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Replies: 6 (Who?), Viewed: 957 times.
pastel-sims
Test Subject
Original Poster
#1 Old 30th Apr 2015 at 1:09 AM
Default How to fix lag (Personal Experience.)
Hey guys! Having a poor performance, low-budget computer can be very hard to run the Sims 3 on. I have found a few solutions that have made my game run from the laggy "5" frames to 60 stable frames. Please read very carefully.


- First, I went in to the game and set all of my settings on 'low.' These can be upped later.

- I'm sorry to say this but the Sims 3 Pets causes a lot of lag, somehow, even with the spawns set to off. Uninstall it, if you MUST have it, this will still work but a little less efficiently.

- This baby right here is like the greatest tool ever invented: http://www.moreawesomethanyou.com/s...ic,15585.0.html *READ IT VERY CAREFULLY!*
Download the fpslimit & the 3booter. Follow the rules & information very carefully.

- Launch your game and adjust your graphics accordingly. :lovestruc


Good luck!
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HarVee
Mad Poster
#2 Old 30th Apr 2015 at 1:55 AM Last edited by HarVee : 30th Apr 2015 at 2:11 AM.
I've noticed that the World Adventures and Supernatural expansions are actually worse than the Pets EP when it comes to rendering. Something about the engine versions in those two packs cause a bottleneck. With World Adventures being the worse of all, I'd recommend not installing it, even if seems every custom world ever requires it.

For me, the best way I've noticed to experience less lag is to compress and combine your custom content into a few simple packages using S3Pe, and to play in small-medium sized worlds with minimal amounts of Sims and lots. Also the Nraas mods "Overwatch" and "Errortrap" help dramatically to increase game stability and reduce save-game bloating and corruption. However, I'd avoid Nraas' "StoryProgression" if you have a lackluster computer, and instead use an altered version of EA's progression to rid annoyances such as emigration or paparazzi.

And with that in mind all that is left to mention is the use of the frame-limiter and limiting the game to 30fps.
Because the earth is standing still, and the truth becomes a lie
A choice profound is bittersweet, no one hears Cassandra Goth cry

pastel-sims
Test Subject
Original Poster
#4 Old 30th Apr 2015 at 2:41 AM
Quote: Originally posted by nitromon
Thanks for sharing, but some of the things in here don't make any sense. Why would you need a FPS limiter if your computer is "low-budget?" FPS limiter is to limit hi-end GPUs that have greater than 60 FPS in order to prevent runaway FPS. If you have a low-budget computer, you probably have a low-budget GPU that can't even do 60 FPS.

Also, you don't have to necessarily set all your settings to low. Each setting has performance/quality trade-offs. Some are worth it while others are not. Refer to this detailed graphics guide.

Lastly, despite any tricks, there are hardware limitations to a "low budget" computer such as your CPU and RAM, which makes a lot of difference in how well the game runs. Single core CPUs, no matter how fast, will have intermitten lags, this is unavoidable since the CPU is being shared between the game and your background processes + OS. RAM is perhaps the most important. Without at least 6-8 GB of ram, your system must use your system swapfiles to clear more RAM for the game. Caching is a big issue when it comes to in game lag.

If a system has a dual core and 6-8GB of ram, I wouldn't consider that a low-budget system. Those specs exceed even the recommended requirement. Also, on a Nvidia, anything above a GT 200 is above average for the system. In the graphicsrules, anything above GT 200 is set to uber.



Thanks for the information. I'm not very tech-savy and I've read somewhere that the FPS in the SIms 3 go crazy. I tried it with & without the limiter and there is a HUGE difference in performance. I have no idea why, though.

Also, with the graphics, I stated adjust them after everything is set up to their liking and to what they can handle even if it isn't necessary. At least, this is what I did.
HarVee
Mad Poster
#5 Old 30th Apr 2015 at 2:51 AM
Quote: Originally posted by nitromon
Thanks for sharing, but some of the things in here don't make any sense. Why would you need a FPS limiter if your computer is "low-budget?" FPS limiter is to limit hi-end GPUs that have greater than 60 FPS in order to prevent runaway FPS. If you have a low-budget computer, you probably have a low-budget GPU that can't even do 60 FPS.


I'm utilizing an AMD Radeon HD 4670. A card I'd consider to be a low-budget card by modern technological standard and I can still achieve over 60fps at times, even when combined with a low-level processor such as a 3.2Ghz Hyper-threading Pentium 4 and 3Gb of 800MHz DDR2 RAM.
Because the earth is standing still, and the truth becomes a lie
A choice profound is bittersweet, no one hears Cassandra Goth cry

christmas fear
Mad Poster
#6 Old 30th Apr 2015 at 8:50 AM
Regardless of your computer, the FPS will go crazy and you need a frame limiter or else it will melt your graphics card. I think you can turn on vertical sync under your video card settings if you don't download the FPS limiter for the same effect.
HarVee
Mad Poster
#7 Old 1st May 2015 at 4:03 AM
Quote: Originally posted by christmas fear
Regardless of your computer, the FPS will go crazy and you need a frame limiter or else it will melt your graphics card. I think you can turn on vertical sync under your video card settings if you don't download the FPS limiter for the same effect.


I have it enabled in Cataylst Control Centre and that still doesn't seem to fix the issue of high frame-rates. It does fix most of the screen-tearing though, but that is to be expected.
Because the earth is standing still, and the truth becomes a lie
A choice profound is bittersweet, no one hears Cassandra Goth cry

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