Replies & Thank You
Re my graphics problems, I want to thank all of you wonderful people for the moral support and suggestions. @celebkiriedhel spent several hours with me going over everything and discovering that the game is not reading data. It doesn’t read the graphics.sgr file when it’s replaced. Checking the config log after loading and running the game with a modified file - it hasn’t recognized any changes. It doesn’t find swimming pools as an option in Build (the round corner is there though). It can’t find road pavement.
I was testing it with no cc at all and with Maxis graphics files. I turned off shadows, reflections, and shaders. I forced the game to regenerate new games. I’d installed empty neighborhood files (N001, N002, etc.). I put the Maxis neighborhood files back. Nothing helped. The neighborhood looks fine - no pink flashing, no red flashing, no blue flashing. Sims look fine. Roads and water are not fine and game objects themselves are just not there, not in the catalog at all.
The hardware and Windows 7 operating system and other software are old enough yet strong enough to run the game without problems. I hope that something about the installation went haywire and that reinstalling it fixes it. I hope.
The sims community always steps up to help people in need. I was ready to quit. You’ve given me options and the determination to keep trying.