Buildings and objects flicker when camera stops.

[derval]

Hi there. Thanks for looking.

I installed The Sims 2 yesterday, along with all the expansion packs except Apartment Life. Shortly I noticed an extremely annoying glitch. When I move the camera around, the graphics are fine, but as soon as the camera stops, everything (objects, people, walls, decorations and buildings) seem to blink. They flash only once and then re-appear, and it happens so quickly that I can't tell if there is anything underneath, or screenshot (sorry!).

I'll give you my system specs.

Operating System: Windows XP Home Edition, version 2002, Service Pack 3.
Processor: Intel Core2 Duo CPU, E8500 @ 3GHz, 3GHz
Amount of RAM: 3.25 GB
Graphics Card: ATI Radeon HD 4800, device ID 9442, 512 MB memory, driver version 8.561.0.0

As you might be able to see, there shouldn't really be a problem S: my father and I were told that this was more of a high-end gaming computer, and so I immediately assumed that it wouldn't have any issues with the Sims 2. Apparently I was wrong.

Any help would be extremely appreciated, thanks so much!

[simkat]

If you had upgraded your graphics card this migh be why.I had this issue just yesterday and had too roll back too the original driver and it fixed that.Ask your dad too roll back your card drivers and see if that fixes it,sometimes those updates don't always work the way they should.

[derval]

Thanks for replying (:

I did upgrade it, and then I uninstalled the driver altogether and restarted my computer. When I turned it back on, it reinstalled itself. This was a few days ago.

I decided that installing an older driver would fix the problem, so I did this on Sunday. Unfortunately that didn't work and totally messed my computer up. I managed to boot it in safe mode and rollback my computer yesterday night. The problem is still there.

When I try to rollback my drivers, Windows says there's nothing to rollback to. I tried to do a system restore but I can only go back as far as February 11, which I did last night in order to fix my computer.

I'm still stumped, unfortunately. I'm worried to try installing an older driver again, just in case it breaks my computer... again. S:

[callistra]

Yeah that doesn't work.. you can't just uninstall drivers and let Windows automatically install them with graphics cards. Also if you put that gpu in yourself you should have uninstalled the previous drivers before installing this card, and if you only had onboard graphics you should have gone into BIOS to disable them.

Lets try this.. Run this program to get rid of all video drivers: http://www.afterdawn.com/software/desktop_software/other_tools/driver_cleaner_pro.cfm Restart your computer. Now get the newest from ATI.com, install and restart again.

If you previously had just onboard graphics then you need to pop into BIOS and look for an option to disable them.

Lastly, I would go to Microsoft.com and download the latest directx.

Also what brand and model of power supply do you have?

[derval]

I've just done as you said, and installed the newest drivers, and the problem persists. Additionally, DirectX 10 won't install because I already have DirextX 9.0c installed, which is, according to the installer, an equivalent.

I've only had this computer since Christmas '08 and have always been running it with the graphics card mentioned above installed. (:

How can I tell what brand and model my power supply is?

[callistra]

I meant for you to install directx 9. Microsoft updates this about once a month so unless you've updated it by physically going to the site and downloading then in the last month or so it's not likely up to date. There is no directx 10 for XP. Try this: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=2da43d38-db71-4c1b-bc6a-9b6652cd92a3

Part of this guide talks about how to check your power supply: http://forums.sims-community.com/showthread.php?t=38662


Did you download any custom content? Did the game ever work or has the blinking problem happened since day 1?