Sims 3 Stutter on Quad Core - fix found «12...Next Go

HalloPumpkin

Hey all,

I bought the Sims 3 and ever since then I have been getting severe stuttering issues, even when the game was running over 60 FPS. I've read numerous reports of this happening with many people. I tried all the options I could find, but none of them worked.

After spending a day trying to fix it I believe I have finally found the solution. Oddly enough, I found the solution in a thread on the Battlefield Bad Company 2 Official Forums.

Step 1 : ctrl + alt + delete to task manager
Step 2: Right click on the Sims 3 Application and select 'Go to process.'
Step 3: Right click the process and 'set priority' to 'high'
Step 4: Right click the process again and click 'set affinity.' Uncheck the box for CPU3.

Those steps completely removed all the stuttering(granted the occasional stutter still occurs, but that is due to my video card and not the game).

I know I didn't come up with this solution, but I figured I'd post it here in case anyone missed it. It made The Sims 3 so much more enjoyable for me.

Good luck.

crinrict

I'm so trying that. Thank you for posting.

crinrict

OK. I have a question for you. Why uncheck CPU 3 ? What about if you have an i7 ? Should you uncheck anything higher then 3 ?

HalloPumpkin

crinrict wrote:

OK. I have a question for you. Why uncheck CPU 3 ? What about if you have an i7 ? Should you uncheck anything higher then 3 ?

That's the fourth core of my processor, making it run on only three cores instead. If you have more cores than four I figure you would only leave two or three boxes checked, and the rest unchecked.

crinrict

Ok. And what's the advantage of only using 3 cores ? I don't really get that part (the high priority thing totally makes sense to me).

bob007

Wondering if this applies to AMD and Intel?

Godsgirl33337

I tried doing this, and it wouldn't let me. It said that access is denied. Do you know how I can bypass that?

crinrict

Do you have administrative rights on your Computer ? If not, that might be the problem.

Try starting the Game with administrative privileges. Maybe that will help.

Godsgirl33337

crinrict wrote:

Do you have administrative rights on your Computer ? If not, that might be the problem.

Try starting the Game with administrative privileges. Maybe that will help.

I'm pretty sure that I do. I also made sure that I'm running the Sims 3 as an administrator. Is there something I'm missing?

crinrict

Not sure. What OS do you have ?

When is it saying that ? When you want to change the settings ?

Godsgirl33337

crinrict wrote:

Not sure. What OS do you have ?

When is it saying that ? When you want to change the settings ?

I have Windows 7, and it is saying that when I right click and try to change the settings.

jynxkid

I think this might be the problem I'm having, but could you explain ;ole with details what the stutter is?

bob007

I don't think this is a universal solution for ALL quad core cpu's.

crinrict

Godsgirl33337 wrote:

I have Windows 7, and it is saying that when I right click and try to change the settings.

Sorry, no idea.

Ubasti

I have the same, I can't change the settings even when I'm using the game as administrator and have all the priviledges. I can change other programs, though, so it seems to be just The Sims 3 that I can't change.

I'm running on W7 64 bit, with 6 cores.

crinrict

I found that you can only change the process if you DO NOT start the game as administrator.

andinic28

I only have cpu o and cpu 1 do I uncheck one of those?

Garnet_Alexandria

andinic28 wrote:

I only have cpu o and cpu 1 do I uncheck one of those?

You have a dual core CPU then. I would not recommend unchecking anything in your case as that would limit the game to one core, and you don't want that.

I had a Core 2 Duo (dual core) when this thread was done and I read it back then. I have a Core i5 (quad core) now and don't have any issues.

That being said, I have two guesses (pure guesses here).

Looking around some files once, the game gives a "threading" rating from between one and three. I wonder if limiting it to three cores helped? Oddly, my Core 2 Duo had a threading rating of three by the game.

The other could be due to Hyper-threading? My Core i5 doesn't have it, so every thread the OS sees is a real core. I wonder if Hyper-threading is part of it. I remember some people saying the game was better optimized/tested on the AMD Phenom IIs over the earlier (Nehalem) Core i7s and Core i5s of the time; something about AMD giving samples and Intel not doing so (?), but whatever the reason, the benchmarks I recall seem to confirm AMD performs closer to Intel here than usual. I think I remember some other Core i7 users saying disabling Hype-threading and/or cores helped them.

Again, just saw random guesses out of Left field. I don't know any technical details of the issues or symptoms. Some people with Core i7s don't have any issues. Core i3s have Hyper-threading too (dual cores with Hyper-threading).

andinic28

Garnet_Alexandria wrote:

andinic28 wrote:

I only have cpu o and cpu 1 do I uncheck one of those?

You have a dual core CPU then. I would not recommend unchecking anything in your case as that would limit the game to one core, and you don't want that.

I had a Core 2 Duo (dual core) when this thread was done and I read it back then. I have a Core i5 (quad core) now and don't have any issues.

That being said, I have two guesses (pure guesses here).

Looking around some files once, the game gives a "threading" rating from between one and three. I wonder if limiting it to three cores helped? Oddly, my Core 2 Duo had a threading rating of three by the game.

The other could be due to Hyper-threading? My Core i5 doesn't have it, so every thread the OS sees is a real core. I wonder if Hyper-threading is part of it. I remember some people saying the game was better optimized/tested on the AMD Phenom IIs over the earlier (Nehalem) Core i7s and Core i5s of the time; something about AMD giving samples and Intel not doing so (?), but whatever the reason, the benchmarks I recall seem to confirm AMD performs closer to Intel here than usual. I think I remember some other Core i7 users saying disabling Hype-threading and/or cores helped them.

Again, just saw random guesses out of Left field. I don't know any technical details of the issues or symptoms. Some people with Core i7s don't have any issues. Core i3s have Hyper-threading too (dual cores with Hyper-threading).

Thanks for your help

bob007

Garnet_Alexandria - Some time back I started comparing Intel to AMD and after some bench marks the AMD seemed to execute code cleaner but not quite as fast. With Intel hyper-threading every core has extra registers connected to the same internal bus (simple explanation). All cpu's have microcode that controls operation. I feel AMD micro code is cleaner but this all depends on what kind of code your trying to compare to. This is my opinion. I remember ordering an Intel Extreme chip and was told I'd be put on a list. I never got it. I've been using AMD for some time now. Have had few problems and good support.

ssaff

Re:

HalloPumpkin wrote:

Hey all,
Step 3: Right click the process and 'set priority' to 'high'
Step 4: Right click the process again and click 'set affinity.' Uncheck the box for CPU3.

-
Thanks A Lot.
Will see how this goes.
(New to Sims since Jan. 2012) - yet with "old" quad core 4 this could make a lot of difference.
"It Makes Sense You Know It Does"

ssaff

crinrict wrote:

I found that you can only change the process if you DO NOT start the game as administrator.

Hi crinprict - Thanks for the info; however, I was able to set the Processor Affinity (for 'Sims3LauncherW.exe') to *uncheck* CPU 3. [Windows XP Professional (5.1, Build 2600) Service Pack 3].
Thanks for your post, as you have prompted me to find a previously-saved 'DxDiag*.txt' file and look more closely at what hardware is in situ. ThanX

ssaff

Godsgirl33337 wrote:

I tried doing this, and it wouldn't let me. It said that access is denied. Do you know how I can bypass that?

- Could it be that you are logged on to (Windoze) as 'Guest' rather than 'Administrator' ? (I'm running Win XP Service Pack 3 [32 bit]) and have no probs disabling the third of the quad core CPU; nor with re-setting the priority.)
HopeThisHelps

maria_loves_alex

what if you're running on 2 cores

bob007

This thread I think only applies if your cpu has 4 cores. I think that may help code execution by eliminating a core. This solution has worked for some. I don't recommend reducing any of the cpu's power. If you have 2 or less cores I recommend leaving cpu settings alone especially if you don't know what these setting do. I have dual core cpus and now have a 6 core cpu and I have not changed any of the cpu settings.

soupy99

Wow, this is way better. Thanks so much.