Dolphin PC buying guide

[NaturalViolence]

#5 for sure. Only one with a good enough cpu to ensure fullspeed in most places. The video card is a bit weak so you'll have to keep efb scale at 1x.

[jeffb8810]

I've been debating on either core i3 or phenom II X2 for an htpc budget build capable of playing dolphin. according to benchmarks and charts found at http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/desktop-cpu-charts-2010/benchmarks,112.html the phenom II X2 5XX series processors are real close to i3 performance and in some rare cases outperform. the phenom II x2 has black editions for cheap (meaning easier overclocks) - namely phenom II x2 555 BE for $89 at newegg and they also have a slight probability of unlocking additional cores (but dont buy it based on that possibility alone).

Its up to you if you want to spend the extra $40 on the core i3 maybe its a good investment? intel has already moved away from the lga 1156 socket to 1155 for sandy bridge, while amd wont be introducing their new processor till summer for the AM3+ socket. I believe AM3+ motherboards are backwards compatible to AM3 cpus but they are not out yet or at least many of them.

What i do suggest is you do not buy the core i3 21xx series sandy bridge as you cannot overclock it at all meaning a well overclocked amd phenom II will outperform it. only reason i can see getting the i3 sandybridge is to later upgrade to an i5 or i7 2500k or 2600k when you have the money.

I'm still undecided on my part at the moment but i have plenty of time. might just wait till amd releases their bulldozer cpus and then reevaluate price/performance again.

[NaturalViolence]

A core i3, whether it is a clarkdale based on sandy birdge based version, is just flat out superior to a phenom II X2 in every way. If they are running at the same clock rates it will destroy a phenom II X2 in an vector intensive application (like dolphin). The only way a phenom II X2 could be considered a better choice (other than the fact that it costs less) is if you managed to unlock the extra cores which would make it outperform the i3 in heavily multithreaded applications.

Also clarkdale based i3s overclock way better than phenom IIs. And it's safe to assume that the sandy bridge i3s will overclock even better than them.

[jeffb8810]

No the core i3 sandy bridge does not overclock, im trying to find the article i read but it was written recently and according to that the i3 sandy bridges are completely locked and have no turbo boost. and if you read carefully i said a well overclocked phenom II will outperform the core i3 sandy bridge i didn't say a phenom II x2 per say although i would like to see some results of a 4ghz phenom 2 x2 up against the core i3 2100 or 2120 at 3.1/3.3 ghz respectively.

edit: heres the article http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/sandy-bridge-core-i7-2600k-core-i5-2500k,2833-9.html

edit 2: back on topic though, you are right though the core i3 540 build is the superior one and being only slightly more expensive than an amd build with better performance per $$. my only problem is you are then stuck with lga 1156. how long will intel release and price drop processors on that socket i dont know but i do know the sandy bridge procs are here now and on a different socket (1155 lol). its like buying a core2quad when corei7 was first coming out in my opinion.

granted amd's new cpus due out in summer (supposedly lol) will use a different socket too but googling am3+ socket motherboards you can find some already being sold, which leads me to wonder would buying an am3+ mobo + a phenom II now (if am3+ is backwards compatible) yeild a better upgrade option for the long run. to make it even simpler, would the max performance you can get out of socket lga 1156 (which intel has already moved on from) in the future beat the max performance you can get out of socket AM3+ in the future, and at what cost $$.

edit3: woops lol i looked more closely at the so called am3+ motherboards being sold online Im not too sure they are real am3+ boards... might have to wait till summer for that too.

[NaturalViolence]

am3+ cpus will be backwards compatible with am3 motherboards but I'm not sure if it goes the other way around, I think it does.

Also I can guarantee you that as far as dolphin is concerned (and other applications that rely on high memory throughput, cache throughput, and vector flop/s) a current gen i3 @ 3.0GHz will still destroy a phenom II @ 4.0GHz easily. They are just flat out better cpus.

Frankly as stupid as this sounds I don't care what any benchmark/review says. Having used an i3 540 firsthand and compared it against a friends phenom II 955 setup I cannot in good conscience recommend a phenom II over an i3 to anyone. Anyone can feel free to call me biased at this point but that's how I feel.

[jeffb8810]

I'll take your word for it then. Ill definitely change my thoughts on AMD for the htpc build. Ill probably just wait untill bulldozer then see comparisons. unless amd pushes it back too far then ill go with core i3. possibly even core i3 2100 even though they dont overclock its the same exact price and ill be able to upgrade to higher end sandy bridge cpus later.

[fregg]

sorry for my English evil
i speek spanish

Which graphical card they recommend me to play dolphin

[Duke Nukem]

(04-13-2011, 01:00 PM)fregg Wrote: sorry for my English evil
i speek spanish

Which graphical card they recommend me to play dolphin

*Checks signature*

XFX hd 5670 1 gb ddr5 dx11

I think that the card you have now is totally OK for playing Dolphin.

[dannzen]

(04-13-2011, 02:15 PM)Gabriel Belmont Wrote:

(04-13-2011, 01:00 PM)fregg Wrote: sorry for my English evil
i speek spanish

Which graphical card they recommend me to play dolphin

*Checks signature*

XFX hd 5670 1 gb ddr5 dx11
I think that the card you have now is totally OK for playing Dolphin.

your cpu could be in some games the problem...
you should for full hd at least got 3.6ghz(i7) or 4.0ghz(amd)

[RaptorZX3]

even a GTS 250 will do the trick...