I'm in the middle of backing up my game folder before I install Mansion & Garden and was wondering how much of the 9.86GB I was backing up was my Downloads folder...

7.94GB

I think I have a problem What's especially worrying is that I did what I thought was a fairly big clean-out recently! My loading time isn't too bad though, so at least there's that. Maybe it's time for a spring clean now that I have a new SP...

Good luck with that. :P
I still have 1, something GB in my regular download map, which has to go in to my Sims download map.
Mostly I throw away things and then put the same amount back in from the regular download map.
But it's getting harder because most of the things I really would like to keep. There is not thát much left for me to throw away ánd I wouldn't like my amount of downloads for the Sims to get much bigger than I have now. Dilemma, dilemma.

My downloads-folder is 2,1 GB with more than 2500 individual files.

Look at the signature. Yep.



Oh, honey. We all know the victor in this. I own a computers shop. I can build a super-mega-awesome-foxy-hot computer. But I do accept the duel. *sips tea menacingly*







I have about 1/4 of it in collections, but they're buggy for me and I generally just stick to a mental order of where everything is.

Baby, I see your tea and raise you a vodka! You might have the computer shop, but I have the financial backing of...of...Azerbaijan! Yeah, that's it.

No, seriously, I actually admire you and your game. Must be awesome being able to play with that much stuff.

Oh, honey, I have a full-stocked bar in the next room. Spiked tea is a bit of a speciality.

It is! It really opens up being able to make distinct neighbourhoods and sectors within a town without reusing even a single bit of custom content. So, so, so worth it.

You two are hilarious.

I have a tendency to re-use stuff. Which means I don't have enough variety, I think. (Well, lack of much creative eye too, really.) One reason for the re-do I'm doing is to get rid of stuff I never use. I want to add things too, but checking it out bits at a time to be sure it looks good in-game. I've already found some glasses that looked great in screenshots, but that look funny on my sims. Ugh.

I'll be right over.



*sigh* I have a lot of stuff in my regular non-netbook game, but I find myself hardly using much of it nowadays. When I get home, I plan to do a weeding...but it's such a pain in the ass.

Last night, I downloaded a ton of stuff from that TS3-to-TS2 conversion tumblr someone linked a while ago. Then I followed links from there to download a whole bunch of medieval and fantasy stuff. Surprisingly, I only added about 1 gig doing so. People seem to be a lot better about making small files than they were a few years ago. Which gives me an excuse to download even more stuff!

Can we all come over to play?

I have 3.85 GB of things on my main game, but, using AGS I'm trying a new strategy on a different game of having the only CC I use being default replacements and things absolutely essential to my gameplay style, like Simblender and Monique's computer; if that works, I'll restart my main game, and transfer that Downloads folder over to it and only allow myself so much non-default CC every so often, eg. 5 posts every two weeks or something like that. It's actually great fun going through the Sims 2 defaults database, looking at clothes and hair, and picking out the ones I like the most.

1.1 GB, 7386 files at the moment. A fairly broad variety of things, ranging from hacks to clothing. I'm particularly pleased with myself as I managed to make 2 (re-coloured) clothing items last month. Both of them are fairly low-quality, but still an improvement on the 0 items I'd made for Sims 2 before

I'm down to a measly 3,5G after my recent clean of buy/build mode and using compressorizer on everything. It's probably more than I should have given that I have crash issues, but custom content is what makes me still play the game, specially in clothing/hair/accessory department.

I do still download things, but I have gotten smarter about it over the years. For example every other week I load up the game with just the things I added those two weeks, and look at it in game. I've learned that some things look great on screenshots, but not as great when you are the one using it, so doing this helps me keep my folder in a constant stage of preliminary-cleanout.



If you don't mind my asking, what is your secret to being able to have 60G and not having your game crash every other second? From my understanding dual or quad core does not help, so do you just have a crapton of RAM or is there something else to it?

I figure I should upgrade my computer, but I don't own a computer shop and my tech guys don't quite take me seriously when i say I need a badass computer to play The Sims 2 on xD They make the assumption that it is a silly little game that requires hardly anything.

5,400 files in 632 folders, which gives me a total of 1.43GB. Which is very low compared to what it used to be before I got rid of all my old 'hoods and Downloads folder and started over. Means I have plenty of space for new stuff :-)

And yes, DigitalSympathies, please share your secret! One day when I win the lottery (ha!) I'm totally going to have an epic computer that I can play The Sims 2 on with loads of CC. Though I guess if I won the lottery I'd be too busy travelling and stuff to spend much time playing computer games.... Having said which, I currently play on a laptop, so I guess I could take it with me. I can totally picture myself curled up on a beach in Hawaii playing a household of sims through a Twikkii Island vacation! :-D

I have come to the stage that whenever I download a skin, hair, or piece of clothing, I go through it with a fine-tooth comb. Skins .... are the tones even and well-detailed? Any freaky noses/bellybuttons/shading? (For some reason, some skintones have really weird noses and bellybuttons.) And they ARE non-Barbie, right?

Hair ... There are very few CC hairstyles that are perfect. It's the nature of the Sims 2 beast. But there are flaws you can live with and flaws that will bother you every time you play. I had recently downloaded a gorgeous hairstyle that looked great in the pictures, but as I played it, I noticed a bald spot right on top of the head. She looked liked some sort of freaky friar. Nasty bald spots are a big dealbreaker with me! Textures are important as well. I know everyone has his or her own texture/color preferences. Ditto.

Bellybuttons, etc. ... some look more like buttons than navels. And some noses are really emphasized. Some people like that. I'm not as crazy about it. And how do the eyes look on both sexes? There are skins that look fantastic on a female, but really strange on a male, and vice versa.

Decor ... OK, it looks pretty. But will I actually use it? Clutter is one thing I DON'T download a lot of. My poor folder is already questioning my sanity, thanks. And, oh .... is it overriding something else?

Clothes ... Like hair ... any freaky gaps or seams? When the Sim moves, what happens? Is it overriding anything else?



I think the time is coming when I really need to. My hardware is showing its age. I'm scouting the forums now, even as I'm looking at the entertaining stuff. Stick with XP and make my old machine a gaming computer? Use Win 7 and have a great machine that will last a few years AND .... I hope ... will play the Sims 2 games? The latter option, though, also depends on my other family members' games. They are SUPPOSED to be researching their respective ones to see if they play well on Win 7. (From what I've read here, Windows 7 is OK with the Sims. I hope so. Otherwise, it's two separate computers for me. Life without The Sims 2 would make me sad. ) No Win 8 for now. Reading that Win 8 thread here is giving me a headache, and I don't even have Win 8!

My techie thinks I'm a nut as well, but he tolerates me, I guess. When my computer needed a video card, I showed him the page of video cards compatible with The Sims 2 and informed him that it HAD to be one of those cards. No compromise. He tried selling me a card NOT on the approved list once, claiming it worked with most games just fine. Most games, yes. But if it's not on the "approved" list, no sale!

He probably thinks I'm out of my mind. He obviously thinks I'm a dirty old woman. (I have ACR, the bouquet, and a few other naughty things. 'Nuff said about that.) But I'm a good customer, and will listen to almost all of his recommendations, unless it doesn't play nicely with Sims 2. He is extremely competent, and I trust in his judgment ... but always check about Sims 2 first!

As for the amount ... I don't even TRY running with the big dogs on that one. I'm quite content to be in the back of the pack re CC.

I've seen references to "the bouquet" two or three times recently, but have no idea what it is. Can someone enlighten me?

I had a similar thing happen with my tech guys. I told them "Build me a computer that will Play Sims 2 with plenty of CC and no lag.". As I expected they severely under-estimated how resource-heavy Sims 2 is, but I knew that so I insisted on going a few steps above what they suggested. However, video cards is such a gamble with Sims, and they pulled the same "This works fine with games", and eventually they agreed to write into the contract that if the card did not work, they would keep swapping until I had one that did.

In the end, the card did not work, and they had to admit I was right to have that as a demand. They changed the card for me free of charge, but the tech guy was not happy about it. He told me that he had sworn never to play Sims 2 in his life (he had to play-test to see what my problem was) because some friend of his had made a look-a-like-Sim of him and got it abducted by aliens and pregnant, which he apparently found so offensive that he declared war on the entire game xD I thought it was rather hilarious, and in the end I got video card that works, and the nick name "Sims girl" in the shop

The best way I can put it here is that it's an extension of ACR, only a little raunchier. Sent you a PM because I do not believe I should be overly-detailed here.

And gummilutt, my techie has hinted that he thinks he should test my Sims 2 game and downloads whenever converting major hardware ... for testing purposes, of course. He has never quite let me live down the time he saw a particularly interesting menu thanks to a naughty mod.

(Getting back OT) .... With a little luck and a little beefing-up of my current system, perhaps I can increase my CC some more. I hope so. I do smile when people claim there isn't enough Sims 2 CC anymore. Not true. It's scattered in more places, but it's still there, and still tempting me to add just a little more to my Downloads every week.

Last edited by gazania : 11th Apr 2013 at 12:16 AM.

18,000+ files in my Downloads folder. It literally grows in hundreds by the day. u___u

For the future, for a lot of cards, you can go into the Sims files and tell them to recognize your shiny new video card. I used the instructions at http://www.leefish.nl/mybb/showthread.php?tid=3666.

8590 files in 777 folders.
1,74 gb...

My downloads folder has doubled in size since I last posted here. I currently have 10.1 GB cc with 29,545 files and 80 folders. Yikes!

At the moment: 8,90 GB
23.913 Files, 90 Folders

Wow, I only have 50MB atm... and I was worried about putting in too much. Looks like I have nothing to be afraid of. Time to go on a downloading spree