Hello.

Just wanted to post this short question here because it was here I did get help to fix it and now I need help to unfix it.

I really want to get back into playing the Sims 3 but the game does not run well even if the computer is good. Especially the Isla Paradiso world runs bad and to troubleshot that I want to give the game access to all of the available ram memory. I do have a total of 8GB's but when installing the game (I don't remember when) I was told that a 4GB patch was needed.

So I did download one and installed it but I can not remember the name of the patch or where it's located. I went in today (different computer) and looked for it in the "Programs and Features" but did not find anything that looked like a patch. The only thing I did find was a program called "Graphics Rules Maker" but when I did open it it looked as it had something to do with the Sims 2 Maison & Garden. I did check the Sims 3 folder as well but could not find a patch.

So the simple question is: If I still have a 4GB patch, where should I look for it and is it safe to uninstall it? What's the name of the patch and what's the name of the software developer behind it?

4GB patch isn't needed since Late Night patch fixed large address awareness, meaning the game can make use of up to 3.5 GB ram.

There are a few mods that will make Isla Paradiso run better; Overwatch will clean boats and vehicles every nighttime, ErrorTrap to fix buggy script caused by Maxis' own glitch, Master Controller to reset buggy objects or sims, and this mod, https://modthesims.info/d/665907/re...houseboats.html will reduce lags caused by inactive houseboats.

Yes I know that the 4GB patch is unnecessary but I suspect I have a patch installed. But where? And how to uninstall it? I do have MasterController, OverWatch and Register. I did check around and changed some settings yesterday but the game did not run better. (In reality, it did run worse then before). Cleaning out the sims inventory should be good apparently, I should try that.

OK, so it's pointless to go search for the patch? OK, I can live with that. My specs are down below.

Specs:
OS: Windows 7
CPU: Intel Core i3-8100 3,60GHz
GPU: Nvidia Geforce GTX 1050Ti
Ram: 8 GB

Could I have a link, please?

you mean, a mod created by user named Marydehoyos? I posted it on my reply.

I dunno, is that the one Nitromon was referring to? Thanks for that link by the way!

OK, sorry for my mess up earlier

The mod is interesting and I will try it. But do I just need to drop it in my Downloads folder or how does it work?

@MrMo Yes the one that legacyoffailures linked is a package file- just extract it from the zip and put it in your Mods folder.

OK, I will post it. It will take a few days before I do so as this is not my main computer and I have to connect the screen and stuff every time. But I will be back.

So, I did take a look at this issue today. I did download the mod, unzipped it and placed the package file in the Mods folder. Before entering the game I did delete the two biggest cache files and in the game I did "de-clutter" my sims inventory as well as the family inventory. As far as I could see, the mod did not come with instructions. I did check a houseboat for new options but did not find any. So I left it and began to play (after waiting for Windows to finish it's background backup. This was overdue so I just have to do it). In all honesty, I did not know what to expect. Did I think everything would be running smooth and fine? Yes, quite so. But even if the game did run better I did not find it very playable. There were a lot of stutter and mini freezing. So much to find it OK. So I did quit and jumped into Bridgeport just to check the game. And though this world is a city with a lot of moving objects (cars, animals, sims etc.PP) it still did run good. The sims did move in a quite "robot like" way but they have always done that, it's the way the game is made. But it was very playable, compared to the IP world it was "like night and day".

As requested I post the log info here. I do not know how much info you wanted but I paste everything down to "Options". I hope this is what you wanted.

You might wanna try recognising your graphics card first by using this program.

https://www.nexusmods.com/thesims3/...tab=description

As Win 7 is not being updated and my antivirus does not have an update for a long time (the computer does not have a internet connection) I did try to make this manually instead of installing a .exe file. But I could not since the OS claimed I have no right to change the file. So I better leave it. The other worlds do run fine, it's only the IP world that runs bad so I think I'm better off moving the sims to another world. But at least, I did try... thank you for the input.

Make a copy and change That copy outside of the folder. Then move the original out and the changed one in. Keep a copy of the original somewhere. Just in case you made a mistake when changing.

I must say, that reply came so fast I did get really impressed.

OK, so I vent in again and was able to change it. I did exactly what the guide did tell me to, nothing else. When in game, I did jump out and checked the GraphicsCards.sgr file and it said: [Found: 1, Matched: 1] instead of 0 so I must have made something right.

I also did change the memory in the GraphicsRuler.sgr file as it said 32MB and as I did not know what to change it to I did fallow the guide and wrote 1024MB. The game did run quite well with only some stutter, no freeze lag. The game clock was running the whole time, even when fast forwarding during the night. Fully acceptable! Now, the game have been good to me before so I won't call it "fixed" before I have done more testing. But for now, It's fine. Happy days?

So I did some testing yesterday and played for about a in-game week. The game runs quite good with only a little stutter so I dare to call the issue solved.

Hello again.

I know that we aren't talking about the 4GB patch but I did not want to change the title if someone wants to find the way back here.

So, Christmas have past and I had a quite some time to play now. Time to get the old Win 7 computer set up and play some TS3. But nope, it did not go to plan.

Since my last post here I have not been playing to much - no time - but I did play yesterday and it worked well. The IP world (that I want to play as I like the sims there) did run smooth but after a in game week it began to stutter. One week - or should I say one season. But as soon as winter did turn into spring the game began to run un-smooth. Today, I did install a stuff pack I did think my sims could use and deleted the two biggest cache files. In game I did reset everything (someone gave me that advice) with MC but the game did just run good for a in-game day (about 21711 objects got a reset). I did remember that I had been modifying the GraphicRules.sgr file so I went into it again and changes the memory size to 2048. I did not know what kind of difference I thought that would do but there were no difference at all. It's still stutters to much. Now I have no ideas left and have a world that I want to play but can not. Do you have any ideas? Any idea that does not involve xx amounts of mods that is...

Yeah, I have understood that the world is not any good. But wold the world not play bad at all time then? Sometimes it does run well but sometimes it's just bad...

Anyway, I have been told that deleting the cache would be good but but maybe I (and they) are wrong... I don't know if anything is wrong with my game but now I suspect so. I did post over at EA answers and was told that installing Error Trap would be a good thing. After only a few minutes of play 50 error were recorded. A couple of in-game days later I had a sim reported with a script error. And then, one morning the sound was gone in game. And after the restart the game crashed hard. And after yet another restart the the sound was still gone.

I'm going back to Sims 4 now.

you mean 50 script ErrorTrap log files or one script ErrorTrap log file with 50 errors inside?

I do not know how to read it. The pop-up message just said Nraas Error Trap. Recorded 50. The later message pointed out a specific sim and said Script Error. But as I had problems later on I have 3 error logs.

ErrorTrap logs are stored inside the usual of your Sims 3 folder in Documents. You can open it with notepad (notepad++ is recommended). If you have no clue what caused an error to one specific sim prior to the log, you can post it to official Nraas site and the techie guys out there should be able to help you.