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Butterflowery's avatar
Butterflowery
Rising Newcomer
18 hours ago

Can I play The Sims 4 on my laptop?

Hi,

I have a question about whether I can play The Sims 4 on my laptop or not. I have a Lenovo Ideapad 17,3 I3- 1215U. According to the system requirements on the EA website, my laptop meets the minimum requirements. Only the video card I’m not sure about.

I have only the base game installed and I have no mod’s and cc. I play no other games on that laptop. Besides for The Sims, I use my laptop for typing, e-mail, internet and watching You Tube video’s.

I looked up information on google and everything that I can find there, say’s that my laptop should be able to run The Sims 4, although on low-minimum settings. It say’s that I should be able to play it even with a few expansions packs, and that I would get a problem if I would have all the expansion packs or cc and mods.

But at the computer store where I bought the laptop, they say that nowadays, to be able to play games, you should have a gaming laptop. I just think that isn’t true, because all the information I find say’s different. They say my laptop doesn’t have a video card, so I can’t play The Sims 4 on it. I think it’s probably true that I don’t have a video card, but on the internet it say’s that my laptop has a integrated Intel UDH Graphics, and that I’m able to play the game with that. (This is what it say’s on google. I’m not sure what video card/graphics I have).

I would appreciate it if someone can help me find out whether my laptop can run The Sims 4 or not, at least the base game. I would like to add a few expansion pack’s, but it is not necessary. If it’s possible, I would like to add ‘Cats and dogs’, ‘Seasons’ and ‘Cottage living’.

Thanx in advance.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

graphics
hardware

1 Reply

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    8 hours ago

    Butterflowery​  What the computer store and probably a number of online sources are trying to say is that modern games need a dedicated graphics processing unit in order to run well, or possibly run at all.  Your laptop's processor, like most CPUs, comes with a graphics chip integrated into it, but these iGPUs can't compare with even the lowest-end current-generation dedicated GPUs.  And they're not supposed to—their main purpose is to handle everyday tasks like browsing the web without using too much energy.

    HOWEVER, Sims 4 on lower graphics settings is not nearly demanding enough to require a dedicated card.  As a comparison, it's actually significantly easier to run on lower-end graphics than Sims 3, although the requirements for playing the two on ultra settings are very close.

    So I agree with your conclusion that you should be able to play on low-medium settings, or perhaps medium if you don't need the game to be perfectly smooth; and I would add that you can probably play with all current packs on low-medium settings, provided your laptop has the free storage to accommodate installing them.

    If you only have 8 GB memory installed, I would avoid more than the lightest multitasking while playing, and I would suggest restarting your laptop before you want to play to clear anything else using RAM that doesn't need to be running.  But using all the installed memory isn't a major problem—the CPU will swap data to the page file where necessary.  The only issue with that is that it's slower than keeping everything in RAM, but there again, it's a question of performance, not whether you can play at all.

    Finally, it's important to say that running Sims 4 on higher settings than your laptop can handle, or installing more content than it can handle, would not put it at any risk.  The possible souce of damage is excess heat, but that shouldn't be a problem as long as you're not smothering your laptop in blankets while you play.  The system would be designed to dissipate as much heat as the components can produce, which is not a lot with an i3-1215U.  So it's fine to experiment with the graphics settings until you get something you like.  At worst, performance will drop and you'll have to back off a bit.

    It's also fine to install whatever packs you want to buy.  I would suggest only buying one expansion at a time, and testing it before you add another, just in case you notice performance dropping to the point where it starts to affect your enjoyment of the game.  But as long as you're happy with how Sims 4 runs, and your laptop isn't running out of storage (try to keep >30 GB free), add the content you want and don't worry about the rest.

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