SMG and SMG 2 audio problems using LLE

[Polcari]

Hello, im new to this forum but ive been reading it for a week now, trying to find a solution to my problem, the thing is... everytime i run super mario galaxy with HLE audio, the game runs perfect appart from the music ( yeah i know lots of people have this problem and fixed it using LLE audio) that after a few minutes it stops, so i came here and start reading alot of topics about this, tried to use LLE, followed tons of instructions ( enable this ,disable that, etc) and the thing is that the music works but it slows down my game and lags alot the music itself... and yes im using the last version of Dolphin, tried all versions from 3.5 to 4.0.1 ( seems to work a little better on 3.5). My system specs are :
Windows 7 ultimate x64
Cpu:amd fx 8150 overclocked to 4.8 ghz
Graphic card: Nvidia GTX 660 OC
Motherboard: Asus crosshair V formula
Memory: Vengeance 8gb 1600 mhz
Hard disk: samsung ssd 120 gb
I really hope that someone having a similar system to mine that can help me with this issue!

[Link_to_the_past]

(10-25-2013, 03:53 AM)Polcari Wrote: Hello, im new to this forum but ive been reading it for a week now, trying to find a solution to my problem, the thing is... everytime i run super mario galaxy with HLE audio, the game runs perfect appart from the music ( yeah i know lots of people have this problem and fixed it using LLE audio) that after a few minutes it stops, so i came here and start reading alot of topics about this, tried to use LLE, followed tons of instructions ( enable this ,disable that, etc) and the thing is that the music works but it slows down my game and lags alot the music itself... and yes im using the last version of Dolphin, tried all versions from 3.5 to 4.0.1 ( seems to work a little better on 3.5). My system specs are :
Windows 7 ultimate x64
Cpu:amd fx 8150 overclocked to 4.8 ghz
Graphic card: Nvidia GTX 660 OC
Motherboard: Asus crosshair V formula
Memory: Vengeance 8gb 1600 mhz
Hard disk: samsung ssd 120 gb
I really hope that someone having a similar system to mine that can help me with this issue!

With 4.0.1 use opengl with vertex streaming hack and lle on thread with every other setting default. If that doesn't help, only switching to an Intel system will help you, since a haswell cpu 4670k for example can match and probably surpass your cpu at stock clocks without any overclocking in dolphin, and if you overclock you will have zero issues. I have a 2500k sandybridge at 4,2 and have almost constant 60fps with lle using the settings i suggested above.

[Polcari]

(10-25-2013, 04:27 AM)Link_to_the_past Wrote: With 4.0.1 use opengl with vertex streaming hack and lle on thread with every other setting default. If that doesn't help, only switching to an Intel system will help you, since a haswell cpu 4670k for example can match and probably surpass your cpu at stock clocks without any overclocking in dolphin, and if you overclock you will have zero issues. I have a 2500k sandybridge at 4,2 and have almost constant 60fps with lle using the settings i suggested above.

with the options you said i have around 50 to 54 fps but the sound keeps lagging as usual, and my cpu is already overclocked from 3.6 to 4.8 and has 8 cores, i can play battlefield 4 ( beta) with ultra settings with 48 -50 stable fps and i cant play this emulator decently when i enable the LLe sound -.- ( hard to believe)...

[DJBarry004]

PC games doesn´t have anything to do with Dolphin. And you will be able to use DSP-LLE in Thread since you have more than two cores.

[rokclimb15]

This is symptomatic of a CPU that can't accomplish enough per clock cycle to keep up. Even at 4.8GHz AMD's Bulldozer architecture only accomplishes about 60% of the work of Haswell. If you can push that OC to 5.0GHz you might find it close enough to keep up.

[Shonumi]

SMG 1 or 2 + LLE audio are some of the most CPU intensive scenarios for Dolphin. There's no getting around the fact that only heavily overclocked Intel CPUs (such as the 2500K, 3570K, etc) have been able to consistently maintain fullspeed with SMG1 or 2 under LLE audio. AMD's CPU don't have a high enough single-threaded IPC to do so. That's just the way AMD designs their microarchitecture; single-threaded performance isn't particularly emphasized.

Modern PC games tend to rely greatly on the GPU for most of their performance. Emulators, on the other hand, generally rely a lot on the CPU. You can find cases reversing the previous statements, but not usually.

Now, you can use what's called the "VBeam Trick" (google "dolphin emu VBeam trick" or something to that effect). The VBeam Speed hack in Dolphin under LLE audio may allow the audio at least to play fullspeed, even if the FPS is less than fullspeed. 50~54 FPS under LLE audio is quite playable imo, but that's subjective. It's better than nothing, however. A more desperate attempt at running SMG1 or 2 fullspeed under LLE audio would be to dump the PAL versions (which run at 50 FPS as their fullspeed frame rates). Sounds crazy (and it is) but cheaper than buying a new mobo + CPU.

[Polcari]

(10-25-2013, 11:51 AM)Shonumi Wrote: SMG 1 or 2 + LLE audio are some of the most CPU intensive scenarios for Dolphin. There's no getting around the fact that only heavily overclocked Intel CPUs (such as the 2500K, 3570K, etc) have been able to consistently maintain fullspeed with SMG1 or 2 under LLE audio. AMD's CPU don't have a high enough single-threaded IPC to do so. That's just the way AMD designs their microarchitecture; single-threaded performance isn't particularly emphasized.

Modern PC games tend to rely greatly on the GPU for most of their performance. Emulators, on the other hand, generally rely a lot on the CPU. You can find cases reversing the previous statements, but not usually.

Now, you can use what's called the "VBeam Trick" (google "dolphin emu VBeam trick" or something to that effect). The VBeam Speed hack in Dolphin under LLE audio may allow the audio at least to play fullspeed, even if the FPS is less than fullspeed. 50~54 FPS under LLE audio is quite playable imo, but that's subjective. It's better than nothing, however. A more desperate attempt at running SMG1 or 2 fullspeed under LLE audio would be to dump the PAL versions (which run at 50 FPS as their fullspeed frame rates). Sounds crazy (and it is) but cheaper than buying a new mobo + CPU.

ok thanks for the info, so as far as i get it, the problem relies on my cpu. another question is, why does my game runs perfect at 60-63 fps using HLE sound? i tested both zeldas for wii and both work great on HLE and the game emulation is at 100% full time the sound works great aswell, even SMG on HLE works great with graphics maxed out i run with constant 60 fps, the sound works aswell, the problem is just the music that stops after 5 minutes or so, why dont dolphin developers try to fix this problem on HLE audio since its less demanding on the cpu? Ive been reading that most people have this problem, unless they have a intel gaming rig with the latest intel cpus, otherwise they cant play this game and others properly. Not all of us have the possibility to have an intel gaming rig, so what makes sense its to make an emulator that works great for everybody in all the cpus ( minimum 4 cores ofc) so that most of the comunity can enjoy playing wii games on computer. Im not a developer, i have no idea how this works but what i see is:
HLE= works great in older and new cpus appart from a few sound issues in some games, that i think wouldnt be that hard to fix
LLE= works bad in most of cpus, only people with the latest intel cpus can play on it with constant 90% to 100% emulation.
I think the solution its not hard to see, if HLE had their sound issues fixed, alot more people in this comunity could actually play this emulator at 100%.
btw sry for my english.

[Link_to_the_past]

If it were that easy it would have been already done don't you think? And the only guy that managed to fix hle audio for most games apart from those that use zelda ucode (like mario galaxy and a few other nintendo titles) have left the project. So don't hold your hopes up for that...

[Shonumi]

Polcari Wrote:why does my game runs perfect at 60-63 fps using HLE sound?

That's due to the fact that HLE audio is vastly less CPU intensive than LLE audio. With LLE audio, you're emulating an entire co-processor (the GC/Wii DSP) step-by-step, cycle-for-cycle, performing every single instruction on your computer that a real DSP would on the game console. With HLE, you're emulating the large-scale behavior of the DSP rather each individual instruction. There's a lot more your system has to compute under LLE audio than HLE audio.

Polcari Wrote:why dont dolphin developers try to fix this problem on HLE audio since its less demanding on the cpu?

The developers work on what interests them. No one on the team is interested in fixing the Zelda ucode HLE implementation.

Polcari Wrote:i think wouldnt be that hard to fix

Polcari Wrote:Im not a developer, i have no idea how this works

I'm not saying I don't share your opinion (it would be great if everyone could play SMG with HLE audio) but unless you've looked at the code or have some familiarity with the current Zelda ucode HLE implementation, you can't really say anything about how difficult fixing it would be. I've actually studied Dolphin's Zelda ucode HLE implementation quite a bit (trying to implement HLE audio in another GC emulator) but what someone really needs to do is examine how a real DSP treats the ucode on real hardware and base any HLE code off of that. I've said in the past I'd be willing to do this, but I haven't exactly found the time away from other projects.

[Polcari]

(10-26-2013, 01:35 AM)Shonumi Wrote: I'm not saying I don't share your opinion (it would be great if everyone could play SMG with HLE audio) but unless you've looked at the code or have some familiarity with the current Zelda ucode HLE implementation, you can't really say anything about how difficult fixing it would be. I've actually studied Dolphin's Zelda ucode HLE implementation quite a bit (trying to implement HLE audio in another GC emulator) but what someone really needs to do is examine how a real DSP treats the ucode on real hardware and base any HLE code off of that. I've said in the past I'd be willing to do this, but I haven't exactly found the time away from other projects.

I understand ur point of view... i guess waiting for someone to fix it, buy a new rig or become a developer myself (unlikely) are the only solutions xD.
Im quite sad that with a emulator like this one, the sound, is the main problem, appart from that, this comunity and developers did a good job so far.

Anyways thanks for the replies on my post, at least i get to know what are the real problems behind the audio issues .