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LindaHollie's avatar
2 years ago

Computer freezes while playing Sims 4

My entire computer freezes while playing Sims 4. I am unable to close the game, move my mouse nor use the keyboard (CLTR+ALT+DEL) meaning I have to hard reset the computer. I've tried resetting my game data to factory settings with no success. Also tried starting a new game with no change.

The freezing is apparently random with no clear constant cause. This is a problem I've been having for several weeks now with no luck of finding a cause.

I have attached my DxDiag.

Any advice or insight will be appreciated.

7 Replies

  • @LindaHollie  Thanks for the dxdiag, which shows a few errors that might be relevant but nothing definitive.  Please run a couple of basic checks of your Windows system files:

    • Hit Windows key-X
    • Choose either “PowerShell (Administrator)” or “Windows Terminal (Administrator),” whichever option is offered
    • Inside the window that appears, copy and paste “DISM.exe /Online /Cleanup-image /Restorehealth” without quotes, and enter
    • The system will start validating soon. If it throws an error, please list it here
    • After it reaches 100%, hit Windows key-X again
    • Again, choose “PowerShell (Administrator)” or “Windows Terminal (Administrator)”
    • Inside the window, copy and paste “sfc /scannow” without quotes, and enter
    • Post the message you receive here

    Restart your computer, hit Windows key-i, select Update & Security, and click the box to check for updates.  If any install, restart again afterwards.

    Please also uninstall all your Razer software: Game Manager Service, Synapse, Cortex, whatever you find.  You may be able to reinstall it later, but test for a while without it.

    If you get another freeze, please look for new errors in the Reliability Monitor.  Hit Windows key-R and enter "perfmon /rel" without quotes, and you'll see a chart of errors and updates with a column for each day.  Today is on the right.

    Look for an error that happened at exactly the time of your most recent play session.  If you find one, double-click it to see more details, then copy that info and paste it into a reply here.  If you don't see a new error, check back in an hour or so—the Reliability Monitor doesn't always update right away.

  • LindaHollie's avatar
    LindaHollie
    2 years ago

    Thank you for the response! I have done everything up to/including uninstalling Razer's software. 

    Here is the message from the “sfc /scannow”

    Windows Resource Protection found corrupt files and successfully repaired them.
    For online repairs, details are included in the CBS log file located at
    windir\Logs\CBS\CBS.log. For example C:\Windows\Logs\CBS\CBS.log. For offline
    repairs, details are included in the log file provided by the /OFFLOGFILE flag.

     

    I will do a playtest today and come back if there are any issues! 🙂 

  • LindaHollie's avatar
    LindaHollie
    2 years ago

    @puzzlezaddict I played a little yesterday and it's still freezing (although my game overall is running better). 

    My computer froze at 11:20am and 2:10pm. Neither show up on the Reliability Monitor (I've attached a screenshot). Should I try another factory reset perhaps? 

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    2 years ago

    @LindaHollie  I see an entry for GameManagerService3, which is from Razer, at 10:13 am.  Was that before or after you uninstalled all the Razer apps?  I ask because it's always possible that something reinstalled itself, or you didn't remove it completely.

    Another factory reset would only be helpful if you added content to the new Sims 4 folder the first time around.  If you did, then yes, try another reset, but this time, play without any of your old content added back.

    Otherwise, or if that doesn't help, please try playing in a clean boot:

    https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/topic/how-to-perform-a-clean-boot-in-windows-da2f9573-6eec-00ad-2f8a-a97a1807f3dd

    The one service to leave enabled is the EABackgroundService, which the EA App needs in order to run.  Disable the rest as described.

    When you reboot your computer, go through the Task Manager's background processes list shutting down any service that doesn't absolutely need to be running, for example anything from MSI Afterburner to RGB software might still be enabled.  If you accidentally kill a critical process and it doesn't restart on its own, just reboot your computer again.

    Don't open anything other than Sims 4 and the EA App while testing, not even a browser window.

  • LindaHollie's avatar
    LindaHollie
    2 years ago
    @puzzlezaddict Thanks for this - I'll have a closer look when I have a little more time on my hands and report back.

    To answer your question: the entry for GameManagerService3 was before I uninstalled the Razer apps. Also, for my original factory reset playtest, I didn't add anything back to the game and it still froze.
  • LindaHollie's avatar
    LindaHollie
    2 years ago

    @puzzlezaddict I found some time to do the clean boot and (unfortunately) the freezing still happens. I even tried a factory reset AND clean boot. 

    I'm assuming that means it's something wrong with my computer. I've just upgraded the RAM  - so that means Graphics or CPU? Sorry for my ignorance, I'm slowly learning about what everything does!  

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    2 years ago

    @LindaHollie  Pull the RAM modules you installed and see whether it helps.  It's possible you have a defective module, or that your motherboard doesn't support this exact product.  If you want me to check the latter, please list the SKU, printed on each module; it'll be a very long number.

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