Dolphin not reading any games for no reason! (Solved)

[DJBarry004]

Well, and what does the driver info says? Does it tells the supported OpenGL version?

[Edvon7]

In DSP settings, under basic, I just see Backend: OpenGL and Software Renderer. That's it. Nowhere else do I see information on 'driver info'. Help me out here cause I saw some pictures on google and Windows has an 'Adapter' setting under Backend. I know that is normal for Mac's though.

[DJBarry004]

Do you have access to the options of the Intel HD drivers?

[Edvon7]

No I don't.

[pauldacheez]

DJBarry004: There are absolutely zero GPU driver options on OS X – seriously, you have to use a separate app to manually switch between integrated and dedicated GPUs, and you have to edit system files to prevent a dedicated GPU from downclocking itself. If you need to know the supported GL version for a specific GPU on a specific version of OS X, either ask the user to install OpenGL Extensions Viewer off the App Store or, even better, use this handy chart Apple has: https://developer.apple.com/opengl/capabilities/ Spoiler: his supports GL 3.3 and no further.

Edvon7: There are numerous OS X-specific Intel HD 3000 driver bugs that prevent current versions of Dolphin from running well on it, notably a recent one (that may or may not be Yosemite-specific) that makes it drop down to software rendering for things as simple as the water in Metroid Prime, among other things in other games. (You can notice when this happens pretty easily – the game freezes for a second or two, then starts running at <10 fps, and there's a CVMCompiler process taking up 100% CPU.) I'd recommend running Dolphin on Windows or Linux if you want reasonable performance on current builds. (It'll be even faster than older builds on OS X, no kidding.)

You also might have noticed that audio under HLE sounds completely different at low speeds between 3.5 and 4.0+. If you think it sounds nicer in 3.5, keep in mind that the reason for that also breaks an immeasurable amount of shit – 90% of the random game crashes you get on 3.5 are the fault of HLE. That was thoroughly fixed in 4.0 and above. Yes, the stuttering is annoying (protip: try the OpenAL audio backend), but that's the tradeoff for not breaking shit.

[DJBarry004]

@pauldacheez: Never heard about that chart (thanks for letting me know, though).

[Edvon7]

I also have option of "software renderer" not just "OpenGL". What is up with that?

Also, thanks for the info on Doplhin 4.0, but I've tried everything and so far Doplhin 3.5 is still better (at least for Wind Waker). I haven't had a single crash with HLE on Dolphin 3.5, it just performs really slowly at some specific parts in specific locations in Wind Waker (at around 40-60% at times). That's about it. Once I wasn't able to save when I started doing 'save game states', but I quickly fixed it and I haven't had a problem ever since. I also only have this Mac laptop, so as of right now, Linux or PC are not viable options for me.