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WolfSpau's avatar
WolfSpau
New Spectator
2 years ago

Why does clearing Tray folder stop lag?

I have been struggling with really bad lag, despite having a good PC.
I read somewhere on here someone said that after deleting their tray files the lag reduced for them.
I have since done this and all my lag is gone - my question is..why?
Why would having a lot of saved lots etc in your tray folder affect live mode in the game - I can't figure out why?
  • Have you never noticed how much gets saved in that Tray? My worry is, that without the contents of my Tray in place, my builds and Sims won't be in My Library anymore. Did you find this to be the case?
  • @Evee95, well when you delete the tray folder items, it deletes every single lot and sim that was saved in there. I know that if I have ALL of my tray files in my folder that it definitely takes longer for the game to load but I don't notice any lag because I almost never, ever have any lag issues in TS4.

    @GalacticGal if I empty my tray file, I have no builds or sims saved in my library. Currently right now I'm sitting at over 9000 items in that folder.
  • WolfSpau's avatar
    WolfSpau
    New Spectator
    Thanks for replying!

    @GalacticGal Like Chicklet said, all the builds and sims in your library are gone if you get rid of them from the Tray folder. They are still there in game if you have placed them down as far as I can tell from my own game.

    @Chicklet453681 what would you say is the reason you don't have lag? I use mods and things like simulation unclogger etc but I still was getting bad lag.

    So far since deleting my tray file I have no lag and I just don't get why my saved lots and sims in my library affect live mode. It doesn't make sense unless I'm missing something super obvious?? Then I will feel silly!!
  • Thank you @Chicklet453681 and @Evee95 That's what I thought. I do have Trays saved to my desktop. Every now and again I will place the lots I want to keep in Build Saves, so I can upload them to My Library, always with an empty Tray to catch them. And, yeah, I could get rid of the lag, as my Tray folders are very full. Haven't bothered to count, though. I may just pull the current Tray, and give my game a 'test' run to see how much if any, a difference it makes.
  • @Evee95, I'm not real sure. The only time I have ever had any type of lag was when my old graphics card died and I was waiting on a new one to be shipped to me and when I went into the game with just the integrated graphics enabled it would sometimes "stutter" like if i was moving my camera view around. Plus it looked HORRIBLE! LOL

    I have a good graphics card and 16GB of RAM installed and the RAM alone makes a world of difference in lag.

    Were your lots and sims full of CC? I know some CC (usually it's alpha CC but sometimes creators "steal" RL 3D models from furniture companies and import those and they will be astronomically high in poly counts), that will cause a lot of lag.

    Are you on a laptop or desktop? I did find with another game that when it was laggy for me, that by opening up my PC Tower case and blowing out all the dust helped a lot with lag and I'd do it about every 6 months or so, or whenever I started getting the lag again.

    The only thing I can figure is the game has much more data to read and process with the tray file full of stuff, but I could be wrong and I too wonder why having a big tray folder would cause lag during "live play".

    The other thing you could try, If you're on a lap top, try a cooling pad or have a small fan blowing on it to keep it cooler.
  • WolfSpau's avatar
    WolfSpau
    New Spectator
    @GalacticGal I'll be interested to see what u find!

    @Chicklet453681 I have quite a powerful desktop PC which is why the lag is so annoying because its down to something in the game. I don't use a lot of CC but I do use a lot of gameplay mods. I recently did a save makeover and replaced all the lots with lots from the gallery. I had saved the lots to my library as I downloaded them too. I've always had that weird lag that goes away if you press the esc key but this lag was weird.
    I think you might be onto something with the game having more data to churn as you are playing.

    Thank you for your replies guys. Really helpful and interesting.
  • "Evee95;c-18190946" wrote:
    @GalacticGal I'll be interested to see what u find!

    @Chicklet453681 I have quite a powerful desktop PC which is why the lag is so annoying because its down to something in the game. I don't use a lot of CC but I do use a lot of gameplay mods. I recently did a save makeover and replaced all the lots with lots from the gallery. I had saved the lots to my library as I downloaded them too. I've always had that weird lag that goes away if you press the esc key but this lag was weird.
    I think you might be onto something with the game having more data to churn as you are playing.

    Thank you for your replies guys. Really helpful and interesting.


    Still have lag, sorry to say. I'm going to trade the new empty Tray for the one I had in my game, prior.
  • "Evee95;c-18190901" wrote:
    Thanks for replying!

    @GalacticGal Like Chicklet said, all the builds and sims in your library are gone if you get rid of them from the Tray folder. They are still there in game if you have placed them down as far as I can tell from my own game.

    @Chicklet453681 what would you say is the reason you don't have lag? I use mods and things like simulation unclogger etc but I still was getting bad lag.

    So far since deleting my tray file I have no lag and I just don't get why my saved lots and sims in my library affect live mode. It doesn't make sense unless I'm missing something super obvious?? Then I will feel silly!!


    I think it takes up space.