First topic message reminder :

Hi ya All,

Back with Part II of the "Package Compressing" tutorial. If you haven't prepared your package files yet, please check Part I for details.

Combining and compressing your (package-) files has as main benefit that you can have very much custom content in CAS & in game while the loading speed of the content remains within acceptable boundaries.

*** In order to get this to work, your Sims 3 game should be closed ***

Before compressing please download the program s3pe Package Editor and install this program on you computer. After preparing your files (Part I) and installing the program you can start the compressing process.

Rename your Packages folder to "Packages_s3pe" and create a new Packages folder. This is like your backup folder for your CC in case something goes wrong, you still have all your CC (click on the pics to enlarge).



I'll advise you not to compress all your Game Mods, Skins and Sliders; they are also small files in size, so you won't notice any performance difference, I think it's just 'safer' not to compress them. So you can either copy or move your Game Mods, Skins and Sliders from your Packages_s3pe folder to your (new) packages folder.
Run the program s3pe Package Editor and select "New"



Click Resource / Import and select "(EXPERIMENTAL) As Dbc..."



In the new version a pop up screen will emerge, please confirm that you're alright with this and click OK.



Got to your Packages_s3pe folder and select the package files you want to compress (per run).

Please note:
Don't select to many package files at once (advice per compressed file not more than 250-300 MB). What I did is compress a file per creator (and yes for some creators this will mean 2 or more compresses files, for instance LianaSims 3 compressed files or PeggyZone 4 compressed files). But you can combine files what ever the way you like (maybe like per sort custom content).

In my example these are 51 hair & accessories by Anubis (263 MB), so select all the files in the folder Packages_s3pe you want to compress and click.



And select No



This importing might take a while and confirm OK. Now you will see a screen like below. Please make sure the following options in the bar below in the screen are checked (see the red circles in the pic): Sort, Display Names and Display Tags.



Then sort by Instance, click on the sort box "Instance" (see below), click this 2 times !



Then sort by Tag, click on the sort box "Tag" (see below), click this 2 times !



Then scroll through the screen to find the Tag "_XML" and the Instance "0x0000000000000000" (because the imported files are all sorted now by Tag and Instance these will all be grouped by kind).



Then select all the instances with code "0x0000000000000000" AND Tag "_XML".



Right click in the selected instances and select "Deleted".



And all the selected instances will be "DELETED".



Then save the file to your new Package folder (you can rename the file as you want, in this case I will name it "Anubis360 Hair s3pe" and click save.



After that you have to WAIT (!!), don't be alarmed this might take some time, maybe up to 5-10 minutes depending your computer.
When the program s3pe becomes 'active' again, you have combined and compressed your first file !! Click on close, followed by new to combine and compress your next file :D

Please check your game if the exercise did work ! After that you can keep the files in the Packages_s3pe folder as backup and leave them there or zip or delete them, what ever you want or like (but ONLY after you are comfortable the compressing has worked !!!).

Good luck with the compressing & Happy Simming !!

Groetjes, Cheers, Gruessen,

Eva

When I compress my package files, the resulting compressed file is also package. Most of the times the total size of the compressed file is less as compared to the total size of the files you have compressed in the file.

The resource.cfg file you can use from like every Peggy hair you download and but it in the mods folder.

When using the new and updated S3PE program you basically don't have to do anything anymore in order to compress.
Just start up the S3PE program, click "file" and "new"
After that click "Resource" / "Import" / "As dbc..."
Than select the file you want to compress in one new file and click "OK"
A new window will open and you can (must) name your new compressed file and click "OK"
After that wait until the program is finished and you have yourself a new compressed file ! ;)

After that check the things I've listed before, so everything is checked and in the right folder and you should be good to go !

Thanks! But do I still want to name the file.....for example: IciaTops.dbc ??

Just "IciaTops" will do (for instance), please don't add ".dbc" the extension will be made automatically. Like I said before it should result in a package and not a dbc file ;)

I am having a little issue, s3pe isn't compressing my files anymore. It's just making them the same size but in one package. For instance; I compressed 29.8 mb of stuff and after compressing it is still 29.8 mb. Sometimes the amount of mb is more! Is there something wrong?

Sometimes that happens, like if you compress Peggy hairs, the size of the compressed file might be smaller, about the same or even a bit larger. That's not really a problem, as S3PE is designed to compress (when possible) and combine data. I have that with some files too.
Still, it will help combining the files, as your game will still be "more speedy" reading and processing 1 file as compared to 50 files (for example.

Thanks a bunch Eva!

Turned my almost 1000 files into 225! Thanks Eva! Also, the new version of S3PE deletes the blank xml files for you, so all you have to do is import and then save!

You're welcome guys ! Glad I could be of help ;)

Well, I dont really get this becouse at mine there are no xml tag filmes or something. most of them are IMG... am i doing something wrong?

Nevermind .

LOL, I was about to say, you're probably using a newer version of S3PE. The xml tagged lines are deleted automatically when compressing (when using a newer version) ;)

Yay thanks for this TUT! My sims 3 is faster then ever :D

Thanks for posting this, Eva! I tried it out yesterday and noticed that my game really did run faster. Thank you for including pictures so that even beginners like me can understand. :D

You're welcome guys ! I'm glad I could be of help with the tutorial ! ;)

You did also have a look at the first part here ??
You followed all steps on this page ?

You've put all the compressed files in the following folder:
c:\My Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\Mods\Packages

You've put a recent "resource.cfg" file in the following folder:
c:\My Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\Mods

I'm not sure what I can do to help, if you have checked all these steps and have performed all these steps "the correct way"'. It should work I think as there have been minor problems before, but it should work for everyone in the end ;)

If you still have problems, please let me know and tell me as much about the problem(s) as you can, as I can't see your computer, so I have to make due with a "problem description".

How do I make sure I have an updates rescoure.cfg mine is from 6/11/2011

Its not showing in the game at all

You can download my .resource file here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?4c3e832e5c1ii1m

That file works.

Mine is older but I'm sure it works, maybe you can try it and see if it helps. You can download it here.

If that doesn't help please go over the steps again to make sure you've done everything correctly.

But I honestly don't think that's the problem, because if your .packages showed up in game before compressing, the problem has nothing to deal with the resource file.

If the packages did show up before compressing, it would mean something has gone wrong with the compressing, I guess if they don't show up anymore.

They did show up before compressing. Cause I took one of the sims3packages I turned into a package and put it in the mods and it showed, but after I compressed it, it didnt show

Do your compressed .packages show up?

They show in the folder but not in the game

It looks like you haven't compressed the file correctly.

You're probably using a newer version of s3pe. If so you don't have to delete anything within the compressed file, like in the pics of this tutorial.
You only have to select the files for compressing, name the (new compressed) file and wait till those files have been compressed and it should be all okay.

Make sure that the old package files aren't in the same folder as the compressed file of course (as those will conflict !).
The compressed files should be in the folder "My Documents\Electronic Arts\The Sims 3\Mods\Packages"

Yea the old package files I keep in the renamed folder then I delete it with the compressed file in the new package folder and it still dont work

I just did it all over and it STILL dont work

Thank you EvaTer! I hope I can do this! LOL

@ RecklessAngel.

IF your CC through packages was visible in your game before the compressing and after the compressing the CC isn't visible in your game, the only thing I can conclude is, something has gone wrong with the way you compress the files, as the only thing the compressing does is make one "big" file of the several files you've selected for compressing. And there's normally only ONE (correct) way to compress files.
I obviously can't see how you compress the files and normally this should work, as you're the first of many simmers, who has tried this and hasn't succeeded yet. I really wish I could help you, but there's just no way I can see what's happening or what's going wrong when you're compressing files.

The only advice I can give you is check again if you're doing things right and in the right order (as I think you're missing something or are doing something not entirely correct) and READ all the tips and tricks over, especially my post 4 posts above this post.

Another issue what might cause conflicts and not showing your CC properly is "bad CC". You can read about checking your CC (before compressing) in Part I here. But this is basically already part of the whole compressing exercise.

Try compressing a couple of files first, so for instance combine / compress 5 files first (say 5 hairs or so) and see if that CC shows up in your game.
If it works, you're on the right track, so to speak ;)

Heres how I do the compressing

Open the program
Select the files
It asks me to save and I click cancel.
Make sure the XML or whatever is crossed off
Save as "saves it the name."
Saves it in mods.

This is what I do:

File > New
Right click and select "Import > (Experimental) as dbc"
Select the files
Click "Open"
A window will come up prompting you to Save As
Type out your file name and hit "Save"

Wait for the program to finish it will import and auto save after each (this is a feature of the latest S3PE). The blue bar on the bottom of the window will be constantly moving with each import. The file name may read "not responding" - but don't worry, it's just not done saving. Depending on the number of files you're importing and the amount of RAM your computer has, it might be slower or faster.


^ That's exactly what Eva has written out in her tutorial, however - so make sure you really did follow it step-by-step. Also make sure you have the correct/newest version of S3PE - you no longer have to delete the xml files yourself, it will automatically do it for you.

Okay, I'm gonna show you the use of s3pe (compressing) the "new way", as the previous way I showed in the tutorial is out dated (as said before), because of newer versions of the s3pe program.

I'll start off with the same pic as before, in the Mods folder in the "My Documents area" on your computer.


I have some Peggy hairs in the Packages_s3pe folder I'm gonna compress as an example.


Open the s3pe program.


Select "New" to create a new "compressed file"


Screen after selecting "New"


Now it's time to add the package files to add to the compressed file you're about to create, by clicking: Resource / Import / As dbc...


Go to the folder of Packages_s3pe and select the Peggy hairs in there and click open.


Another window will open as you have to name the new compressed file and save it on your computer in the mods\packages folder. You can name the compressed file like you want (you can also rename it later if you want to).
I've named the file "This is a test compress file" in this case (don't forget to select the folder mods/packages, so the compressed file will be saved in the correct folder right away !!).


WAIT until the program has finished combining and compressing the files. When the program is done the screen would look like this (or something very similar).


Exit the program, as the combined package file has been made and saved.


The compressed file has been made and is available for use, in the mods\packages folder.


And you're done !! This is it ! Nothing more, nothing less !! No more deleting xml lines and stuff. Just select new, open the files you want to compress, name the file, wait and you're good to go !!

How come your package files are orange? Mine are blue and green

It depends what programs you have installed that are set to automatically open that type of file.

My icons are blue because I have a program called "Merlin" - so I can quickly view thumbnails of the packages to identify them. I set .package files to be automatically opened by Merlin. So, your icon will differ accordingly. Eva's are set to automatically open in "Postal" - which is why she has a yellow icon.

Oh ok (: Well I will retry this and then let you guys know if it worked

YAY IT WORKEEEED!!!!!!!!!!!! THANK YOU SO MUCH!
1 more question. I have a few package files that I downloaded as pages (most Sims3 hairs are package files when you download them) Can I compress those as well or could I only compress what I convert?

I'm SOOO happy for you it worked in the end !! Yay !! ;)

I'm not sure if you downloaded the hair files correctly, as there are normally 2 kind of "sim files" you can download. It's either package or sims3pack I think (maybe in zip or rar files or something similar for download purposes but that's about it).
If you downloaded "page files", I think you have to re-download the correct file(s) or link(s) to the hair(s) as you can only use package file(s) to compress or sims3pack file(s) to convert to package files (in order to compress).

And thanks Ameenah, you explained that perfectly !! ;)

I'm happy it worked ( :

You posted to the correct subject ? Or ...

I'm explaining it there in the same way Eva does, why doesn't it work?

I think you did okay explaining things, but sometimes it doesn't work out the way we expect it to. I tried to explain things before to RecklessAngel, but it somehow didn't work either until I did the post last night.
The most important thing is it worked for RecklessAngel this time (I think), all the solutions to the compressing issues are in this thread so I'm glad you added the video, as I'm sure it will help other simmers ! ;)

Thank you so much for all your help Eva! But I missput my question. You know how sometimes when you download a hair its ALREADY a package file? Can you compress those too or can you only compress what you converted

You're welcome RecklessAngel !! ;)
You can compress all package files you want normally, although I won't recommend compressing mods and houses, like mentioned before somewhere in either Part I or II (I think ).

Ok thank you oh so much for all your help! :D

You're welcome, I'm glad I could be of help