Forum Discussion

Simplycoya's avatar
3 years ago

Extreme Lag even with Mods/CC Removed

I'm hoping someone can help me here. I've been playing the sims 4 on my gaming laptop for years with a massive CC/Mods folder, previously 90g large.

Over the last year my game and been getting extremely laggy. Even going down to a 20g CC/Mods folder or no CC/Mods at all my game is stuttering laggy and it's really bad. I'm getting 5 - 12 FPS when I play and have OBS Studio running.

I create YouTube videos playing the sims and it's really impacting my LPs when after a few sim years with a sim, once the family starts growing the lag ramps up and I can't play the household anymore. 

Here are some of my specs and I also have the dxdiag report. I also have 35 of the packs installed on my game. All EPs, Most GPs and some SPs. And my save is around 68K GB, it's huge!

Is my laptop just too old with a weak CPU and GPU to play the game any?

Laptop: Lenovo IdeaPad L340

OS: Windows 11

CPU: Intel Core i7 9th Gen 2.60GHz (12 CPUs), ~2.6GHz

Graphics Card: NVIDIA GXT 1650

Memory: 16 GB RAM

SSD: 1TB

HHD: 1TB 

What I've done: 

  • I've checked the neighborhood log with MCCC - I have no Father Winter issues or a crazy number of hidden households
  • I've deleted all ghost/homeless in my save file and it still lagged 
  • I removed all my mods and cc, started a fresh save, downloaded my family back into a brand new world, still lagging. 

I'm starting to think it's my PC but I'm just not sure, my memory gets up to 89/90% when playing. It's never done this before ☹️ 

7 Replies

  • @Simplycoya  Your computer is more than powerful enough to run Sims 4 on ultra graphics settings at much higher framerates than what you're seeing.  Recording your play will increase the demands on your hardware, but it's still capable of much better performance.

    Please try playing a new save in a clean user folder.  I realize you've removed most of the possibly problematic files from the user folder already, but this is just a bit more thorough.  Move the Sims 4 folder out of Documents\Electronic Arts and onto your desktop, and the game will spawn a new folder when you launch it.  Don't add anything to the new folder yet; just start that new save and see how it runs.  Don't download your existing household from the Gallery either; just use a freshly created sim.

    Please test without any other software running, only Origin and Sims 4, at least for now.  If fps is still low, restart your computer and try again (with another clean folder), except this time, play while offline.  You can sign into Origin and put it in offline mode, then disable wifi and/or disconnect the ethernet cable before pressing Play.

  • khitteh's avatar
    khitteh
    Seasoned Ace
    3 years ago

    Check Dynamic Lighting (it's for keyboard and peripherals and found under Game Options - Other) is set to OFF.

    A couple of times that setting has magically switched back to on for me, and I found it's the cause of massive and unfixable fps drops - until you switch it off.

  • Simplycoya's avatar
    Simplycoya
    3 years ago

    Thank you so much! I gave it a couple days to try a few things out. I guess the game can handle zero cc, fresh save. But I forgot to try with OBS running. I still haven't found a fix for my save while running OBS even with reducing the population.

    I am in the middle of an LP on my channel so I kind of need this save to work. Not sure what else I can try with this one. It's getting really frustrating and nothing seems to work. 

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    3 years ago

    @Simplycoya  The next question is how Sims 4 runs with no cc but with OBS running (and absolutely nothing else).  If it starts to lag, put the game in windowed mode, open the Task Manager, click the Performance header, and let me know what you see in terms of CPU use and temperature.  You can post a screenshot if it's easier.

  • Simplycoya's avatar
    Simplycoya
    3 years ago

    Thank you so much for trying to help me out with this. 

    So this is what I got from my testing: 

    NO CC & OBS Open 

    This is fresh brand new save with zero cc installed 

    15 - 23 FPS but this drops significantly when moving around the camera and sims going about their routine

    CC & OBS Open  

    My regular cc folder installed

    10 - 15 FPS but this drops significantly when moving the camera and sims going about their routine. 

    I attached my CPU & GPU from task manager in both scenarios (no cc/ with cc). My memory is much higher with CC (78%) but CPU and GPU seem to be around the same 30 - 40% for both. 

    I also deleted my local thumb cache file ad client db from the sims 4 folder when booting up both times. In both scenarios the lag was pretty significant the camera is stuttering and all around it just looks bad for filming. ☹️ 

  • Dynamic Lighting was off ☹️ I almost wish it wasn't hoping that was the problem 

  • puzzlezaddict's avatar
    puzzlezaddict
    Hero+
    3 years ago

    @Simplycoya  I was actually looking for the Performance tab, which is the second one from the left.  This is the Processes tab.