Mac is Best? I heard.

My laptop is mostly for my university tasks.

My old desktop computer that broke was an Acer Aspire TC 280, which I bought in 2017. It played the game really well with all the expansions and stuff packs I have now, for nearly 8 years, until finally about 6 months ago, the paste dried out from overheating. Luke the computer guy and I made a backup on an external HD just in time before it never started up again. So now I've been saving up for a new desktop computer to replace that, while making do with this laptop, which is a HP from around 2020, it can't run Windows 11 and is quite limited with playing Sims 3.  I should be putting it back to its original uni-stuff only use. 

My son (I am old enough to have a fully grown, been to university himself, one of those ... ) recommended something with extra fans, and he found a couple of builds with his favourite retailer, but the quote he got expired, and the Black Friday sales are soon anyway. I asked the googly AI for a recommendation and one of the things it said was the thing about the Mac computers and the 64-bit scenario. 

So it seems my son's recommendations were probably the best already. A new desktop, similar but better than the old one, and keep my HP laptop for university as it is. I didn't and don't know if the laptop could be upgraded anyway. 

Anyway ... 

Hey there, just a heads up as a Mac sims player, myself and a bunch of other Mac owners CANNOT download content from the Sims 3 store + exchange because of a soft locking bug causing the launcher to crash when the 'download' tab is opened. This has been happening for at least 7 months and no official response has been given by EA. So, for this reason, I CANNOT recommend anyone buy TS3 if it is intended to be played on a Mac.

DivinylsFan​  It's nice to know that AI is still significantly behind on some subjects.  Of course, within the Mac category overall, the ARM models (M1 and newer) are much better than the older Intel models, but that's not difficult to figure out.

I do think extra cooling would be useful here, but you might also want to look for laptops with processors that kick off less heat in general.  It's hard to make generalizations these days because some of the newest Intel and AMD CPUs are extremely efficient, but even slightly older ones are not, and the newest ones are not always available.  The TDP is the CPU's maximum power, in watts, but that doesn't tell the whole story since the processor doesn't necessarily generate all that heat all the time.  So check online reviews for the processor(s) alone and for the laptop(s) in question.

In terms of performance, any modern dedicated graphics card will be sufficient.  For the processor, the useful benchmarks are single-core and dual-core performance; it doesn't matter how many cores you get (beyond four), only how fast they run.  Check a few different sites since some are heavily biased towards one manufacturer or the other.

the quote was from a googly AI

You sure Macs, with the 64-bit, aren't better?

I'm looking around for a new computer especially to play. Everything else I can do on this laptop. 

The old computer which was very good for playing Sims 3, for more than 5 years, was an Acer from 2017. Can't remember the specs. It burnt out last year, the paste dried after being overheated for too long. My son found a build with extra fans, saying that and some better specs would be good.  I've been waiting for my uni load to end for the year. I asked the googly AI for advice and the above answer about Macs is what I got. I thought it was interesting. 

Is the Windows PC preference influenced by compatibility with other people? I basically use my own create a style, and the Nraas mods, so, other cc isn't an issue for me. If not then I guess I'll go with my son's recommendation. 

Previous computers' failures playing Sims, 3 and which also used to happen with 2, took up so much of my time, wasted my days ... I am hesitant, even fearful, of going through it again while the years have marched by and so much lamenting chews up my mood, and thought space.

I wish that time machine, and the ITF portal ... are those the only two time-travelling devices? Would appear in reality ... I'd love to go back to the 80s. And my younger self.

DivinylsFan​  I would absolutely not recommend buying a Mac if the goal is to play Sims 3.  Sure, it's nice to have a 64-bit version of the game, but there are too many other problems with this version that EA never bothered to solve.  And the game isn't nearly as smooth as it is on a Windows gaming PC.  I have both and only use my Macs when I'm testing something, or occasionally to build when I'm lying in bed with my laptop and don't want to get up.

Out of curiosity, where on earth did you see the quote you posted?  I can't imagine any real players saying that, at least not those doing a proper comparison.

As for igazor, he hasn't ever signed into this site and hadn't posted on the old Sims forum for a while before the transition.  But he also owns Macs and plays in Windows instead.