Computer Freezes and Restarts?

xLunaSimsx

So, my friend has been having a problem for a while now. She'd be in CAS, making her family, and after about an hour (?) of creating sims, her computer would freeze suddenly, and then the screen would turn black. The computer would make a weird noise internally, and then it would suddenly reboot on its own.
To specify, this is a Mid 2010 Mac Mini with 8GB RAM and an NVIDIA GeForce 256MB Graphics Card.
Could it be a Graphics Card Issue? A RAM Issue (though I don't believe it is)? There is more than enough storage on the hard drive.

phoebebebe13

Mac has issues with ram usage unless your friend is bootcamping windows @igazor Mac help Thanks

igazor

TS3 for Mac is crippled version of the game compared to its Windows counterpart. No matter what we do, it can only utilize 2 GB of RAM total before crashing or delivering an Error12 upon trying to save. Almost no player would be able to stay in CAS for that long without the game running out of usable resources no matter how much RAM is installed. Purging RAM frequently throughout the game sessions might help. Getting out of CAS and saving frequently might also help.

http://forums.thesims.com/en_US/discussion/658546/latest-mac-help-threads-guides-please-start-here-before-posting-a-problem-updated-27-07-14/p1

https://bluebellflora.com/resetting-ram-during-gameplay (this explains and illustrates the purging RAM technique)

Having said all of that, I am surprised that the game runs on that Mac Mini. Its graphics card is typically not strong enough to carry TS3 well. But if the game works other than within these very long CAS sessions, then that's great.