Can't seem to get 100% speed in games

[kyjor]

Hello, I have a couple of games that I can't play at an enjoyable fps. The first two that come to mind are SMG2 and Kirby Air Ride. I've been on this website countless times, and I look the through the forums weekly, but I can't find an answer to my question. I looked at the list of perfectly emulated games and I think they are both on there. In SMG2 I get around 80%, then it can dip to around 70%. Kirby Air Ride slows down as more people play with me. After two players it dips from 100% to 70-80%. The thing I don't understand is that as I view my CPU meter, the usage ranges from 50-85%. I'm just assuming that I still haven't fully utilized my CPU so that I can play Dolphin to its full potential. I don't know how emulation works, but I can tell you that I play SSBB at 4x at 100% with no dips in performance. I recently over locked my CPU, and nothing changed at all. I also monitored my GPU usage and it's usually at 80%; but the clock rate was 300 MHz at the time. My settings are exactly the same as the speed guide on this website. I also attempted this on both backends. I would appreciate any solutions to my dilemma, thanks!
Specs: CPU: AMD A10-6800k 4.1, OC'd to 4.6.
GPU: AMD Sapphire R9 270 Dual-x 2GB.
Ram: G. Skill Sniper 8GB DDR3 2400 (I'm running it at 1600)
Dolphin 4.0-1776
Windows 7 64-bit
Let me know what other info you would need please!

[admin89]

Dolphin is a dual core application and your CPU is weak for SMG which is a demanding game
All AMD CPU : Single threaded performance is poor . In other word , performance per core is bad compared to lastest Intel CPU
Base on our official Dolphin Benchmark , The fastest AMD CPU atm : FX 8350 @ 5.0GHz is weaker than an i3 4130 @ 3.4GHz stock speed

[kyjor]

(06-03-2014, 06:57 PM)admin89 Wrote: Dolphin is a dual core application and your CPU is weak for SMG which is a demanding game
All AMD CPU : Single threaded performance is poor . In other word , performance per core is bad compared to lastest Intel CPU
Base on our official Dolphin Benchmark , The fastest AMD CPU atm : FX 8350 @ 5.0GHz is weaker than an i3 4130 @ 3.4GHz stock speed

Thank you, I just don't understand why Dolphin isn't using the entirety of my CPU

[Shonumi]

That's just how computer science works. When a task is linear (or serial if you prefer) you can't break it down into smaller task (e.g. multithreading) to improve performance. Emulating a GC or Wii is a very linear task; there are only a few places where tasks can be run in parallel at the same time.

See here for more info: https://dolphin-emu.org/docs/faq/#couldnt-dolphin-use-more-my-cpu-cores-go-faster

[kyjor]

(06-03-2014, 11:56 PM)Shonumi Wrote: That's just how computer science works. When a task is linear (or serial if you prefer) you can't break it down into smaller task (e.g. multithreading) to improve performance. Emulating a GC or Wii is a very linear task; there are only a few places where tasks can be run in parallel at the same time.

See here for more info: https://dolphin-emu.org/docs/faq/#couldnt-dolphin-use-more-my-cpu-cores-go-faster

Okay, I see. Thank you. I am planning to switch to intel, what processor would you recommend? I'm looking to play as many games as possible at 100% with it. And I have an unrelated question If you don't mind answering Shonumi. I am going to be a freshman in college, and my major is computer science with a concentration of game programming. I wanted to know if you taught yourself or did you learn programming in a course? Emulators extremely interest me and I hope to work on them one day.

[Shonumi]

An overclocked i5-4670K will do, but I would wait until Intel starts producing the Broadwell equivalent, since it should be better at overclocking.

As for my programming experience, I'm just a hobbyist (who just happens to be involved with some game and emulator programming). I'm self-taught, though I did take one introductory course in C++ as an undergrad (ended up being remedial, but it gave me science/math credits and maintained my high GPA :p). I've a B.A. in English, and I move boxes all day for a job, but I somehow made a working GB emulator

[kyjor]

(06-04-2014, 02:58 AM)Shonumi Wrote: An overclocked i5-4670K will do, but I would wait until Intel starts producing the Broadwell equivalent, since it should be better at overclocking.

As for my programming experience, I'm just a hobbyist (who just happens to be involved with some game and emulator programming). I'm self-taught, though I did take one introductory course in C++ as an undergrad (ended up being remedial, but it gave me science/math credits and maintained my high GPA :p). I've a B.A. in English, and I move boxes all day for a job, but I somehow made a working GB emulator

Thank you very much, I really appreciate it!