New computer

01-29-2011, 08:26 AM #1

I am buying a new computer, and one of the things I want to make sure it can do is run dolphin well, my price range is about 500-600 dollars, this is what I'm thinking atm, would it run dolphin well? Thanks!

Amd Phenom II 6 Core 1100T 3.3GHz

Ati Raedon HD 5870 2GB

remedy2 · 01-29-2011, 08:39 AM #2

(01-29-2011, 08:26 AM)Jake55111 Wrote: I am buying a new computer, and one of the things I want to make sure it can do is run dolphin well, my price range is about 500-600 dollars, this is what I'm thinking atm, would it run dolphin well? Thanks!

Amd Phenom II 6 Core 1100T 3.3GHz

Ati Raedon HD 5870 2GB

You'd do better looking into Intel's sandy bridge. 6 cores isn't going to help with dolphin (dolphin uses 2 cores max), raw processing and memory speed will. Sandy is more efficient than the Phenoms. If you really need 6 cores you will have to overclock the Phenom to get good FPS on dolphin. I have found my sandy bridge able to hit 100% FPS in almost every game on dolphin I have tried.

**Starscream** · 01-29-2011, 08:44 AM #3

The Phenom II will work just fine for the majority of games.

**Squall Leonhart** · 01-29-2011, 08:44 AM #4

wait for AM3+.

01-29-2011, 09:06 AM #5

(01-29-2011, 08:39 AM)remedy2 Wrote: You'd do better looking into Intel's sandy bridge. 6 cores isn't going to help with dolphin (dolphin uses 2 cores max), raw processing and memory speed will. Sandy is more efficient than the Phenoms. If you really need 6 cores you will have to overclock the Phenom to get good FPS on dolphin. I have found my sandy bridge able to hit 100% FPS in almost every game on dolphin I have tried.

Do you have a suggestion for which Sandy Bridge processor I should get?

**NaturalViolence** · (This post was last modified: 01-29-2011, 10:14 AM by NaturalViolence.)

As said above either wait for AM3+ bulldozer cpus later this year or buy a sandy bridge now.

Quote:Do you have a suggestion for which Sandy Bridge processor I should get?

The 2500 and 2500k sandy bridge cpus are great for dolphin. Buying a 2600k for $100 more would be a waste since the only difference between them is that HT is enabled on the 2600k and disabled on the 2500k. And dolphin (along with most applications) won't benefit from HT in any way.

remedy2 · 01-29-2011, 10:02 AM #7

(01-29-2011, 09:06 AM)Jake55111 Wrote:
(01-29-2011, 08:39 AM)remedy2 Wrote: You'd do better looking into Intel's sandy bridge. 6 cores isn't going to help with dolphin (dolphin uses 2 cores max), raw processing and memory speed will. Sandy is more efficient than the Phenoms. If you really need 6 cores you will have to overclock the Phenom to get good FPS on dolphin. I have found my sandy bridge able to hit 100% FPS in almost every game on dolphin I have tried.

Do you have a suggestion for which Sandy Bridge processor I should get?

Well I like the 2500k because it is only ~$200. You can go with the 2600k but you will be paying $100 more. Either one of those will leave you with room to overclock to 4.3GHz and above on air.

01-29-2011, 11:28 AM #8

Okay, I decided on the 2500K is there any better graphics card for dolphin than the Raedon HD 5870?

remedy2 · 01-29-2011, 12:08 PM #9

(01-29-2011, 09:58 AM)NaturalViolence Wrote: As said above either wait for AM3+ bulldozer cpus later this year or buy a sandy bridge now.

Quote:Do you have a suggestion for which Sandy Bridge processor I should get?

The 2500 and 2500k sandy bridge cpus are great for dolphin. Buying a 2600k for $100 more would be a waste since the only difference between them is that HT is enabled on the 2600k and disabled on the 2500k. And dolphin (along with most applications) won't benefit from HT in any way.

Right but the 2600k will win with benchmarking apps and will increase your e-penis size a bit Smile

. Practically you are right, I just couldn't see the point in spending the extra $100 for the HT when there wasn't an app I could think of that would use it. Perhaps video encoding but I do that rarely.

**NaturalViolence** · 01-29-2011, 03:08 PM **#10**

Quote:Okay, I decided on the 2500K is there any better graphics card for dolphin than the Raedon HD 5870?

Well the 6950, 6970, GTX 570, GTX 580 are all faster cards but anything past a 5870/GTX 470/GT 560 is overkill for dolphin unless you need to use 9xSSAA. A 5870 is sufficient for 3x efb scale + 4xSSAA in any game but 9xSSAA + 3x efb scale will still be too demanding for it in some games. 4xSSAA seems to virtually eliminate all aliasing to the point where 9xSSAA offers almost no improvement though (in older revisions, some people are having problems getting 4xSSAA to work properly in newer revisions).