are best?

caffeinated.joy:
I'm not familiar with the card, but I would make sure you completely removed the drivers for your old card, and then make sure the drivers for your new card are updated...they aren't necessarily sold with the most updated versions.

rwills:
Ah, the dreaded nVidia Blue Screen.

First the bad news: There is nothing yet available that will end or fix the problem altogether.

However, there are some steps you can take that will help prolong game play until the prob shows up.

I use the same card (GeForce 6200), and the steps outlined below have helped somewhat, especially in having the first instance of the blue screen be able to eventually reset itself and get back to the game long enough to Save and Quit.

First, get the latest driver for the card, uninstall the old driver and install the newest one. If you have WinXP, that is this one:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_175.19_whql.html

If not WinXP, go here:

http://www.nvidia.com/Download/index.aspx?lang=en-us

and look under your operating system for the latest drivers.

Periodically check in at nVidia to see if there are even newer drivers available.

Also follow the instructions in Solution A --Make It Permanent, here:

http://www.modthesims2.com/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:nVidia_Blue_Screen_Issue

Also, in the graphic options, set some of the items from High to Medium. I've found that setting Textures to Medium does help a bit, but your mileage may vary dependent on your computer, your EPs and the sheer amount of stuff to be displayed in any house or lot. Turning off outside shadows has also helped, but even so the blue screen eventually occurs.

Last but not least, clean dust from your computer, both on the outside of the vents and inside the case. Heat build-up on the card as it is stressed by game play can trigger the blue screen as well.

I do not have Vista but if you do, setting the game's compatibility to XP should help a bit, too.

As well, in case you, for instance, have any Windows downloads pending, anti-virus updates to install, or anything else that will trigger a nag balloon in an icon in the system tray or a nag screen alert, take care of that before playing. Those ragga-fragga balloons alone can trigger the blue screen.

EDIT: Oh, two more things.

1) Try to remember to Save the game just after 6 p.m. in Sims time, as that is when scads of things are reset or updated by the game itself.

2) If a character has an age transition coming up shortly, Save, Quit and then after your hard drive has stopped doing its thing, start anew, as the age transitions do seem to stress the card as well.

Ldyvamp:
That's weird when I went into update driver it said that it could not find any better than what I am using but the date on that driver said 4/19/2007 and the one you gave me for xp was july 2008. Thanks for that direct link. I am downloading it now. I also, just upgraded the memory to 2 gigs and got a 500watt power supply. So, the computer is very clean inside. Since you have the same card I was wondering if you could help me out with the vid cards options. I have no idea on what the best settings would be. In appearance & themes under display settings the screen res. is set to 1024x768 at 32 bit color. My only other options are: 800x600 or 960x600 for res. and if I choose one of these it distorts my desktop. My other color option is 16 bit mediem. Now when I go into settings advanced it pops up the options for the vid card itself. Here are my settings: In performance & quality the image settings are at high quality. In color correction they are: vibrance low, bright 98%, contrast 112%, gamma 0.97 and image sharp is at the halfway mark. In temprature I'm running at 42c and the threshold is 130c. In screen resolution tab it is 1024x768 color 32bit with 70 hertz refresh rate. What should I change these each of these settings to? I'd really appreciate some help with the settings. I thought this card was going to solve all my problems I had before...meh :(

rwills:
I'd say keep it at 1024x768 and 32-bit, and keep the vid card settings as they are, that is to say at default. Changing any of those parameters will have no discernible affect one way or another insofar as the blue screen goes. That glitch is just an unofrtunate factor of Sims2 and many nVidia cards not playing well together (both EA/Maxis and nVidia have acknowledged the existence of the conflct, but neither has actually ever offered anything which fully resolves it). The only settings I'd recommend fiddling with are the in-game options - not the resolution but rather experimenting with setting some of the options that are set at High to Medium. Again, bumping down the Texture option a notch has helped out a little on my system.

As mentioned before, there are some things you can do to help get more game play in before the blue screen shows up, but there is nothing whatsoever that will stop it from happening now and again regardless.

Admittedly the blue screen (especially when it doesn't eventually pop back to the game but rather just crashes) is an annoyance, but one many nVidia card users just have to become resigned to. Sometimes I get no more than 10 or 15 minutes of game play in; sometimes it runs smoothly for hours and hours, but happen it eventually does.

The only other advice I can readily offer is to shut down your anti-virus program before playing -- especially if you are using Norton, as Norton anti-virus has been demonstrated to accelerate the occurrence of the blue screen. (I use AVG free version slightly modified with a custom install for anti-virus and whether on or off, it doesn't seem to matter insofar as the blue screen goes.)

If it'll help, here's a link to a Google search on the situation -- likely, you'll get the same recommendations already outlined here:

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=sims2+nvidia+%22blue+screen%22&btnG=Google+Search

For whatever consolation it may be, you're not alone:

http://sumomo.modthesims2.com/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:nVidia_Blue_Screen_Issue/Cards

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