Dolphin PC buying guide

[GodRays]

XP 64 is the worst operating system since winME.

Install windows 7 x64, or you'll regret it.

[ExtremeYoshiFan]

I am aware but I happen to have a spare key for XP 64 and I just need to know if the rig will fare well OS doesn't matter, eventually I would buy 7 64bit but my budget doesn't allow for that at the moment.

And Vista 32bit is worse, I will use what I have before I buy more, and If I install that first then I can use an upgrade disc instead, It would save money. I would only buy an upgraded Graphics card as of now if I needed it to get full speed for most games(mainly sunshine and Galaxy).

I want to know if the setup is good, not the OS.

[Ocean]

That combo deal expired, so unable to fully comment on it.. However, I wouldn't say a medium-lower range AMD dual core is the best option for Dolphin emulation, seeing as many games are quite CPU intensive and you will experience significant lag.

For that price, though, the external GPU you chose is an excellent choice. Should be enough for any game, will definitely be enough for Sunshine and Galaxy (galaxy should be at least 40-55fps IMO).

If you didn't buy it yet, post your budget and maybe we can find a better combo equivalent for the price.

[CacoFFF]

(03-06-2010, 10:59 AM)ExtremeYoshiFan Wrote: I am aware but I happen to have a spare key for XP 64 and I just need to know if the rig will fare well OS doesn't matter, eventually I would buy 7 64bit but my budget doesn't allow for that at the moment.

And Vista 32bit is worse, I will use what I have before I buy more, and If I install that first then I can use an upgrade disc instead, It would save money. I would only buy an upgraded Graphics card as of now if I needed it to get full speed for most games(mainly sunshine and Galaxy).

I want to know if the setup is good, not the OS.

Do you have silly web cams or printers?
If not, I don't see why you shouldn't install XP64 if you have a spare key.

Just keep it process free, and your framerates will be higher than most of other ppl with a similar rig to yours, especially on OpenGL.

[211989]

Thanks for this very good information, please if you have more info please tell us

[ExtremeYoshiFan]

Thanks for helping me find some hardware, I didn't buy exact parts, but I got same CPU, faster clocked 2gb RAM, and an ASUS board with a radeon 3000 onboard(hybrid crossfire x support was what I wanted when I bought this as I want a good potential upgrade as I wanted a micro atx board, with only one PCIe for GPU's), I get full speed with frameskip, I haven't bought a dedicated GPU, although I feel it will help if I use the hybrid crossfire x if I buy a GPU as i currently get about 20-30 fps in sunshine(but 60 vps at 100% speed), or do you always count vps as full speed or is it true fps that you meant by 55-60 fps, I don't care, just curious. BTW, my only xp64 problem was Wifi driver for linksys wusb54g, but was easily fixed by installing slightly altered ralink drivers.

I haven't tried galaxy, and FYI, I use Dolphin V2.0 64 bit.

I love multi-core, I have mainly used Intel CPU's(P4 and older really, a few duos but none mine) but some AMD(a laptop, and an old PC currently being used in a mame cabinet), and I am very pleased with what I bought(an AMD 2.8ghz regor Athlon II x2), and I will use their parts from now on, much cheaper, and very upgradeable as I have an AM3 slot on my mobo. Thanks for helping with my hardware. It is amazing compared to my other machines, I am amazed I get a full bootup in under 30 seconds(as in off to desktop, starting from when bios loads).

[mikespit1]

I just built my PC and for now I am satisfied with my 5770 and AMD Athlon II X3 OCed to 3.3GHz, however, since I play some CPU intensive games like GTA4, Dolphin, and probably Crysis 2 I'm wondering if I should upgrade since I only spent about $60 on the CPU. I'm torn wither to go for the new Phenom 1090T x6 or to just grab a X4 955 BE since they might come down in price. Is there any difference between those two when it comes to dolphin? I feel like the lack of L3 cache and lower clocks are killing my performance which usually hovers around ~45fps.

[ExtremeYoshiFan]

(04-20-2010, 03:08 AM)mikespit1 Wrote: I just built my PC and for now I am satisfied with my 5770 and AMD Athlon II X3 OCed to 3.3GHz, however, since I play some CPU intensive games like GTA4, Dolphin, and probably Crysis 2 I'm wondering if I should upgrade since I only spent about $60 on the CPU. I'm torn wither to go for the new Phenom 1090T x6 or to just grab a X4 955 BE since they might come down in price. Is there any difference between those two when it comes to dolphin? I feel like the lack of L3 cache and lower clocks are killing my performance which usually hovers around ~45fps.

See If you can at least unlock you Athlon first, It may not help in dolphin, but you will get a speed boost in everything else(although you may need to lower your overclock to get it to work unlocked).

[DarzgL]

The configs need some update IMO... HD4850, GTX260 and GTX285 are quite outdated...
An E8000 is a very bad choice nowadays since it's still quite expensive and less powerful than any X3 or X4 less expensive proc.
The motherboards are too expensive, $70 - 80 ones can do the job quite well for people who don't want overclocking, USB3 and such.

[Paladia]

In terms of FPS, I didn't really see any difference between XP 32-bit and Windows 7 (64-bit) even though I'm running a fairly modern system.