does the Video card increase the game play's speed and performance?

Question

i admit it, im addicted to the sims 2 (all exp packs), and yeah. But, my performance is getting slower and slower, I might need to reformat soon, but to make better performance with higher quality smoothness other than just giving the game with high details in graphics, i want to make sure if the video graphic card increase the speed of the game play as well as the RAM, HD, and the CPU. Unless everything parallel with each other... .__.; then that would be a problem cuz then i might need to buy everything with high speculations... >_>;;

Basically, i want to do this so i can make sims 2 movies and actually not lag in the game at all! >.<;; someone please help me!

Answer 1

I play the Sims 2 + exp packs every once in awhile myself. A few things might make the game slower over time.

1. The more items you download, the longer the game takes to load
2. Frame rates will worsen with increased house size. A ton of items will also. Might try keeping the houses you build or import small to medium in size and items.
3. 8 people living in the house + house guests will slow frame rate. Especially if you're running the cheat to allow more than the suggested house guest limit for your RAM. The suggested limit is there for a reason.
4. The game is a memory hog. Try rebooting after each session. I notice a big difference after a fresh reboot with game play.
5. Turn down the graphics. If you're running an older card, displaying shadows might be dragging frame rates down.
6. Making sim video's uses more memory, thus slower frame rates.
7. If after all the above you're still having freezing or slowing, you might want to upgrade video card, video ram, and ram. (EA suggests 512mg ram, I suggest 1gig and a video card that has at least 256mg on it. If you're processor can't handle that much memory, upgrade that too)

Answer 2

Yes, a better graphics card CAN help [most games are written to take advantage of the card's abilities]. The card will have a CPU on it so it can do much of the processing for your computer, leaving the main CPU with mainstream tasks.

You should start by de-fragginf your hard drive though. Many things are in 'virtual memory' [ie the hard drive until needed] and it takes far longer to access things that are spread all over the place than if they are nearby / next sector.

Check out the manufacturers site - see if they can tell you what is required for the best results.

Answer 3

Yes, the better the video card, the better your game is going to run...UP TO A POINT. There are other factors involved, such as the amount of RAM, CPU speed and monitor. Even the fastest video card is going to perform poorly if the other factors are low.

Answer 4

It depends on your CPU. There is a recommended Clock speed (e.g. 2.6 GHz) for games. Increasing Video Card Memory may reduce the physical memory required for gaming (especially for Intel graphics).

Answer 5

It all affects performance!
I run the http://pclinuxos.com and that tells me my hardware , and the speeds of everything. try it!