Is Gaming Dangerous on a Laptop?

[codyw]

Played the game today for about 4 hours without any crashes. I walked away for 5 minutes and came back to the game not responding. I re-installed Kaspersky because it seems the game runs better without the custom content added

I went through msconfig and unchecked a few items. I will see how much longer I can play the game without it stopping again. It seems to be getting better and better as far as time length is concerned.

 

[Layback Bear]

Keep working on that msconfig. Things will get better. Remember you can always put a check mark back if need be. If you stay out of Windows Services you should be okay.

 

[codyw]

Thanks for the information!

 

[DustSailor]

If I might add to this:

download-free optimizing tools: http://www.sevenforums.com/tutorials/11728-optimize-windows-7-a.html

 

[codyw]

I spoke with an EA Technical Representative today about the issue. After we dug deep into my system's hardware, we found out it has 4 processors. It is suspected that the game was getting too much processing power because all 4 processors were feeding it. We opened Task Manager during game play, right clicked the Sims 3 process and went down to Set Affinity. In there, the following items were checked:

• <All Processors>
• CPU 0
• CPU 1
• CPU 2
• CPU 3

We unchecked everything and only checked CPU 0 & 1. The game was working fine for about 4 1/2 hours when it unexpectedly crashed on me again. Would it help if I unchecked CPU 0 and checked CPU 2 in its place while leaving CPU 1 checked?

 

[DustSailor]

Was he smoking crack? Never heard of that helping at all. Perhaps disabling hyper-threading, but disabling cores? Wouldn't that slow things down?

 

[DustSailor]

Try updating the BIOS (safely). If you haven't, try updating all drivers and updates for windows.

Look in event viewer for what it says the problem is. look for errors and critical errors, etc.

What is your antivirus software? (did someone ask this already?)
^ Try disabling it during game and see if you notice improvement.

DO you have other security software installed?

 

[codyw]

The game isn't really all that slow with 2 processors feeding it. I have Kaspersky Internet Security 2013 installed and I have disabled it during game play (before contacting EA) and I still had the game crashing. The only security software installed on my system is Kaspersky Lab. I still say there is something with Kaspersky interfering somehow because my friend (who I see every other weekend and play the Sims 3 with) does not have crashing problems and she has Trend Micro Titanium 2012. It seems like the more "tweaks" I do, the more the game lasts longer but crashes eventually.
I am keeping the laptop cool during the entire game with a cooling pad underneath the laptop and a medium sized fan beside the laptop blowing cool air INTO the side vent where hot air is exiting the system.

I have attached the Application & System logs from the Event Viewer.
Because the Application log was too big to be uploaded to the forum, it has been zipped/compressed.

 

[DustSailor]

have you tried uninstalling them?
If you use the free versions of these products, try uninstalling them and testing the game afterwards. use these uninstallers

Kaspersky: http://support.kaspersky.com/downloads/utils/kavremover.exe
Trend Micro for 64 bit windows 7: http://solutionfile.trendmicro.com/solutionfile/EN-1037161/64bit.exe

^If you've ever had these programs installed, you might consider using both uninstallers to see if it will remove all traces of the program. If this doesn't help at all, then reinstall your favorite antivirus program.

Go into control panel and uninstall everything you don't need/use. This deletes possible conflicts of programs.

Type MSCONFIG into your start menu search bar and click the program. On the same general tab that appears, select diagnostic startup under startup selection. If the game works, something in that list is causing you trouble. If it still crashes, it may be hardware (or hardware driver) related. If it doesn't crash, you will need to go through the services tab (select hide all microsoft services), and slowly enable services you need to run on your computer until you find the problem. If you don't, they are fine to be enabled.

You can either leave the startup programs all unchecked (found in the startup tab) as it will help performance, or slowly check the ones you want, same as you would have done to the services tab.

For good measure, check with your choice antivirus program for any viruses. Also consider use of malwarebytes, which has an additional manual scan that is very thorough, and doesn't conflict: http://download.cnet.com/Malwarebyt...4572.html?part=dl-10804572&subj=dl&tag=button

 

[codyw]

I have both paid copies of Kaspersky & Trend Micro. I will run Malwarebytes again and will try the diagnostic startup and see what I get.

 

[codyw]

Just did a Quick Scan with Malwarebytes and it came back with everything clean.

 

[DustSailor]

I have both paid copies of Kaspersky & Trend Micro. I will run Malwarebytes again and will try the diagnostic startup and see what I get.

Because they are both antiviruses, use ONE of those tools to completely remove ONE of those programs. You can not have 2 antivirus softwares installed (even if one is disabled). They will conflict, and cause... slowdowns.

 

[codyw]

Yes, I know that and I only use 1 AV. I've seen the effects of two on a system--VERY SLOOOOW

I have both paid copies of Kaspersky & Trend Micro. I will run Malwarebytes again and will try the diagnostic startup and see what I get.

Because they are both antiviruses, use ONE of those tools to completely remove ONE of those programs. You can not have 2 antivirus softwares installed (even if one is disabled). They will conflict, and cause... slowdowns.

 

[Layback Bear]

Just a reminder. Having two anti virus installed is a no no even if one is disabled. One anti virus installed at one time on one computer. The active anti virus will see the disabled anti virus and have a little argument. This could cause many problems.

 

[codyw]

Although it's been a few weeks since I lasted posted, I have been playing the game on my MacBook which is giving me a mediocre performance during the game but does luckily the game does not freeze up on my Mac.

However, I just had a thought and am going to throw it out to see whether it's a good or bad idea. I have a Windows XP and 7 license for virtual environments. Would it be bad good or bad idea to try installing the games on an OS in a virtual environment using VirtualBox ad trying to play that way or would that be even harder on the computer and its hardware? Suggestions?

 

[theveterans]

You would get a mediocre performance when playing DirectX games in a virtual environment since the virtual environment is not really designed for serious gaming.

 

[boogieboy]

IMO nothing happens to a laptop except reducing the life of the battery if it's running on battery mode and yes the laptops get heated when gaming so buy a notepad cooler.

 

[codyw]

I have a cooling pad that I use and I make sure that it's on full speed when gaming. Just thought I'd ask about the virtual environment and gaming.