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steviecraig's avatar
2 years ago

Crashes in Windows 11

Sims4 with no mods keeps crashing in windows 11. Sometimes it will play up to 5 minutes before it crashes back to the launcher. Files have been repaired numerous times as well as reinstalled numerous times. Windows 11 was reinstalled 3 days ago and the problem persists, also ran SFC and DISM to make sure installing was correct and no corruption. Latest Nvidia driver is installed. Visual C++  x86 and x64 have all been deleted reinstalled, even repaired. Dxdiag is included.

Thank you for any help on this.

3 Replies

  • @steviecraig  Thanks for the dxdiag, which lists among its several Sims 4 crashes two that are due to the Nvidia graphics driver.  It's possible that the driver itself is not at fault, that it's the graphics card itself or even the high refresh rate of your monitor.  Since the last is the easiest to test, please set your main monitor's refresh rate to 120 Hz or below, restart your computer, and see whether it helps.

    If you get another crash, please clean-uninstall the driver, as described here:

    https://crinrict.com/blog/2019/02/clean-re-install-of-graphics-drivers-with-display-driver-uninstaller-ddu.html

    Rather than reinstalling the very newest Nvidia driver, try a version that's a couple months old, just to cover your bases.  It's simple enough to update again when you're ready.  You can find recent drivers here:

    https://www.nvidia.com/en-us/geforce/drivers/

    Please do NOT install GeForce Experience.  You can install it later if you want, but for now, it's best to keep things simple.

    If this doesn't help either, please open the Task Manager before launching Sims 4, and see how hot your GPU gets.  This is only a rough estimate, but it should be obvious whether there's a problem considering how low a workload this game is for your card.

  • steviecraig's avatar
    steviecraig
    2 years ago

    Thank you very much, No suggestion worked.  I have an older driver for the Nvidia now installed. I turned the refresh rate down on the on the main monitor. GPU temp was 30C before the game and in the 5 mins it ran before crashed the highest it went was 33C for a second and basically stayed at 31/32C. The game did tell me it didn't recognize the graphic card and is not in the database.

    Trying to figure out now if it's the game or Windows 11 install error, even though SFC and DISM are still clean with no errors or is the 4080 graphic card already failing. New Dxdiag attached.

    Thank you again.

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    2 years ago

    @steviecraig  I don't think it's time to start wondering about your graphics card yet.  Still, if you never ran stress tests after installing it, now would be a good time.  I believe the demo of 3DMark is still free on Steam if you're interested.  No need to buy the full version; just run Time Spy and Firestrike and let me know if you see a crash or any other problems, or if 3DMark says your scores are significantly below what it would expect for your hardware.  You can also link me the results pages without creating an account.

    Again, I'm not saying your GPU is the problem here, and it's still less likely than other possibilities.  It's just that this kind of test is always a good idea when building a new system or even installing a new core component.  If you get the equivalent of a pass, that's not absolutely conclusive, but it means that a hardware problem is very unlikely.

    Your new dxdiag shows one new Sims 4 crash and a bunch of Edge update errors.  I noticed a few days ago that Edge had set itself to start with Windows after an update, even though I would never allow this, so please double-check your settings as well, specifically the Startup list in the Task Manager.  If nothing else, you'll claw back some resources, especially if Edge can't update itself properly and is falling all over itself in the attempt.

    For Sims 4 itself, 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.  If this helps, you can selectively reenable services until you find the culprit.

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