Can I get better peformance out of my laptop?

[Grimm560]

(08-06-2019, 09:28 AM)mbc07 Wrote: While the Intel UHD Graphics is pretty competent for Dolphin, I'm not sure if it's powerful enough for 3x IR. Try lowering that to 2x IR and see if it helps. Switching to DirectX 11 or DirectX 12 video backends might also help...

You don't have to do anything. As long as it's not too hot, your i5-8250U will automatically raise its clock speeds up to 3.4 GHz on this particular CPU model.

I'll give that a try too. I saw that my power settings were on Balanced...it was the only power setting that was an option so I added and switched to an option for high performance. I'll toy with a few setting changes in Dolphin based on the replies. I really appreciate it!

[mbc07]

And just to be sure, you're on AC Power when you run Dolphin, right? Running off battery, even in high performance mode, will limit the overall performance a bit...

[sirdaniel]

I addidtion what previous poters wrote:
-Change backend to dx12 or vulkan.
-Change resolution to 2x
-Enable show FPS option
-Enable widescreen hack - just for better visuals
- Shader compilation - be careful with that as the right option depend on the system. Try Synchronous Ubershaders and Asychronous Ubershaders ans see if that helps or not. Do it as a last stage of tweaking.

Dual channell can give You boost in GPU performance even 20% over single channell. Dual channel is like having dual RAM bones like 2x4GB. To verify existence, just use simple program CPU-Z and go to Memory Tab you will see if DUAL channell is enabled. Then go on SPD Tab and choose different slots available. It will show your RAM configuration.

To see if CPU throttling (going down with clocks at high tempertures) simply just open task manager, go to Performance Tab andl see CPU clock. If it go well below 3Ghz then it probably means laptop cooling cant cope with heat.

[Grimm560]

(08-06-2019, 01:59 PM)mbc07 Wrote: And just to be sure, you're on AC Power when you run Dolphin, right? Running off battery, even in high performance mode, will limit the overall performance a bit...

yessir! I always run on AC Power playing games or using apps like Photoshop, Power Director, and OBS.

[Grimm560]

(08-06-2019, 03:18 PM)sirdaniel Wrote: I addidtion what previous poters wrote:
-Change backend to dx12 or vulkan.
-Change resolution to 2x
-Enable show FPS option
-Enable widescreen hack - just for better visuals
- Shader compilation - be careful with that as the right option depend on the system. Try Synchronous Ubershaders and Asychronous Ubershaders ans see if that helps or not. Do it as a last stage of tweaking.

Dual channell can give You boost in GPU performance even 20% over single channell. Dual channel is like having dual RAM bones like 2x4GB. To verify existence, just use simple program CPU-Z and go to Memory Tab you will see if DUAL channell is enabled. Then go on SPD Tab and choose different slots available. It will show your RAM configuration.

To see if CPU throttling (going down with clocks at high tempertures) simply just open task manager, go to Performance Tab andl see CPU clock. If it go well below 3Ghz then it probably means laptop cooling cant cope with heat.

I used to have CPU-Z on my old laptop....forgot all about that. I'm doing a few different tweaks little by little based on all the info I'm receiving. Some of the tweaks seemed to work better for some games but not all. I'm thinking that could be because of hardware limitations. I ran through about an hour of Buffy Chaos Bleeds. The stutter and frame rate drop were there but not enough to ruin the experience. I noticed it more when I was in full screen or had the window maximized. The frame rate would also shoot up once in a while. Buffy has decent graphics but never really pushed the Game Cube's hardware. Soul Calibur is what I want to get to working because it either crashed or hung after about 5min of gameplay even when I changed the settings in Dolphin based on the game's Wiki. My kid likes playing fighting games cuz he gets to beat on his dear old dad without getting into trouble so you know SC is gonna be important to play in the house. Lol

Thank you for all the great info. I will definitely make a copy of what I'm learning and keep it as a guide.