My game keeps crashing!

[marthatoo]

I already have ambitions, late night and world adventures installed and I recently installed the expansion packs: pets, seasons and supernatural
Ever since I installed the last 3 expansion packs my game keeps crashing in build/buy mode after around 5 mins!
I don't know what the problem is and it's really bugging me!
If you can help I would REALLY appreciate it!
P.s. I'm not that computer savvy!

[Skilletnap]

I don't know if you took a look at this post HERE., but it has some suggestions for what might help you. It has links to some tools designed to find out what is causing your crashes, basically. And of course, a few fixes have been posted as well:

Hi All,

I'm relatively new to the game, but have about 32 years of programming experience under my belt.  I was having MAJOR crashing, lagging and just relative "sluggishness" in the game but was able to fix it quickly using 3 steps without increasing the memory allocations for programs found at http://simswiki.info/wiki.php?title=Game_Help:Insufficient_Memory_Crashes (this has the potential of causing many more issues with your computer and generally  can cause more problems than it's worth, so I recommend trying the below steps first).

First off, (and this can't be stressed enough) as posted on Carl's and other Sims sites- Prior to gameplay, clear your game buffers by cleaning out the following folders from your "MyDocuments\Electronic Arts\sims3\" folder: CASPartCache.package, scriptCache.package, compositorCache.package, SimCompositorCache.package, DCBackup\0*.package, and SocialCache.package.  Also take out the Thumbnails in the main Sims3 folder and the "bad" files from the Saves folder.  Instructions are at http://www.carls-sims-3-guide.com/forum/index.php/topic,3852.0.html.

Next, disable any active "real time" virus software scanning.  Most folks have Windows Defender running in the background anyway to intercept most of the nastys you may run into while Porting your sim or hosting others.  The only major disadvantage to this is that it is wise to not download/run any new files if you are surfing the net while playing Sims.

Finally, and this is the real biggie:  DISABLE INDEXING.  When you start playing Sims, it starts building file upon file upon file and indexing loves to grab on and try to speed up your computer in the process.  The indexing program itself uses very little of your computer's memory, but what it does to your drive is atrocious during game play.  Besides, most modern processors have no trouble handling 99% of Searches you will do without indexingprovided you keep your drive(s) defragmented.  Indexing is a holdover from the Windows 98 days (I wont bother you with the lengthy explanation as to why it's still there).

Fixing this is a two-step process:
1. Click on your "My Computer" link off your desktop (this brings up your document file folders and drives).
2. On the "My Documents" folder that you dump your Sims3 caches to, right click (brings up a scroll-down menu).
3. Click on "Properties", and, on the screen that pops up, uncheck the box that says "Allow Indexing Service to Index this disk for faster file searching".   If this is already unchecked, make sure to go to step 4.
4. Like the "My Documents" folder, do the same thing for your main "C" drive mentioned above.

For me personally (running 3GB memory, Dual-core 1.8GHz processor, 2GB MSI GTS450 Video Card) the difference has been nothing short of "phenominal".

Regards,
RealRomster