Hi, I'm having some very serious problems w/my game. The initial launcher comes up fine and then goes into the initial loading, but *just* before that loading is finished or 2 seconds into the family loading screen, it crashes w/nothing but a black screen and my only option is a hard restart of my comp. I've tried everything, even rolling my comp back. About the only thing I've not done is uninstalling and re-installing the game. I've tried right clicking and starting from the icon in the game bin as admin, I've tried right clicking on it and then on trouble shooting from that same icon in the bin, but none of those work. I still get the black screen. Before this all started, I had installed a very old game from 1998 which required DX7 (I think) or earlier. To my knowledge, I did not install any earlier version of DX. Everything seemed to be fine for a while and then this happened. Does anybody here know any other tricks? Thanks!

I don't think I did. I usually click on "no" when prompted.

What Windows OS you have there? I think if you have DX9c (Windows XP) or above, you won't need any DX7 because it's already covered in the newer version of your OS, I think it could be more than just that, if you can post more details about your OS, your computer's spec, your DeviceConfig and have proper drivers installed for your graphic, it will be easier to locate where the problem lies that affecting your TS3.., some old games can be run even in the newest Win 10 but some may need to be adjusted (like using DOS box etc) to fit or runs well in the newer OS, but still that can't be counted as it will be 100% compatible.. or affecting your TS3 directly..

I have Win7 64 bit, Intel i7 processor, 24 gigs RAM. My video card is a GeForce GTX 970 and the drivers are up to date. The only problem there is that the sims does not recognize this card, but that has never been a serious problem before. Just kind of laggy graphics so to speak. Something weird here. I might be "barking up the wrong tree" again. I just looked and it said that I have DX 11! So I guess it's back to the drawing boards for what is causing this.

Well you need TS3 to get your GTX970 recognized that's why, it doesn't have anything to do with your old game from 1998 or DX7.. so let's put that aside for now, go here to get your GTX970 recognized by TS3, the tutorial is made for Win 10 but the steps are the same for any other previous Windows OS, and don't forget to install FPS Limiter to protect your GTX970 when playing TS3

I have another question: I got to the point of editing my DeviceConfig file, the GraphicsCards.sgr, and the GraphicsRules.sgr. After I got done w/that, he had an add on for the 900 series of cards which I have. He says:

"Update: For some new gpus like some of the Nvidia GTX900 or the newest GTX1000 series, this step preventing Texture Memory Override may night work, and for that it needs to be manually adjusted, to fix this manually follow this step;

1. Open the GraphicRules.sgr (located in your TS3 BG installation directory) with Notepad
2. Go to this line: "seti textureMemory 32", edit and replace the "32" with your actual VRAM amount you have in your graphic card, 1024 for 1GB 2048 for 2GB 4096 for 4GB VRAM and so on..
3. Then go to this line: "setb textureMemorySizeOK false", add hashtag before the "setb.." like this --> # setb textureMemorySizeOK false
4. Close Notepad to save, don't use Save As to save it.
5. Remove/delete your DeviceConfig and Option.ini from your TS3 Docs folder.
6. Launch the game and set up your graphic again from TS3 main menu for TS3 to regenerate a new DeviceConfig and Option.ini in your TS3 Docs folder for the next time your run your game."

I got as far as 4, but am a bit confused about 5 and 6. I just edited the deviceconfig file and now I have to delete it? Also, I don't have an options.ini file in my docs folder, only an options file. Now what do I do?

Sorry for the late reply, I just got back from the hospital visiting my uncle, he got stroke yesterday..

Anyway.., about steps #5 & 6, I'm sorry I forgot to explain that you'll only have DeviceConfig and Option.ini once you have launched the game at least once..

The one you're editing was the GraphicRules.sgr file in TS3 BG installation folder not the DeviceConfig.log in TS3 Documents folder, the DeviceConfig and Option.ini will be generated by TS3 once you go to TS3 main menu and do some graphic configuration set up according to your computer spec.

So I apologize, that was my mistake, I should have put that you'll only need to do this manual step once you have launched the game at least once, and then see what TS3 says in the DeviceConfig after that, so if you haven't launched the game after you finished installing them, you won't have these DeviceConfig and Option.ini, executing the TS3 Launcher after finished installing the game will generate TS3 Docs folder, but only after you launched the game and went to the TS3 main menu, then TS3 will generate the DeviceConfig and Option.ini in your TS3 Documents folder generated earilier.

Therefore, the correct steps should be, after you edited the GraphicCards.sgr to make your gpu recognized and have FPS Limiter installed to work for TS3, run the game up to TS3 main menu, make adjustment to your graphic setting accordingly as necessary at TS3 main menu, then exit the game, and then go to your TS3 docs folder and open your DeviceConfig, if you don't have any Texture Memory 32MB Override then you're good to go, but if it does exist then you'll need to do the manual steps to fix the Texture Memory Override. Only do the manual steps if there's Texture Memory Override, otherwise you don't need to..

I just found out about this.. that if your gpu is more recent and have more than 1gb VRAM, it's more likely that the big VRAM may not be suitable for the VRAM of the gpu's profile being replaced so it says Texture Memory Override in your DeviceConfig.

Thank you for questioning them out, i will make some changes to the update so it won't confuse the users to follow them

Hi, I'm still having problems here. Please bear w/me here. I'm almost a total and complete tech dummy! I tried to d/l the FPS Limiter and that's where I'm stuck. You say to click on "install/run," but there is no "run" that I can see. It d/ls in a zip file as pictured. It's possible that I can d/l version 2.1.2.0 b/c I have Net Framework 4. When I double click on the first file listed, I get a pic like your first small one at the bottom.

Also, I'm very sorry to hear about your uncle. I do hope and pray that he's ok.

Umm.. you right, I think I need to update that the Nvidia Inspector too, I personally preferred and used the 3Booter FPS Limiter from Maty as it's more simple for my daughter to launch the game after I set them up, and only use the Nvidia Inspector when running TS3 CAW..

Anyway.. for Nvidia Inspector, after you extracted the zip or the rar file, just run or double click the NvidiaInspector.exe file and it will launch the program, and then just follow the steps..

Note: To make sure the Nvidia inspector is working to cap the FPS when running TS3, when you at the TS3 Main Menu, open the cheat box by pressing Ctrl+Shift+C and then type "FPS ON" (without the quotes), and then when your game is fully running, check your top right corner of your screen, you'll see a small numbers there, that's your FPS that are currently running, if you set it up to 30 FPS it will be around 28-31, if you set it up to 60 FPS it will be around 58-61, if it goes beyond that.. then exit the game immediately because it's not running to cap your FPS, the steps to check if your Nvidia Inspector capping your FPS or not in CAW EIG mode is also the same, open the cheat box in EIG and type "FPS ON" (without the quotes) and you'll see the small number on your top right corner of your screen..

I suppouse the NVidia Statistics Server (or any "click, check option, run" solution) would be much easier for OP to manage. The effect is the same, the way may be much simpler.

Well, it's back to the drawing board here. I tried going over to maty and d/ling his mods, ran the game and it still crashed after getting to the game choosing window. At least I got that far!

hmm crashed.. that would be a different matter then, because even if your TS3 don't recognize your graphic, TS3 can still be able to run without crashing, so let's try to fix them one at a time..

First, can you please post your DeviceConfig after you done the steps above to check your progress so far? Just the 1st 40 lines from your DeviceConfig, and please wrapped them in spoiler so it would be nice

Secondly, what is your TS3 game version? 1.67 or 1.69? Have you tried to run your TS3 with a clean run without CC and mods (by moving your TS3 docs folder to desktop or somewhere else temporarily)? Because some bad or incompatible CC/Mods with your game version may caused the game to crashed..

Edited:

PS: btw.. how long have you been playing TS3 without FPS Limiter or Nvidia Inspector capping the fps?? I just hope for the best that TS3 hasn't make any damage to your graphic card like mine in the past..

I have version 1.69 and yes, I am testing everything out on a clean slate. For your last question, I've never had the FPS Limiter or Nvidia Inspector on. My game ran really smoothly until I got the new card and then the only thing that happened was that my graphics were a bit laggy and would be fuzzy when I zoomed out. Before all of this started, I updated the drivers.

Here are the lines from the DeviceConfig that you requested. I'm not sure what you mean by "wrapping them in a spoiler."

Well running TS3 without capping the fps will kill your graphic card slowly, that's what happened to my GTX280 in the past because of playing TS3 about 2 yrs without it, hopefully it hasn't done any damage to your GTX970, fps limiter usage for TS3 it's not about running the game smoothly or not (though it helps smoothing your gameplay performance), but protecting your graphic card from constant stress work and overload that cause overheating because the fps keeps increasing, in fact it still safer to say for your graphic card running TS3 without having TS3 recognizing your card, but you have FPS Limiter or Nvidia Inspector running in the background for TS3 to protect your card..

Ok about your DeviceConfig.. (I wrapped them with spoiler ), it says:



I think you got it wrong by adding your card into the GraphicCard.sgr instead of replacing one of the cards with your Device ID, because it Found 1 but Matched 0, you'll need to fix this to get it recognized. What you did there is you actually added your GTX970 to the GraphicCard.sgr list, not replacing one of the cards in the list, well it won't work that way.. therefore your DeviceConfig says Found 1 but Matched 0.

Ok from here.. please note that your Device ID for your GTX 970 is 13c2, and follow the following steps to fix it;

1. Replace your GraphicCards,sgr with the original (unedited one) from your backup.
2. Open it with Notepad and go to this line: ---> card 0x06cd "GeForce GTX 470"
3. Replace the last 4 digits of 0x06cd with your 4 digits Device ID (which is 13c2) like this; 0x06cd ---> 0x13c2
4. Close the Notepad to save changes.
5. Go to your TS3 Docs folder and delete your DeviceConfig and Option.ini
6. Launch the game and go to TS3 main menu.
7. At the TS3 main menu, adjust your resolution accordingly to your LCD screen monitor native resolution and set its refresh rate to 60hz, (at this time you may also make another adjustment as necessary the way you like to play TS3 if you want to, like disabling EA's story progression.. etc)
8. Exit TS3 when you're done adjusting.

Note: This will downgrade your GTX970 to work as GTX470 for TS3 because TS3 don't have GTX970 profile in its database, so to fit your GTX970 for TS3, this will tell TS3 that you got GTX470, this will only downgrade its generation from 9th gen to 4th gen and its instructions but not the quality of your card performance because both of GTX970 and GTX470 are in the same class/rank.

Then the next step is to check your new DeviceConfig;

9. Open your new DeviceConfig with Notepad and you should see them changed like this:



10. Check the following lines if there's Texture Memory 32MB OVERRIDE, if not then you're good to go, but if there's Override, then you'll need to redo the manual steps you did earlier above.

Ok, now after you done redoing all the steps as above, try to run your TS3 with Nvidia Inspector capping your fps for TS3 to protect your card, and see if the game still crashed, hopefully it's not.., but if it's still crashing, then let's fix that after this one fixed 1st

Note: Since your game is 1.69 version, you'll need Nvidia Inspector to cap your fps, FPS Limiter 0.2 or with 3booter from MATY won't work because the nature of TS3 1.69 can not by-pass the launcher to run the game directly, maybe this is the one that causing your game to crash..

Well, unfortunately this didn't work. I saw my mistake and corrected that. I re-edited the original files from backup. Under the heading Graphics device info and then the name, it does say GTX 970. Now it says "found 1 matched 1, but now I get the black screen the instant I hit launch. I also have maty's mods in place and the resource.cfg file. Those are the only ones though. Do you have any other ideas? Maybe my card is shot? If so, I do still have my original card that I can put back in.

I got that black screen when I had an outdated version of some mod in my game. Have you tried deleting your sims 3 folder and letting it rebuild another one?
I don't know if this is what your prob is or not but it can't hurt to try it.

Yes, I'm using a clean install folder. The only mods I have in there are maty's. There's nothing else in there.

Can you post a screenshot of what happened? Also can you post your new DeviceConfig after you re-edited it so we can have a clear view of what's happening to your game?

Btw.. did you mean you run your game with FPS Limiter with 3booter from MATY? If that so.. don't use that for TS3 1.69, because to run it you have to by pass TS3 launcher and 1.69 version can not by pass the launcher to run TS3, that maybe the one that made you game crashed, use the Nvidia Inspector to cap the FPS for TS3 1.69

But to double check to see if it's because of something else, try a test run, run your game without any FPS limiter or Nvidia Inspector, start a new game when you're at the TS3 main menu (do not use a previously saved game of yours) and wait the game to load to full running, if it's successful, no black screen no crash.. you can load a new game in to full running mode.., then exit TS3 immediately, this is just to check or test run to see if everything is working, do not try to play it just yet as there's nothing capping your fps. If this test run successful, then run Nvidia Inspector and set up a profile for you to run TS3 with Nvidia Inspector capping your TS3 fps and then do a test run again but this time with Nvidia Inspector running in the background for your TS3.

If the test run above did not successful, then it's something else causing your game to black screen or crash, to test if your card is shot or not, do a test run with other game that you have other than TS3, do not use a stressful full workload software to test like ATi tool just yet, unless you're sure that something wrong with your card and/or most of your game failed to run. You can try TS3 with your original card if you want, just remember if you do a test run without anything capping your fps in TS3, exit TS3 immediately after it's successful to load to full running screen.

I don't know about 1.69 because my TS3 is 1.67, but if you can upload your original (unedited one) GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr files from your backup, maybe I can have them look and see if there's any differences from 1.67.

Hi again, I tried starting the game w/no mods whatsoever in a clean game and it black screened immediately upon launching again. here is a pic the part of my DeviceConfig file that you're looking for and also the window that comes up when I double click on the first exe file in the zip when I d/l Nvidia Inspector. I have no idea what to do from there or where to extract the files in the zip.

Ok let's do the Nvidia Inspector 1st to activate FPS limiter for your TS3, from the Nvidia Profile Menu in your picture above:

1. Click the "_GLOBAL_DRIVER_PROFILE (Base Profile)" box.
2. Scroll down until you find "Sims3", and click "Sims3" for your profile.
3. Once it changed to "Sims3", make sure there are TS3.exe, TS3W.exe, Sims3Launcher.exe etc written in the green bar (under the Profiles box).
4. Go to the number 2 Sync and Refresh, click the Frame Rate Limiter, change the "off" to "30" or "60" fps to turn it on.
5. Click "Apply Changes"
6. Run your TS3 via launcher.


Now if you still experiencing black screen even if you do test run with or without Nvidia Inspector, try the following steps so we can locate the cause of the problem;

1. Copy and backup your edited GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr files, saved them in a different folder from the original unedited ones.
2. Copy and backup your current DeviceConfig.log and Option.ini (you can put these two with the edited GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr files as backup)

3. After you back them up, move your TS3 Documents folder to desktop or somewhere else for temporary.
4. Put back your original unedited GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr from your backup to your TS3 BG installation folder (this will replaces the edited ones).

5. Run the game via launcher, go to TS3 Main Menu and start a new game and wait until the game fully running, if it's back to normal and you don't experiencing black screen anymore, then the steps in making TS3 recognized your GTX970 may be not compatible with TS3 1.69, note: exit immediately if you're not running Nvidia Inspector in the background.

6. If the black screen still occur when you do the test run with the original GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr, then it may be something wrong with your TS3 1.69 installation, or your Windows 7 may not recognized your GTX970 because of incompatible drivers or missing something etc, or (I hope I'm wrong) worst case scenario.. probably TS3 has already done some damages to your card for not protecting its fps while running TS3..

Note: if you managed to run your game without any black screen or crashing, you can try to put back your edited GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr and your TS3 documents folder back, and do test run with Nvidia Inspector, if it's still not working, you can use the original unedited GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr files to play but make sure you have Nvidia Inspector running to protect your card, in the meantime if you can upload your original unedited GraphicCards.sgr and GraphicRules.sgr files, I can check them for you and do some comparison with 1.67 version, and see if there's a way to work it out.

You are using awesome mod? That could be the problem. I would remove it and try loading without it. Can't hurt to try.

Could I ask you please Persian to not post in here since you're not even reading the whole thread? If you read the thread, then you'd know that your suggestions have absolutely nothing to do w/my problem. Please just let Papa Emy do the best he knows to try to help. Thanks!

Well PapaEmy, I'm not sure why you had me do this. I followed your instructions, but basically, it took me back to where I began. I had the Nvidia Inspector running in the background. It doesn't matter if I close the window out or if I leave it in the background after applying the changes, the game still crashes. It seems also, that no matter how much editing I do, it's still going to crash. I'm thinking of just putting my old video card back in. It could very well be that this video card can't do sims anymore. Like you, I learned a hard lesson.