HELP!! Sims 2 graphic problem. HELP!!

HELP!!!

ok, I have seriously done almost evrything I can think of to fix my HUGE problem. I have a problem where, after about 10min. of play my sims menu goes all red, and freezes (like shown in my picture), or half of the screen gets covered in muticolored lines, and freezes. I have a nVidia GeForce 5200 video card, and all the required specs. I have updated all the drivers for the video card, I have installed the sims 2 patch, and I have installed DirectX 9. I tried opening the game in a window ( -w) and have tried it without sound ( -nosound) Still the same problem!!! I don't know what else to do!!! ???

HERE IS THE PIC -->> http://www.postidol.com/simproblem.jpg


HELP! CONFUSED???
If anyone has any answers please let me know!!!!

Try dropping graphics settings in game and in NVIDIA control applet, like antialiasing, etc. How hot is your graphics card when this happens?

Okay I think this may help you but did you close all the programs in the lower left hand corner toolbar thing. If not do so. If you cant then you just have to right click and click quit or shut down program. Only the ones you cant quit or shut down are fine. If you still have this problem I dont know what to tell you. I hoped this helped you!

Hi!!!

Thank you so much for replying to me. I really do appreciate any help or options you guys can suggest to me. So, I shut down everything in the background, and in the lower toolbar, and still only after 5 min. it went all screwy again. It also does this screen, which it just did. :

http://www.postidol.com/simproblem2.jpg

This is what I have found so far... not sure what it means but it works. slightly. I can play for about 5-10min. then it goes all wonky. So I shut it down, and open it again and it opens on the first screen exactly the same way I ended it (in lines or all red) But it still loads, and the music continues to play. Just the screen is screwy. But, if after I close it down the first time, and I install the new drivers again before I open it up again, I can get another 5-10 min. of play. I don't know what else to do, or what will work!?!?!

Please help me!?!?! Thanx again to who responded to me for some answers.

I have lowered my settings on Sims to the lowest they can go. But, as for the Video card, I will have to check that one. Thanks!

I'm having this exact same problem - thus far I've installed/uninstalled/reinstalled the latest driver for my video card. (I have a nvidia Geforce 5600 fx). So far no dice - I got it to play normally for probably 30 minutes but then they jumped to the red and green. I'll probably contact nvidia tomorrow since it seems to be an issue with their hardware, but I thought I'd see if a solution had been found in this thread.

Sounds like a heating issue. May want to downclock your card and see if that helps. If so you'll need to get better cooling for your card.

Thanks for the suggestion. Unfortunately downclocking my graphics card seemed to have zero effect, although I admittedly know nothing about downclocking so I may not have reduced the speed sufficiently to make a dent. This is quite an odd problem and I've been trying to fix it for days. Getting kind of frustrated!

Try using older drivers:
http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_2k_61.77

And update the game, if you have not done so already:
http://thesims2.ea.com/update/