Lagging Issues and endless loading screens again!

This is really overwhelming to me as I’m not computer smart so I’m not sure of how to do any of this safely. All this for a game seems like so much and very discouraging for me and just makes me more uninterested to play ☹️ I’ve done so much for this game and it breaks every single time. I’m exhausted and don’t have the energy for any of this as it just stresses me more. 

I only saved a backup to an external drive but I don’t have the game “installed” on the external drive. This is the only option I have to backup my files in the event my computer was to crash for any reason. I would do a clean install of the game if that were to happen and just put my saved game files and such back. I only used it weeks ago to have a newer backup but I removed the device safely (ejected safely before removing) but I haven’t had to use that backup yet. I don’t play with the external drive plugged in. I just use it to save my data and I safely eject it and store it away until I do another backup of important things. 

also back to disabling my antivirus…. Doesn’t that make my computer prone to viruses? I disabled in the past and wound up getting a virus in my old computer and had to start over with everything. and do I have to turn it on and off after every game? That seems tedious and annoying to remember. I just want to be able to play and just shut down when  I’m finished. I thought maybe my antivirus was the issue but again idk how to do that safely without exposing my computer to potential threats since I play for hours at a time. 

@smilelikemiles  You don't need to worry about your graphics driver or the computer's page file usage.  Neither of these looks like a current issue.

For the antivirus, the point is to test playing with it disabled, not to get rid of it.  As long as you only open Origin and Sims 4 while it's disabled, your computer should be safe.  (And you can quit the game and reenable the antivirus as soon as you see the results.)  If you see signs of a virus with the antivirus disabled, the virus was already there—neither Origin nor Sims 4 is going to allow malware to download.  If this doesn't help, we move on to other possible causes.  If this does help, the question then becomes which settings you need to change to keep it from interfering with Sims 4.

The clean boot may look intimidating, but all it really involves is clicking a few boxes, then restarting your computer.  Going through the Task Manager's background processes list should only take a minute or two.  It only takes a few seconds to set Origin to launch Sims 4 in windowed mode, and another few seconds to check the Task Manager while the game is loading.

I understand this process can feel quite involved, but the thing is, you've already tried the simple fixes and they haven't helped long-term.  The goal here is still to identify a problem that can be addressed once and then never again, or at least not again for a long time.  It's the process of finding that problem that can take some work.

@puzzlezaddict 

your right about the page file maybe. If the computer is taking a long time to load then the computer is real busy doing something else or going through a very long error routine. I say this because the user indicating the game does start after a long time - 30 minutes. The user has 12,600mb page file and mine has 18,..600mb page file on a 1tb drive. The computer is not crashing. It's like something is choking the system and increasing the page file would not hurt anything to try it.

Driver Date/Size: 6/22/2022 8:00:00 PM, 1130000 bytes

         WHQL Logo'd: n/a

     WHQL Date Stamp: n/a

Don't look WHQL to me.

My computer is running smoothly and doesn’t take a year to start lol just my sims game load time is taking a long time and now the game is fine until it lags and freezes up (game froze during saving and I had to force quit and lose everything). I have nothing running when I play sims besides origin obviously. I never had this issue before and my graphics card was just updated recently so it should be able to handle the game. That was part of why I was having a separate issue with the game but that’s now resolved. 

Idk how to disable it as I haven’t done it in a while. It’s also intimidating bc I don’t even know what some of the stuff on task manager is so how do I know what to check and what to leave unchecked? I’m not computer smart so it looks confusing to me. 

@smilelikemiles  Look, just do what you feel comfortable doing, list the steps you've taken, and we'll go from there.  For example, a clean boot isn't completely thorough if you don't also go through the Task Manager and shut down any extraneous apps, but it's still better than nothing.

If you want, you can also post screenshots and ask what you should or shouldn't disable.

But please at least try the instructions I posted.  There's clearly something going on with your computer that's interfering with Sims 4, and the only way to find it is to test.  If I could offer you a magic bullet to fix this, I would have already.

I’m sorry if I’ve been so cranky over this it’s just so frustrating. I have no issues with anything else on my computer and other games. This game is just poorly designed IMO. And it’s laggy and glitchy. It’s just frustrating bc I find it could be better. I will try I’m just running on little time. I work 7 days a week so I don’t have a whole lot of time to dedicate to this. I miss being able to just go on and play. This was so sudden so it’s irritating. 

I’ll do my best and report back with screenshots when I have a moment but for right now I am busy so idk when I’ll get back on my laptop to play. I appreciate the help so I’m very sorry if I seem ungrateful it’s just annoying. I bought this laptop and spent more then I can being I’m low income after all my bills and I feel like I have so many problems with this game. I wish I could have a better PC for it but this is all I can have living in a small space. If you’re around tonight I might try and do some of this later but no guarantees. 

I have a question. 

when I started with a fresh folder I replaced the whole sims 4 folder with the backup I had on my desktop (not my external drive copy as that’s not my most recent backup anyway) does that make a difference? It just occurred to me that the last time I had the game make a new a folder that’s what I remember doing. Should I also test this with only moving over my games + other specific files (and eventually the mods and cc I have after I test in vanilla) 

should there only be specific files I should be putting into the fresh folder? If so what files besides my saved games folder do I transfer over? 

@smilelikemiles  The whole point of a clean folder is to not add anything to it.  Don't transfer over your saves, don't transfer your mods and custom content, don't even transfer a single file.

No I didn’t mean for this. I know this I’m supposed to play without adding to it. I meant in general. 

Last time you helped me my game started working as normal again and this is what I ended up doing. I’m asking was I supposed to only move over certain files or replace the whole folder bc I’m asking if that maybe messed my game up bc some files are corrupted or bad. 

I know when I’m doing the testing to not have anything in it. Lol I was talking in general when my game gets the all clear to play again… I don’t want to start over I have legacy families that I’m playing 

@smilelikemiles  Sorry, I misinterpreted that.  Once your game is stable (and please not before, because it would unnecessarily complicate things), you can move over the contents of your Mods folder and test again.  If performance is still good, you can copy over the contents of saves and Tray.  I'd leave out everything else—the game will regenerate those files on its own.  But you may want to add the contents of Screenshots as well, or at least put the images aside for later use.

It’s ok I should’ve been clearer in what I was saying. I’ll be attempting this tomorrow as I couldn’t play tonight anyways even if it was working. Lol 

Thanks that’s all I needed to know! I appreciate that. I will make a new backup to both my desktop and external drive of my current saves, the tray and ofc my mods. Screenshots I plan to put in a separate folder in my computer anyways so I will also do that. 

I’ll get back tomorrow with whatever I’m able to accomplish. 

Hello are you available to help me if I need help? Im about to attempt to do what you told me too but I might need some assistance and I’ll try and remember how to do this if I have to do it again in the future. 

I am going to do a clean boot now but I’m nervous that I did something wrong so I’m afraid to restart as I read about someone messing up and they basically wiped out their whole PC. I am always paranoid bc I did something wrong in the past which caused me to lose everything 

@smilelikemiles  I'm around.  As long as you follow the instructions for the clean boot and don't do anything else, your data should be completely safe.

Ok I will try. I backed up my tray, saves and mods onto my desktop since I will attempt a clean sims 4 folder. I will also disable anitvirus but since i have the internet open right now I will leave it

This is what I've got so far. Are the circled things safe to disable? Following videos and the link you sent is everything supposed to be unchecked in the last photo?

Ok did clean boot with extra help from a Microsoft agent. going to try everything else now

@smilelikemiles  It looks like you found exactly the right settings.  And yes, you could disable the Asus services at startup without any negative impact.  But I doubt the two in your first screenshot have any impact on Sims 4, so you can leave them enabled if you prefer.

So I can't stay awake much longer because I will soon lose internet access for the night. So far so good. It started up kinda slow but not 30 minutes slow and the game did launch. I do plan to delete some saves down the road to help too. Microsoft told me how to enable everything again and told me what to enable before shutting down my laptop later.I was told by microsoft to enable those ASUS processes so I will.

So far I used window mode, started with a clean sims 4 folder, created a new save that seemed to be running ok. I also disabled my antivirus. Here is my CPU, not sure how much this actually helps. next should I start putting in my mods folder and then eventually the tray and saves (one step at a time)? Later on will it be ok if I just replace the folders for mods, tray and saves in the newly generated Sims 4 folder? 

@smilelikemiles  CPU use looks fine, although I'd check it a few times while playing (without minimizing the game) to make sure it still stays in that range.  The only concerns would be if CPU use rose to over 90%, not just a spike but a fairly consistent value; or if the temperature for the Nvidia GPU (last value in the left panel) rose above 80º C or so.

You can start adding back content and reenabling your antivirus and services, but please do one category at a time, for example add your mods but not your saves, or reenable the antivirus but not all the services.  The point is to see when the problem resurfaces.  Once you know that, you'll have narrowed down the list of culprits significantly, and we can go from there.

It's fine to move over the saves, Mods, and Tray folders rather than moving the files inside.  Just go with what works for you.

Thanks so much I’m going to continue testing and I will get back to you with a report. 

Ok so the report is everything was ok adding one by one and doing one step at a time. CPU appeared ok although I only played for a few minutes. My antivirus auto turned itself on after 15 minutes so it seems to be doing ok with or without it turned on. I can try again tomorrow when I have more long term play. I’m now enabling everything again as I was told to do. So we will see I guess. I launched in full screen mode although window mode isn’t that bad. Thanks so much for helping! 

as far as I can tell after enabling everything one by one I haven’t noticed a difference yet (in terms of any sign that anything’s messing up my game). I might have to play more to notice anything but as of now the game is loading up good and everything. 

edit: So my very last test of the night I restarted my PC after enabling everything after the clean boot. It seemed to load slower on this last attempt of the night. Not 30 minutes though so I’ll take it! Lol 

@smilelikemiles  That definitely sounds like an improvement.  Let me know if you need more help.

Thanks so much I greatly appreciate it!