Since it's likely that as more people discover Dolphin for Android they are going to come running to the forums asking what phone they should buy to play when development is done, I thought I'd preempt some of those posts by giving a general overview of the two most relevant SoC vendors, the state of their current products, and what we can expect from future phones/tablets.
This is a purely hardware discussion, Actual software implementation will be platform dependent.
NOTE: This is an extrapolation using benchmarks from current CPUs and Dolphin Builds. All information is taken from a combination of Anandtech.com, Wikipedia, and 1st/2nd party Sources from Intel and Qualcomm. I've chosen Intel and Qualcomm platforms specifically due to their popularity and feature set.
NOTE: If you are currently capable of any gaming on dolphin I'd love some performance references. Feel free to pm me. Data will go towards posts like this.
TL;DR
-Drivers suck, getting better
-CPU performance better than you'd think, not there yet
-GPU performance problematic for a while
-Development should get easier rapidly
First thing!
-This is not about ARM vs x86
-Yes I will address ARM and x86 performance near the end
TL;DR: ARM vs x86 is not a concern you should have, Software stack vastly more important.
So where do we stand CPU wise?
-Both Krait and Atom are adopting "Big Core" architecture changes. Huge % IPC increase since Cortex A9
-Clock speeds have jumped from 1.5ghz to 2.5ghz quickly and continuing to climb. Likely cap similar to x86 Desktop.
-Atom and Krait have core scaling to adapt to variable core load
-Both have Intel "Big Core" like thermal management, Atom moreso
So what device will be able to smoothly Emulate Dolphin first?
-Platform dependent, likely Snapdragon devices due to development popularity
-CPU wise Atom is significantly faster with less power usage under load.
How are we doing GPU wise?
-Both Snapdragon and Bay Trail SoC support OpenGl ES 3.0
-As noted in the Dolphin Development Blog the GPU driver side of things is considerably worse, but there is some hope.
-Hardware standards support is good but both memory bandwidth and GPU throughput are underwhelming but improving fast.
-Adreno 330 roughtly 50% of HD 4000 performance.
Are there any Current Devices that have the hardware to Emulate Dolphin smoothly(if slow)?
-Yes-ish. As development has primarily been on Snapdragon based devices they are most likely. My Droid DNA is capable; clockspeed helps.
-Tablets will be better than phones due to TDP constraints. Aka, tablets will usually have higher CPU clocks, more memory bandwidth, and wider GPUs.
-In general, snapdragon S4 Pro and better(200,400,600,800,810)
Are there any Announced Devices that have the hardware to emulate Dolphin smoothly?
-No, but the 805 and 810 will be a big step up
!!!To sum up, it's going to be a while until we get even native(1x) internal resolution at fast emulation rates even for not demanding games. The good news is that mobile SoCs are reaching performance levels where active development is less painful. !!!
This is a purely hardware discussion, Actual software implementation will be platform dependent.
NOTE: This is an extrapolation using benchmarks from current CPUs and Dolphin Builds. All information is taken from a combination of Anandtech.com, Wikipedia, and 1st/2nd party Sources from Intel and Qualcomm. I've chosen Intel and Qualcomm platforms specifically due to their popularity and feature set.
NOTE: If you are currently capable of any gaming on dolphin I'd love some performance references. Feel free to pm me. Data will go towards posts like this.
TL;DR
-Drivers suck, getting better
-CPU performance better than you'd think, not there yet
-GPU performance problematic for a while
-Development should get easier rapidly
First thing!
-This is not about ARM vs x86
-Yes I will address ARM and x86 performance near the end
TL;DR: ARM vs x86 is not a concern you should have, Software stack vastly more important.
So where do we stand CPU wise?
-Both Krait and Atom are adopting "Big Core" architecture changes. Huge % IPC increase since Cortex A9
-Clock speeds have jumped from 1.5ghz to 2.5ghz quickly and continuing to climb. Likely cap similar to x86 Desktop.
-Atom and Krait have core scaling to adapt to variable core load
-Both have Intel "Big Core" like thermal management, Atom moreso
Spoiler:
-Platform dependent, likely Snapdragon devices due to development popularity
-CPU wise Atom is significantly faster with less power usage under load.
How are we doing GPU wise?
-Both Snapdragon and Bay Trail SoC support OpenGl ES 3.0
-As noted in the Dolphin Development Blog the GPU driver side of things is considerably worse, but there is some hope.
-Hardware standards support is good but both memory bandwidth and GPU throughput are underwhelming but improving fast.
-Adreno 330 roughtly 50% of HD 4000 performance.
Spoiler:
-Yes-ish. As development has primarily been on Snapdragon based devices they are most likely. My Droid DNA is capable; clockspeed helps.
-Tablets will be better than phones due to TDP constraints. Aka, tablets will usually have higher CPU clocks, more memory bandwidth, and wider GPUs.
-In general, snapdragon S4 Pro and better(200,400,600,800,810)
Are there any Announced Devices that have the hardware to emulate Dolphin smoothly?
-No, but the 805 and 810 will be a big step up
Spoiler: