@Berj2468 Thanks. Your laptop's graphics driver is a bit old, not so much that I'd expect it to be incompatible but enough that it's worth looking for an update. You'll need to use whichever one HP provides, as its software usually blocks third-party drivers. Go here:
https://support.hp.com/us-en/drivers/laptops
Enter your serial number, choose your OS (just Windows 11 is fine) if prompted, and you'll land on the driver download page for your laptop. Click All Drivers, then expand Driver-Graphics, and find the newest Intel driver. Your current version is 31.0.101.4091, so anything that starts with 31 and ends with a higher number than 4091 would be newer. If you find one, install it and restart your computer before testing the game.
If HP doesn't offer a newer driver, there is a way to install the more generic Intel version, but I wouldn't recommand it and would suggest doing everything else possible to fix this issue first.
That includes playing in a clean folder: move the existing Sims 4 folder out of Documents > Electronic Arts (or rename it), and when you launch the game, a new folder will spawn with no content. Your saves and other data will be intact in the folder you moved but not read by the game. Don't restore any of that, at least for now; just start a new save and have a look at the shadows. Please start the save in summer, and if your sim arrives to a cloudy day (or worse), travel to a different world where it's fully sunny and have a look around.
Your dxdiag shows a number of errors from the EA App, so I'd recommend uninstalling it with Revo Uninstaller (the free version is fine) and reinstalling. The dxdiag also lists a couple of errors from what I believe is NoMachine remote desktop, so try updating or uninstalling and reinstalling it. I doubt those errors are related to Sims 4, unless you're running the game remotely, but they should still be addressed.
