Another Surreal Computer Event
 

It's my turn to have something go mondo bizarro wrong with my machine.

I installed some more stuff for The Sims 2; just a couple of sims and some objects.

Then I tried to start the game. It hung up halfway through loading. I couldn't get back to the operating system so after about a half hour of alternately waiting and trying to get the computer's attention, I used ye olde power switch alternative.

Now the machine won't boot. I hear the startup noise and see the XP logo. Then the screen goes black and stays black.

It's really hard to believe that a data file for The Sims 2 could blow away my operating system. Something extremely strange is happening here.


Merde. Now what? :thinking:

Even more bizarre: I left it unplugged for about a half hour and then rebooted it with the network cable disconnected and the Sims 2 disk out. NOW it looks like the operating system is coming up!

Now I'm trying a System Restore. I got an unhandled exception in the Microsoft .Net framework. That's even weirder because the only thing I know of on my machine that runs .Net is SimPE, I haven't run all day.

Aha! I pulled my folder for Caravan Sims 2 out of my Downloads folder, and now the game starts!

Dang it, that's disappointing. I paid for most of these things.

Well, if you feel really brave, you can put them back in slowly...

Wow.

I've heard of some funky stuff happening with "bad" custom content but total computer failure?? That's a first!

Take Miros's advise & try placing the files in the "offending" folder back in slowly.

My bet is it will be like my Downtown lot problems: traced down to 1 measly file...

(Still really bites, especially since it's pay-content!)

Even more bizarre behavior: I got the game running. Created a new family with a couple of sims I had downloaded; just the Rabbit family, Jessica and Bunnie. :D Then when I went back to the neighborhood screen and the whole thing crashed again.

This time it was something like I've never seen--a pattern of vertical lines, alternating black, gray, red, gray, and then repeat.

It was frozen again, so once again the hard-core power cycle.

When it came back up, after a while I got an error message that said, "Windows has recovered from a serious system error."

I still am having difficulty coping with the idea that some download I installed might be causing the whole system to crash.

HP Digital Imaging Monitor crashed, too, but it crashes about 50% of the time anyhow.

Greg, have you got a second hard disk you can install into the machine and do a fresh Windows install?

I do have a second hard drive but it's already installed in the machine.

How do you get the machine to boot from a different drive?

You would have to install XP onto that drive, (this is possible, XP is based on NT, it will install to your choice of hard drives.) and you should then have a choice of bootable XP system drives at the load up screen.

Boot into the fresh install and see if you can fix the first one. If not just blow the original installation away, and run from the new one, it won't care.

You may have to hit F8 at startup to get the boot manager. Then you can rearrange the boot order at the same time by making the fresh unborked installation the "active" system.


Edit:
If it makes you feel any better. I was out of contact for a couple of days myself last week.
Trying to get a new software unlocked, I delved into the realms of "Ooh ooh, where did my router just go?"

Yep, I managed to fry my internet configuration to the extent I had to reset my router to factory and start all over again.

That was fun.

This is very scary. It would be even scarier if it were my machine doing that.

Yes. These things are most easily rectified in a hands on situation.

It's communications. The tech people need the right descriptions to come to the right diagnosis.

"The pixel thingy", doesn't cut it when describing a problem to the technician.

How are things Greg?

My machine magically started working again, and after removing some orphan things from Downloads, even the game works! Now I'm afraid to turn it off! :lol:

Chicken!

May I say? You certainly paid for that little lot.

Pay site = scam:hack:fish, stay away, be afraid.
Danger, Will Robinson. Danger.

Glad to hear all is well now.

Um, Shorty... you do know we used to run SimsHost, the paysite from hell?

We need a Treasure Hunt. I miss Treasure Hunts.

Caravan Sims have some lovely things. When I first put Anja in my game, I made her a tiny Victorian town house with all their gorgeous furniture. Unfortunately she got friendly with a hunky sailor and .... well the house got too small :P

Yeah, there's all sorts of cool stuff. I haven't a clue which of their things is causing me grief.

Have you checked that folder for hidden hacks? The other likely culprit is one horribly high poly object...

Does anyone else miss treasure hunts?

I wouldn't expect there to be hidden hacks in one the Caravan Sims objects, though it might be calling a routine that I don't have in my game. I ran the Hack Conflict Detector but it didn't find anything. Delphy's Download Organizer didn't find any orphans, either.


Hmm... how could we do a treasure hunt? We no longer have a hundred sites for folks to hunt through or thousands of folks who might want to hunt.

One way might be to ask all sorts of Sims sites all over the net if they would like to participate. The only way it would work, though, is if we had a central treasure hunt engine that everyone linked to. The style of the original treasure hunt where one site linked to another just wouldn't work because it's almost guaranteed that there will be no-shows.