Re: Anyone have suggestions for a laptop to run TS4 on?

@puzzlezaddict  Thank you for your quick response. I'm going to be much more relaxed while gaming now. I set alarms in Hwinfo. It will warn me if the temps rise to 80C or above.

While we are on the topic of fans, I have another question. We determined that the fan situation is normal when gaming, but what about when I'm not?

Sometimes the fans come on for seemingly no reason when I'm doing something simple in Firefox like browsing Reddit, or typing in a Word document, or copying and pasting text into an email. They come on everytime that I enter or exit Firefox or Word.

They usually run for about 5 - 10 seconds at a time. The volume of the fans range from gentle hum to moderately loud. They’re usually quiet when doing those things but should I be concerned when they do come on every so often?

One example of a frequent pattern is the fans kick on and run for about 5-10 seconds. Then they shut off for about a minute, then they come back on for 5-10 seconds, then shut off for a minute, and that process repeats itself.

@sims929292  On some days, my laptop fans do the same thing whenever I get a ping in Discord.  I've watched the resources Discord uses, and it's kind of ridiculous, but as far as the fans go, they're responding to a temporary spike in CPU use, which is what they should be doing.  It's normal for the fans to rev up for a few seconds, and it's also unfortunately normal for programs to use more resources, or use them less efficiently, than we might want.

If you're curious, you can watch the values in hwinfo, or even in the Task Manager—I'm guessing you'll see a similar temporary spike at the same time as the fans start making noise.  The issue is the app you're using at the time, not your computer, and the fans are just doing their job.

@puzzlezaddict  Hello, I have a bit of a concern and I'd appreciate your expertise once again. I installed a game from Steam on the laptop yesterday. (I hope I'm allowed to ask about this here because the game was not TS4, it was Planet Coaster). Started the game up and within less than a minute, Hwinfo was letting me know the CPU temps were reaching 80C or above and staying there. This is the first time that that's happened. The highest temp I saw was 94C!

@sims929292  Planet Coaster is definitely more demanding on the processor than Sims 4.  I'd be interested to know the CPU load, as shown in hwinfo on a per-core basis: a laptop processor will run hot when it's maxed out or close to it, although exactly how hot depends on the laptop.  It also depends on the ambient temperature, so yes, a very warm room can have some effect as well.  I've been known to open a bunch of windows at night to get the temps down so I can play CPU-intensive games without thinking about temperatures, but then I live in a place where it's usually no more than about 65º F at night.

Lowering the in-game graphics settings can actually increase the load on the CPU if you don't also cap framerates.  The more frames per second the graphics card is rendering, the more draw calls the processor needs to handle.  So the better question is what happens if you lower the settings and cap fps at the same time, either in the Nvidia Control Panel or within the game if it has the option.  Vertical sync works in fullscreen mode; an explicit framerate cap should work anywhere.

Having said all that, 80º C is not dangerous for a processor or even close.  If you see a temporary spike to >90º but it comes down again, especially if that spike is only on one core at a time, it's also not a problem.  The processor will thermal throttle if necessary to protect itself, and at that point the immediate concern is with the in-game performance you're losing due to the throttling.  It's certainly not good for the long-term health of a CPU to run it at 95º for extended periods, but it doesn't sound like that's your issue.  And it's entirely possible that your particular laptop is tuned to let the CPU run into the 90s: doing otherwise would either require a more expensive cooling apparatus (or fans that were annoyingly loud) or leave some performance on the table.

Your GPU temps are totally fine.

@puzzlezaddict  It’s fixed!
I went back into the settings of the game and did this:
The game lets you choose a refresh rate, you can choose 60 Hz or 144 Hz. I chose 60 (I think it was set on 60 all along).
I also switched from windowed mode to full screen. I turned V-Sync on (it had been off).
Now I can play on medium settings without seeing any temps in the 80s.

I tried high and ultra settings, and Hwinfo says it throttles with those because the temps still reach the 80s. I think I’ll play it safe for now and just keep going with medium settings. When it cools off outside, I will try the higher settings again. Right now I’m just glad that I can play at all. I was worried that it was never going to work, not even on the lowest settings.

Thanks yet again for your help.

I have one more quick question: If you’re playing a game in full screen mode, do the alarm pop up notifications from Hwinfo still pop up over the game? Or does full screen stop it somehow? I’ve only seen them pop up in windowed games before.

@sims929292  Fewer frames per second means fewer draw calls for the processor as well as a lighter load for the graphics card, so it's not surprising you'd see cooler temperatures.  Is the processor throttling in the 80s, or the graphics card?  A GPU will throttle hard above 80º C, but most laptops' settings will allow the CPU to go over 90.  On the other hand, maybe yours is more aggressive with the cooling.

Fullscreen mode is also lower-impact than windowed, at least most of the time, although it's better to use windowed or borderless if you want to look at other apps while you play.  You can also switch modes on the fly though.

---

I have one more quick question: If you’re playing a game in full screen mode, do the alarm pop up notifications from Hwinfo still pop up over the game? Or does full screen stop it somehow? I’ve only seen them pop up in windowed games before.

---

I don't actually know, although I'd expect the notification to show up even in fullscreen.  There's an easy test though: set an alarm for a ridiculously low tempertaure, say 65º C for the CPU, and play in fullscreen, then wait to see what happens.  If you don't see the pop-up, play in borderless (or windowed fullscreen in Sims 4 parlance) instead.

@puzzlezaddict  It's the CPU that was throttling. I haven't seen the GPU overheat yet. The CPU throttles on 80C or above. I haven't changed any settings related to that so the laptop seems to be automatically set that way.

@sims929292  It does sound like your laptop's internal settings are throttling the CPU somewhat prematurely, but that's not exactly a problem, more an uncommon feature that could occasionally be a bit inconvenient.  If everything's working now though, there's no reason to worry about it.

You're welcome to message me if you want, but I don't always check PMs right away.  (I do get to them eventually.)  If the question is about Sims 4 though, it's better to create a thread here: more people would see it and be able to make suggestions.  Even if I was the only one answering, I might get stumped or want a second opinion, in which case it's easier to link a thread than to ask permission to share PMs and then copy/paste each one.

But however you want to approach things, I'm sure we can make it work.