Hello,

I have my eye on the following laptop to play Sims 3 on: https://www.bestbuy.com/site/acer-n...p?skuId=6504566


I don't have any unusual needs or requests, just hoping it has the capacity to handle the base game + expansion packs + mods / CC. Would love this group's thoughts if they think this is a good choice.

Others can advise about that specific laptop more than I could. I play 3 on a desktop that is well over 10 years old, an i7, still on Windows 7, yes, and I have all but K Perry installed as I did not get it. It plays beautifully. I am on that now.

I have a laptop that is a few years old at another location and I ran the specs by people here before I got it. Other than I cannot stand that it makes me put things on D as there is about a teaspoon of space on C, I have had no problems, and it plays 3 beautifully also. Mine is an HP Omen I think it is called. But I do not have the specs at hand.

The laptop in question is going to do about as good a job running TS3 with all expansions as any laptop can. And that's a very good price for it, these days. Note though that it has a 12th generation processor (Alder Lake), which I believe still means it won't run the game at all unless some steps are taken to address the incompatibility of TS3 with that particular processor range. That's pretty well documented both here and on EA's AHQ site for TS3, and many players with that hardware set have moved past the initial issues by now.

I have to agree though, given the choice I would never want to play TS3 on a laptop. It takes more system power to accomplish the same things and, unless there is a fancy external monitor docking or other kind of hookup involved, playing such an immersive game on a small laptop screen for any length of time would drive me more bonkers than I usually am.

I sure do agree that I like being on this 22 inch monitor more than the 17 when I play. I also have been known to give some of my friends a WTH when they are siamese twins with their phones when they own computers. I do not like to even type on my ipad. Give me a full screen and keyboard rather than something smaller than a piece of bread.

All super helpful context -- thank you, all!!

I have a Lenovo Legion 5 laptop. AMD Ryzen 7 5800H. 16GB RAM. Nvidia RTX 3070.

I run the game at max graphics settings and have all expansions/stuff packs installed and store content. The game runs great. I highly recommend Lenovo Legion if you're looking for gaming laptops.

My Acer Nitro has good graphics. However, not sure if they fixed the fan exhaust. Both fans exhaust thru one port. It may cause heat issues depending on your fan settings. Also, the hinges are crap. They are too tight, and the display support arms are stamped metal that flex, and evetually break... if you do not notice, the increased flexing of the bezel may cause you to crack your screen. THAT is my personal experience with Nitro.

My Acer craptop circa 2017 still runs all the Sims 3 and most of the EPS with mods. Loading time is longish with 16gbs RAM but the graphics aren't horrible. I'd get an Acer again. I did a lot of research before buying it. I've upgraded the RAM a few times over the years and needed a new power cord. It was probably $400 back in 2017 (might even have been 2016). Of course the integrated graphics card isn't "the best" for gaming but I have a terrabyte of storage and might get a SSD storage if it lasts.

I used a laptop to play TS3, its expansion and stuff packs, and mods, and it lasted 8 years (I also used it for my jobs). It was an Acer Aspire, and it might have lasted longer except for something corrupting the hardware on the inside (I never found out what that was, although I had someone look at it).

There are advantages to using a laptop to play TS3: it is portable, if it is a good laptop, it will last a long time, and you can upgrade the RAM and hard drive if you need to. I myself am looking for another laptop to play TS3 and maybe some other games on; I have been shopping around too for one, with some potential candidates in mind to choose one from to buy when I have enough money saved to buy one (I have a work computer I use for work).

Good luck with your search!

Sims 3 played well on my prior laptop also, which has Vista. So some laptops can and do handle Sims well. Glad to say.