Some Performance Questions From a new user

[Mylesg13]

Hi Everyone - I've just recently started using Dolphin and I have things set up reasonably well but I do get a bit of lag here and there and I'm looking for some advice as how to best set things up for my hardware.

First off here is my system setup:
- OS: Win 7 - 64 Bit
- CPU: Intel i7 - 2600k Quad Core
- RAM: 8 GB at 1600 MHz
- HD: Western Digital VelociRaptor (WD6000HLHX) 600GB SATA 6Gb/s
- GPU: Radeon 6970
- mobo: Gigabyte - Z68 UD5 board

Should be relatively beefy enough to run things I would think but let me know if anything looks weaker then it should be.

I'm currently using build 7687 - let me know if there are better builds I should use instead of that one.

Games I'm trying are - New Super Mario Bros, DKCR, Smash Brawl, Zelda: TP (GC Version).

Things generally run at full speed 90% of the time but I do get random bits of lag here and there in all the games which is a little bit annoying. In DKCR I get much poorer speeds - the levels generally start around 60 and then drop to 40 fps mid way through.

The settings I'm using are the following - let me know what I should be using for these though:

Sound Settings
- DSP LLE (I was using HLE as its much faster but was getting too much distortion and weird glitches with that sound). Is DSP LLE primarily a hit on the processor or does it impact other components as well?
- Audio throttle is off and I have Lock LLE to core checked

Main Settings
- Framelimit - Auto
- Lock threads to cores - checked
- Dual core enabled
- idle skipping enabled
- Frame skip = 0
- JIT Recompiller - Recommended

Graphics
- Aspect Ratio - Auto (I had this 16:9 before but for some reason that makes Zelda:TP run at like 10 FPS)
- DirectX9 (Tried DX11 but it was pretty glitchy with some texture rendering)
- Res 1920x1200
- Internal Res - 2x
- Vsync unchecked
- Per pixel lighting checked
- Ani. Filtering 2X
- 4xSSAA
- Skip EFB access to CPU checked
- Ignore format changes checked
- EFB Copies - Virtual checked (Ram not checked)
- Ex. Frame buffer disabled
- Disable fog checked
- Open MP Texture decoder - checked

I think thats everything - anything I didn't mention is unchecked.

Anyway - looking at whatever settings, build, etc is most optimal for my hardware set up that will give me solid speed with good visual quality and any other tips you can provide.

Thanks guys for your time and help on this and let me know if you need any other details

[vortextk]

I say use d3d11, not d9, unless the game specifically runs much weirder/worse in 11. Also don't use 4x ssaa if you are using d9 because it doesn't really work anyway, just up the internal resolution if you have to use d9(d11 AA works fine). For the texture problems, like the green/purple miscolored areas if that's what you mean, use version 3.0 and d11. I'd also up the resolution of what you're running anyway as I never go under 3x, sometimes 4x native with my card and while still rather useable, crossfire for regular pc games, it's a lot older and slower than yours.

The most important bit about your computer I think is processor speed, is that processor stock? People get like 4.8ghz with amazing cooling, you should be probably see 4ghz+ easy even with a regular cooler but you should definitely look into that as processor speed is probably the most important thing outside of settings. To me it looks like you have too much checked for lower systems like disable fog and stuff, I understand where you're coming from if you're getting slowdown, but it seems overkill for a system that should kind of eat up anything on dolphin.

I use 7671 mainly and you can see my specs down below, I also have settings for each of my youtube videos of dolphin games if you want to see just for comparison sake, you can click the link or sig. Definitely check the threads for specific games where it seems too slow, maybe they're just rough games(like the mario galaxy games) or maybe there is something small to check/uncheck that solves a lot of performance issues.

[Mylesg13]

(08-11-2011, 08:45 AM)vortextk Wrote: I say use d3d11, not d9, unless the game specifically runs much weirder/worse in 11. Also don't use 4x ssaa if you are using d9 because it doesn't really work anyway, just up the internal resolution if you have to use d9(d11 AA works fine). For the texture problems, like the green/purple miscolored areas if that's what you mean, use version 3.0 and d11. I'd also up the resolution of what you're running anyway as I never go under 3x, sometimes 4x native with my card and while still rather useable, crossfire for regular pc games, it's a lot older and slower than yours.

The most important bit about your computer I think is processor speed, is that processor stock? People get like 4.8ghz with amazing cooling, you should be probably see 4ghz+ easy even with a regular cooler but you should definitely look into that as processor speed is probably the most important thing outside of settings. To me it looks like you have too much checked for lower systems like disable fog and stuff, I understand where you're coming from if you're getting slowdown, but it seems overkill for a system that should kind of eat up anything on dolphin.

I use 7671 mainly and you can see my specs down below, I also have settings for each of my youtube videos of dolphin games if you want to see just for comparison sake, you can click the link or sig. Definitely check the threads for specific games where it seems too slow, maybe they're just rough games(like the mario galaxy games) or maybe there is something small to check/uncheck that solves a lot of performance issues.

Overclocked to 4.0 ghz and things are much improved - plus the CPU is still quite cool - surprised at how easily this thing overclocks probably wont go much higher since I'm just using stock cooling and I dont want to risk it too much.

v 3.0 seems to run a bit better as well. I have DKCR running almost 100% at 60 at all times with really good image quality. - I just get minor dips to 57-58 fps occasionally which causes the audio to skip a tiny bit which is mildly annoying... probably going to play with settings a bit more to see if I can tweak that. How does audio throttle work exactly - should I be using that instead of the frame limit to fix the minor sound skip issues? The graphics lag isn't really noticeable at all - the occasional skip in music/audio definitely is noticeable

Anyway - thanks for the advice - very helpful.

[vortextk]

Well I have sound issues on almost everything, mostly just scratch/blips. Sometimes pretty rare, sometimes constant but usually very small/short. Say in Zelda TP, the first dungeon has a lot of drum beat stuff. Most of the low(pitch) bass drum beats would static just a bit. It was a very small distorted sound, but just constant the entire time playing through the dungeon.

Of what I've read, sound might not get much better outside of using LLE, which requires dumping the sound files on an actual wii. It eats up more cpu power so I haven't bothered as with my computer I'm usually pushing stable framerates with as much image quality as I can, but you might have enough of a speed buffer to try it out. There are threads on how to do that around here.

Did you up your resolution and maybe add AA? Depending on graphics backend atleast. You should be able to.

[Mylesg13]

I'm actually using LLE for sound right now and its working fine but it definitely ups the CPU strain substantially though. I actually get 0 lag at all with HLE for sound.. but then I get some nasty distortion in some games - DKCR is especially bad - so LLE seems like the better option of the two. Using audio throttle instead of by frames seems to have fixed most of the minor sound skips I was getting earlier so I'm pretty happy with things now.

Hugely impressed with this emulator by the way - very cool to be able to play all these games at hi-res - smash bros and DKCR look gorgeous.

[vortextk]

Yeah it can be bad depending on the game. Tales of symphonia seems to be awful with hle. The games I've tried for the most part sound fine, just have those little annoying blips here and there. I'm as impressed with it as you are, being kind of disgusted with some games on my tv now...atleast gamecube. Wii games looked mostly ok, but rarely great.