Buying new laptop for SC4

[HyperXK09]

So haven't played SC4 for two Years since having my pc destroyed in a flood.  Looking to start playing again  on the weekend at my part time job.  Any suggestions or things to look for or steer away from when looking for a new one?  Thought I saw something about
The game not working on Windows 7 and something  about quad core nous screwing with the game???  Don't remember.   Looking to buy in 2 weeks, so any help would be appreciated!

[rambuckel]

SC4 is actually working on Windows7. On my comupter it used to crash quite often. But you can easily start it in XP-Mode which will make it pretty stable. Concerning the number of cores you can easily force the game just to use one core. I do not know if that works with four cores but it does with 2.

That's the two things I did to make the game run stable on my 2core / 64-Bit-Windows system. Actually nobody really seems to know which complications there are in detail as I already read that those two things I did are not really successive on systems of other players. As far as I know an influence of the kind of graphic board is assumed.

I'm surely not an expert on these matters but maybe it's helpful for you nontheless.

- rambuckel

[Grneyes]

I'm going to be buying a new laptop in the next couple of days also and there are many Windows 7 threads on here, what you need to do to make SC4 stable and also all the tools that go along with it (Terraformer, Mapper, etc). There's also a tutorial on Windows 7 and SC4 on Simtropolis.

[Lowkee33]

Why not buy a $50 computer that its only use is to play the game?

If I were spending 500+ on a computer I don't think I would worry about SC4.

[Grneyes]

But why pass up a bright shiny new laptop?

[cmdp123789]

Well I recently bought a Dell Inspiron... quite awesome! the prices are reasonable... and the specs are great... I got an Intel Core i7... 8 gb ram... NVIDIA 2gb  525... dont remember everything... but the thing is that 8 gb ram will work out all your problems... and the intel i7 basically is a beast. You dont actually need to buy the super computer to play the game... but since you are buying you should consider to buy it not only based on simcity needs...

[HyperXK09]

I would love to buy an old XP gaming laptop, but I'm sure that would be close to impossible to find.  I love SC4 that I would get something that would just be dedicated to playing that game alone.  I'll look over at simtroplis and see what I can learn over there about the issues.  Just really don't want o buy a new laptop, install the game and find out it just crashes.   Maybe I should stay away from quad-core processors?  and there are certain type of video cards that are bad??  Really getting confused...   

[Lowkee33]

I did a search on e-bay, seems like there are a lot of options for less than $100 US dollars.  I'm timid of e-bay though.

I think SC4 prefers Nvidia graphics over ATI, but I have an ATI (x8500) and it works fine.  I think as long as you set SC4 to run on one core then you should be fine.  When I install it, it is very choppy, but setting the affinity solves all problems (It will also solve problems on many other games too).

Maybe buy a desktop so you can change hardware?  I don't know .

[HyperXK09]

I would bu a desktop, but getting this laptop would be so I can bring it with me to my p/t weekend job, so I can get a good 14-16 hrs of play every weekend, with no nagging wife telling me to "get off" the computer, all while getting paiod for it!!  Ive never even used a PC with windows 7, let alone install or chage any settings on it.  IF you see anything on Ebay, that would be perfect for SC4, let me know.  just the ones I saw didnt tell me what kind of grpahics card they had, if they had a good one at that and only went to 2 gigs of memory and would want a bit more then that for this game.  hate when it used to lag.  Had an XFX Nvidia card on my old pc for years, and ran SC4 with no probelms.  Im just so lost in all this.

[HyperXK09]

how about this figures?  Any good?

System Manufacturer: ASUSTeK Computer Inc.       
System Model: G50VT               
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU     P8400  @ 2.26GHz (2 CPUs), ~2.3GHz
Memory: 4096MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 4096MB RAM
DirectX Version: DirectX 11
Card name: NVIDIA GeForce 9800M GS
Manufacturer: NVIDIA
Display Memory: 2287 MB
Dedicated Memory: 495 MB

[Grneyes]

So, I have my new laptop and need to move everything over. I have so far copied all my plugins and new regions onto a flashdrive. Is there anything else I need?

[RickD]

You should be fine by moving everything to the same location on the new machine after you reinstalled SC4 (and the Patches). And don't forget the plugin folder in program files\maxis.

[Grneyes]

Thanx! Also, I cannot find the thread about fixing the plugins folders because something about it doesn't like folders that start with "u"? There were two ways to fix this, a really long complicated way and a really short easy way and I can't find either one.

[HyperXK09]

Why not buy a $50 computer that its only use is to play the game?

If I were spending 500+ on a computer I don't think I would worry about SC4.

yea I wound up getting an old PC with a fresh install of XP.  has a great Video card that seems to be running SC4 pretty well.  only spent $60.  So now getting back intot he game!