SimCity 4 Timer Keeps Pausing

[AusBoy94 42]

First I would like to say that I absolutely love this game! I've been playing it since I was about 9 years old. I finally got the game to work on my new Windows 7 laptop, dual core, etc. (If you are still having problems with crash to desktop and you have a multi-core system, I have a fix.)

Recently I've been playing the game, I play on cheetah speed, but about once every [game] month, the game clock will just stop. It's very hard to make progress when the time just stops. The game doesn't freeze, just the time. I've tried lowering the settings to see if maybe it has something to do with all of the graphics but that doesn't seem to affect the situation.

I was wondering if anyone else was having the same problem and what I could do to fix it.

  Edited June 23, 2012 by AusBoy94  

[CaptCity 4,683]

Depending on the size of your cities, running on Cheetah will often have this effect. It takes take for the simulator to do its thing and there'll be a lag as it "catches up". Try changing the speed to one of the slower settings.

[AusBoy94 42]

Yeah, that's what I was afraid of. My city has about 450,000 Sims. It's just disappointing because when I zone new areas, it "catches up" then it takes a while to develop. I guess those are the consequences of doing it big.

Maybe you could help me with another problem/concern. I was wondering, (semi-off-topic) does using one CPU at max damage the processor?

[Indiana Joe 1,750]

No. When I set SimCity's affinity to one processor it maxes mine out too. I've never had problems. In fact when I used to have an ancient single core computer, the processor was almost always maxed. The only issue might be with overheating, but if your computer's fan and other cooling systems are working you shouldn't have problems.

[Haljackey 17,242]

This has happened to me since I got the game in 2003. I think it's just something built into the game... it has to adjust before progressing in time.

-The most common occurrence when this happens is when you plop a park or another item that will affect the desirability/land value of the area that ploppable impacts.

-A good way to minimize the amount of time it takes is to view another area of your city, preferably an undeveloped area.

Oh and my computer specs have changed considerably since I got the game and this effect has remained the same for each PC. Better PCs will not minimize or eliminate this occurrence, unfortunately.

[AusBoy94 42]

Okay! Well thanks guys! I guess it's just a problem I'll have to work around.

I managed to get to 575,000 Sims in my city. Going to push it further.

[Essex 322]

It's possible to run the game dual core?

[Haljackey 17,242]

It's possible to run the game dual core?

Yes. It is possible to run SC4 on as many cores as you want by editing the shortcut code. Just know that every PC acts differently to running the game on multiple CPUs depending on your specs. Some don't have any trouble at all, others can suffer chronic crashing.

For example, I run SC4 on 8 cores. This is my shortcut code for reference:

[html]"C:\Program Files (x86)\Maxis\SimCity 4 Deluxe\Apps\SimCity 4.exe" -Intro:off -CustomResolution:enabled -r1920x1080x64 -d:DirectX -CPUCount:8 -w[/html]

(I use a variety of other shortcut extensions as well )

A good safegaurd to avoid chronic crashing on a PC with multiple cores is to force the game to solely run on one core (change the CPU count to 1).

  Edited June 23, 2012 by Haljackey  

[Essex 322]

Thanks so much for that, runs a lot smoother now and the no intro was much needed aswell!

[uvapwns 1]

If you try adding more RAM to your computer, it gets rid of that problem. I was having it and added a gigabyte of RAM, and it runs much smoother now.

[nukeu123 307]

This is normal, really its the simulator doing a check(simple way to say) it will pause for a breve moment to check what happend last month and what will happen next month, the time and frequency of this pause is affected by the performance of the computer(quite obviously) the worse your computer preforms, the longer and more frequent this occurs

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

OK, to consolidate all this:

It doesn't matter how many cores you set to. The game is single threaded, and setting the CPU count to any number greater than 0 simply means that the processor dispatcher can send the application to whatever is available, but you still only get one core at a time.

The game is an x86 (Pentium era) 32-bit program. It can never use more than 2GB directly. Having more RAM simply makes room for other operating stuff to run without a lot of swapping.

When the clock stops it is probably due to the path finder on a city that has grown beyond the ability of one CPU to handle all the objects and still keep up the frame rate. The pathfinder does not run all the time. I seem to remember someone knowledgeable said it was every 120 Sim-days, but I suspect it also runs if you build a major road or a big zone. The no-road zots are a symptom of the pathfinder not getting around quick enough. If you don't like them, you can get rid of them with the cheat tastyzots, which only eats the ones on screen. You may need the extra cheats .dll for this.

So, no amount of new hardware will help except a faster CPU. Those of you who can, could over-clock if you want to risk your chip.

Generally on a big city I run on second gear (Rhino). This gives the program enough slack to mostly keep up with the necessary graphics and still run, if slowly. Cheetah simply exacerbates the problem, and running on Turtle in this situation means that you can just watch the animation or go our for coffee while you wait for things to develop. Why people run on Cheetah except for bursts of development for some specific goal confounds me. This is supposed to be a leisure time activity, not a rush to build a megalopolis.

[Haljackey 17,242]

If you try adding more RAM to your computer, it gets rid of that problem. I was having it and added a gigabyte of RAM, and it runs much smoother now.

The game is an x86 (Pentium era) 32-bit program. It can never use more than 2GB directly. Having more RAM simply makes room for other operating stuff to run without a lot of swapping.

Actually 32-bit programs can use up to 4GB of RAM. If your PC has more than than this, SC4 will not utilize it, but other programs you have running in the background will not hinder SC4's performance.

Why people run on Cheetah except for bursts of development for some specific goal confounds me. This is supposed to be a leisure time activity, not a rush to build a megalopolis.

I almost exclusively run cheetah, and I've been doing it since 2003. Not only is it a good way to boost you coffers quickly (that is if you're running a surplus), but it also lets you take notice of the rapid change your city is making. Everyone plays the game differently Moose .

However, I do not run on cheetah with the variable-speed automata enabled. That would drive me insane.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Well, you see, Hal, that everyone does what he pleases. This doesn't stop us from a little badinage. I have never seen SC4 exceed 2GB while running, and I forget what handsprings are needed to get above 2GB, but I suspect the authors didn't bother. A 4GB box when this was made was really unusual. As I think about it, you have to load some pointer registers with a base then go indirect through them.

[uvapwns 1]

Actually, the memory I added made it 2 GB. I know, I have a bad computer.

  Edited June 23, 2012 by uvapwns  

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Actually, the memory I added made it 2 GB. I know, I have a bad computer.

A computer is only bad if it doesn't do what you say.

[uvapwns 1]

Ah, well. It's still pretty small.

[Haljackey 17,242]

A Noony Moose: I use this program that patches the EXE file to use up to 4GB or RAM: http://ttcshelbyville.wordpress.com/2012/02/28/make-32bit-applications-use-4gb-of-ram/

I also recently ran SC4 with my task manager enabled. With just SC4 and my internet browser running (looking at this thread lol), I clocked at over 5 GB of RAM usage. I typically run around 2GB or RAM use when not running any programs.

Click for full size.

I also have 1.5 GB of VRAM available, not sure how much SC4 can suck from this though.

[AusBoy94 42]

OMG You have a super computer!

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

OMG You have a super computer!

Twelve gigs? Unless you have 6 cores, that's kind of overkill.

I have 4 GB but a 20 GB swap partition. When I run the game, Linux allocates: 2 GB VM, 592 MB RAM, This is for my largest city. It is running about 85% of the CPU in Rhino speed. At this time Firefox is taking over 90% of the other core.

Over the whole system (4GB) only 2.5 GB is allocated, and there are a few MB on the swap partition that are active from some of the system daemons. There are about 100 processes running, mostly sleeping.

[AusBoy94 42]

I only have two sucky Celerons.

[Fatherted 129]

Kind of a duh, but pause then unpause and it continues *facepalm*

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Kind of a duh, but pause then unpause and it continues *facepalm*

When you pause, the simulation doesn't really stop, only the graphical updates. That's why it can catch up, then.

[AusBoy94 42]

Alright, here it is:

Comments, question!

  Edited June 27, 2012 by AusBoy94  

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

Images not visible. Must be either png, gif, or jpg.

[Darkwings 5]

What A Nonny Moose said is accurate.

Since the game is not made to make use of multicore machines, having a good overclocked cpu is actually better than having a lot of cores and RAM.

Anything running close to 4 Ghz is already the max the game can use and sadly this has been happening with later games too.

Anything 'more' than that (more cores, more RAM) will just help the rest of the system. If the system is weighted down by a load of background stuff you will most likely want to get rid of that anyway.

PS: I have no problems with the images...

  Edited June 27, 2012 by Darkwings  

[AusBoy94 42]

Images not visible. Must be either png, gif, or jpg.

It's visible for me? :/

It's a JPEG. I used a site to host it (since I can only upload a whopping 137 KB here)

Do you know how to post pictures, then?

What A Nonny Moose said is accurate.

Since the game is not made to make use of multicore machines, having a good overclocked cpu is actually better than having a lot of cores and RAM.

Anything running close to 4 Ghz is already the max the game can use and sadly this has been happening with later games too.

Anything 'more' than that (more cores, more RAM) will just help the rest of the system. If the system is weighted down by a load of background stuff you will most likely want to get rid of that anyway.

PS: I have no problems with the images...

But you can see them....

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

I've had the can't see the image problem several times now. I wonder if the image site you are using excludes users in Canada?

[AusBoy94 42]

That's what I was wondering, too. Try copying the imgae URL and going to the website.

[AusBoy94 42]

What about now?