Compatibility?

[RadFallout100]

I was thinking about building a portable emulator since the Nintendo Switch seems like it may not allow hacking like other portable consoles, and so I was thinking about using Raspberry PI, but it turned out that it wasn't powerful enough. Then I found a similar item called UDOO and they have an ULTRA version with a 2.56Ghz Quad Core CPU, 8Gb DDR3 RAM, and an Intel HD 405 GPU. I haven't been able to find this specific situation reviewed online, and was wondering if it could run Gamecube and Wii games without the problems other people have been facing trying to make the ultimate portable emulator.

[Shonumi]

The strongest CPU available in the Ultra version is an Intel Pentium N3710, which is fairly weak by Dolphin's standards. It *could* run some games in Dolphin smoothly, but not likely the majority. The specs seem similar to the GPD Win, and there have been a number of videos on how well that plays Dolphin. Google around or search YouTube to get an idea.

[RadFallout100]

(10-11-2017, 11:35 PM)Shonumi Wrote: The strongest CPU available in the Ultra version is an Intel Pentium N3710, which is fairly weak by Dolphin's standards. It *could* run some games in Dolphin smoothly, but not likely the majority. The specs seem similar to the GPD Win, and there have been a number of videos on how well that plays Dolphin. Google around or search YouTube to get an idea.

But the ULTRA edition has twice the ram and twice the cpu power so I would assume that it would perform better than the GPD Win.
https://shop.udoo.org/usa/x86/udoo-x86-ultra.html?___from_store=other&popup=no

[RadFallout100]

And also the GPD win seems to perform well, getting almost 30 fps with gamecube emulations, so it could be assumed that the UDOO x86 ULTRA would perform better (maybe play most wii games at about 30 fps?)

[KHg8m3r]

A Intel C2Q Q6600 has about 1.5x better single threaded performance (what matters for Dolphin) than the N3710. I used a Q6600 for a couple of years. It sucks for Dolphin, and you'll only get a small handful of games to paly fullspeed.

[Shonumi]

(10-12-2017, 12:10 AM)RadFallout100 Wrote: But the ULTRA edition has twice the ram

RAM essentially makes no difference in Dolphin. As long as you have enough for the OS and Dolphin when it's running, adding more doesn't help performance.

Quote:and twice the cpu power

Not really. Both CPUs have a minimum clock rate of 1.60GHz. That's the worst case scenario, imagining that thermal throttling prohibits any of the cores from boosting to a higher speed. Both CPUs also have a maximum "burst" clock rate of 2.56GHz (assuming the GPD Win is the Z8750 version). As a side note, getting the maximum clock rate in either CPU is unlikely under normal circumstances, again because of thermal throttling. Anyway, aside from differences in the microarchitecture (Braswell vs Cherry Trail), they'll perform the same in Dolphin. From what I've seen, Braswell and Cherry Trail are pretty close in terms of IPC, at least close enough to make using the GPD Win a good reference for the UDOO.

The only major difference I'd see is the integrated Intel Graphics. The XDOO is better than the GPD Win in this regard, so you could consider what the GPD Win is capable as a baseline. It might not be strong enough to make a difference in Dolphin, however.

Quote:And also the GPD win seems to perform well, getting almost 30 fps with gamecube emulations, so it could be assumed that the UDOO x86 ULTRA would perform better (maybe play most wii games at about 30 fps?)

However demanding a game is in Dolphin is on a game-by-game basis. You can't even say that Wii games in general are more demanding than Gamecube games. With mobile hardware like this, it's hard to say that it will play "most" games. If you have specific games you're interested in, looking up videos from the GPD Win would be the best way to see how it runs. You could do an expanded search by looking up other Dolphin videos running on similar Atoms or Pentiums.