Many people ask me how i could play so many GameCube and Wii games smoothy with the bad specs of my LapTop...
Then after a lot of reseaches i did a tutorial for help not only low specs users, but even high specs that don't are playing his favorite games smoothy yet...
This tutorial was made for Windows users, but i think that various things can be used in Linux too.
Somebody can help me to change the name of the windows commands and text parts in " " from portuguease to english?
1) When you run dolphin, run only dolphin and no other program, nor paralel processes that don't are very important to Dolphin run. It's strongly recomentaded that you close even anti-virus programs.
For some games/PC, maybe a restart for system before play Dolphin will be usefull too, since liberate too much RAM for you!
2) Enter in notepad, write the following code:
TASKKILL /IM EXPLORER.EXE /F
start "Boost for Dolphin" /wait /high /max Dolphin.exe
start explorer.exe
Rather than .txt, save as .bat
Then put this file under the same directory as you extracted Dolphin.
When you will play dolphin, rather than click at the Dolphin.exe, click on the .bat that you created.
3) If you're using Win7 or vista and have a pendriver, insert it on a USB port and chose "Dedicate this device to ReadyBoost" or something like that (thanks Jaime).
4)Download the last version of the GAME BOOSTER...
Install and Run this program before run dolphin.
It's interesting to use game defrag too, then click on it and choose the dolphin directory to defrag.
Then choose in main menu "Switch to game mode" and choose ALL THE PROCESSES (except windows explorer) to close.
You can enter in 'options->edit service list' and put more unnecessary services in the list, to gamebooster close them when he is in game mode. After use of dolphin, you can enter in Game booster and select "Back to normal mode!"
5) At the moment, in my tests, the best OS for run dolphin is Windows seven x64 - (for me, i tested various OS and this was the best for me, cos i think that the experience is vary too much, for each machine specs). If you have a x64 processor and want to play dolphin, you can install this operational system, so you can use the x64 dolphin, that have some features running underground to acelerate the use with x64 processors. But have people that claim that XP are good too, saying that is a more "economical" OS for the PC. Give us a feedback, if you could test both, after you test with all the tips of this post!
6)Mantain your OS and hardware drivers even updated. If you are using Windows seven, go to "control panel->device manager" and check if all of the hardware are updated. For update of the OS, go to "control panel->windows update" (thanks Jaime).
Be sure that you have using the drivers developed for your OS, I was using drivers for vista in my win7 and see a huge difference of performance when i installed the actual win7 x64 drivers (if the drivers are from vista, win7 will update too,but you'll stay with the wrong drivers updated only and not the right driver)
But sometimes, the best driver not will be the newest. If you experiment a drop down of speed with a new driver, revert the drive to old version!
7) Ever use the DirectX plugin. Today it's have the same compatibility of the OpenGL plugin and runs much more faster!
8) Spellforce created compilations that make use of SSE3, SSSE3 and SSE4 instructions for Intel processors. These compilations had better benchmarks than the normal compilations. But only use these versions if they are not <10 releases. We strongly reccomend that you make use of most recent SVN verion for Dolphin, since this receive perceptible improvemnts every day!
9) Go to your video card confurations and choose that that speed and performance is better than "quality" (quality for me is to run smoothy )
10) Make use of Advanced System care, CCLeaner or any program to clean you registry constantly!
Ever defrag your HD and maintain your system clean!
It's important that you keep your PC away from viruses too!
11) If you are using Vista or Win7, just desabling Aero Glass will give you a extra speed. For me, i aways use the classic Windows theme, without wallpaper, just black solid color (not only give me more performance but it's visual clean too), but you don't need to be so radical, only using a theme without Aero glass will be good (since you will play you nor will see the windows, then, why spend resources of your Pc justto show aero glass?)
12) The best configuration for most of games is:
Dolphin configuration:
check only:
General:
-Enable Dual core (if you have a dual core processor, of course)
-Enable Idle skipping
-Enable cheats (optional, check only if wat to use AR codes)
-Framelimit: 60 (even you play PAL games-only some of them need to put in 50. For me, that i wat to play a little bit more fast, i leave, generally in 70. Auto is a pesada option. I never use auto)
-Hle the IPL
-JIT recompiler (some games run better in JITil. Never use the Interpreter if you want to gain speed)
-Disable use panic handlers
Gamecube:
leave the default
Wii:
-Use EuRGB60 mode (pal60) - I'm doing a exaustinve test to see if this is really necessary!
DX9 Graphics Plugin:
Graphics card: choose your better graphic card here
Fullscreen: 640x480
windowed: 640x480 (see the next itens to you see how to play games in fullscreen, but the cost for processing is the same as the windowed, but for that work you have to leave these resolutions)
Enhancements:
All unchecked
Advanced:
-Disable fog (some speed gain in games such Luigi`s mansion)
-Enable EFB copy-> to textures (if you'll play any game that the use of this don't makes graphics differences, iit`s better to leave this unchecked, since this comsume some specs)
DSP-HLE
only check the -Enable HLE audio
If audio isn`t good, go to thread of the game in this forum and choose the config for this game.
Of course, some games will need that you use texture cache, EFB to RAM, CPU->EFB access(wario world, for exemple), enable XFB (megaman 9, for example).
This configuration is the one of spend less resources if the game that you want to play show any problems, try to change some configs (look at the forum if the game have a thread).
13) I know a very smart way to play dolphin in full screen without wasting a lot of resources of your PC: After you enter in dolphin, choose fullscreen, run a game, do [alt]+[tab] until you reach the main screen for dolphin. stop. The main screen will be in the resolution of 640x400. Go to directx9 plugin config and uncheck the fullscreen. Choose a game and it will run in window, but filling the screen. Smart trick, don't is?
14) Frameskip:
after do all of that, test the game. If this is not in a good speed yet, close the dolphin, choose 1 or 2 frameskip and play the game again. The gain of speed is considerable! (but you have to choose the frameskip every time that you run dolphin, since it don`t load the last frameskip check yet - please devs, look at this issue)
Sorry for my bad english...
Anyone have more tips to runs well slow games or in gain speed in crap PCs?
Then after a lot of reseaches i did a tutorial for help not only low specs users, but even high specs that don't are playing his favorite games smoothy yet...
This tutorial was made for Windows users, but i think that various things can be used in Linux too.
Somebody can help me to change the name of the windows commands and text parts in " " from portuguease to english?
1) When you run dolphin, run only dolphin and no other program, nor paralel processes that don't are very important to Dolphin run. It's strongly recomentaded that you close even anti-virus programs.
For some games/PC, maybe a restart for system before play Dolphin will be usefull too, since liberate too much RAM for you!
2) Enter in notepad, write the following code:
TASKKILL /IM EXPLORER.EXE /F
start "Boost for Dolphin" /wait /high /max Dolphin.exe
start explorer.exe
Rather than .txt, save as .bat
Then put this file under the same directory as you extracted Dolphin.
When you will play dolphin, rather than click at the Dolphin.exe, click on the .bat that you created.
3) If you're using Win7 or vista and have a pendriver, insert it on a USB port and chose "Dedicate this device to ReadyBoost" or something like that (thanks Jaime).
4)Download the last version of the GAME BOOSTER...
Install and Run this program before run dolphin.
It's interesting to use game defrag too, then click on it and choose the dolphin directory to defrag.
Then choose in main menu "Switch to game mode" and choose ALL THE PROCESSES (except windows explorer) to close.
You can enter in 'options->edit service list' and put more unnecessary services in the list, to gamebooster close them when he is in game mode. After use of dolphin, you can enter in Game booster and select "Back to normal mode!"
5) At the moment, in my tests, the best OS for run dolphin is Windows seven x64 - (for me, i tested various OS and this was the best for me, cos i think that the experience is vary too much, for each machine specs). If you have a x64 processor and want to play dolphin, you can install this operational system, so you can use the x64 dolphin, that have some features running underground to acelerate the use with x64 processors. But have people that claim that XP are good too, saying that is a more "economical" OS for the PC. Give us a feedback, if you could test both, after you test with all the tips of this post!
6)Mantain your OS and hardware drivers even updated. If you are using Windows seven, go to "control panel->device manager" and check if all of the hardware are updated. For update of the OS, go to "control panel->windows update" (thanks Jaime).
Be sure that you have using the drivers developed for your OS, I was using drivers for vista in my win7 and see a huge difference of performance when i installed the actual win7 x64 drivers (if the drivers are from vista, win7 will update too,but you'll stay with the wrong drivers updated only and not the right driver)
But sometimes, the best driver not will be the newest. If you experiment a drop down of speed with a new driver, revert the drive to old version!
7) Ever use the DirectX plugin. Today it's have the same compatibility of the OpenGL plugin and runs much more faster!
8) Spellforce created compilations that make use of SSE3, SSSE3 and SSE4 instructions for Intel processors. These compilations had better benchmarks than the normal compilations. But only use these versions if they are not <10 releases. We strongly reccomend that you make use of most recent SVN verion for Dolphin, since this receive perceptible improvemnts every day!
9) Go to your video card confurations and choose that that speed and performance is better than "quality" (quality for me is to run smoothy )
10) Make use of Advanced System care, CCLeaner or any program to clean you registry constantly!
Ever defrag your HD and maintain your system clean!
It's important that you keep your PC away from viruses too!
11) If you are using Vista or Win7, just desabling Aero Glass will give you a extra speed. For me, i aways use the classic Windows theme, without wallpaper, just black solid color (not only give me more performance but it's visual clean too), but you don't need to be so radical, only using a theme without Aero glass will be good (since you will play you nor will see the windows, then, why spend resources of your Pc justto show aero glass?)
12) The best configuration for most of games is:
Dolphin configuration:
check only:
General:
-Enable Dual core (if you have a dual core processor, of course)
-Enable Idle skipping
-Enable cheats (optional, check only if wat to use AR codes)
-Framelimit: 60 (even you play PAL games-only some of them need to put in 50. For me, that i wat to play a little bit more fast, i leave, generally in 70. Auto is a pesada option. I never use auto)
-Hle the IPL
-JIT recompiler (some games run better in JITil. Never use the Interpreter if you want to gain speed)
-Disable use panic handlers
Gamecube:
leave the default
Wii:
-Use EuRGB60 mode (pal60) - I'm doing a exaustinve test to see if this is really necessary!
DX9 Graphics Plugin:
Graphics card: choose your better graphic card here
Fullscreen: 640x480
windowed: 640x480 (see the next itens to you see how to play games in fullscreen, but the cost for processing is the same as the windowed, but for that work you have to leave these resolutions)
Enhancements:
All unchecked
Advanced:
-Disable fog (some speed gain in games such Luigi`s mansion)
-Enable EFB copy-> to textures (if you'll play any game that the use of this don't makes graphics differences, iit`s better to leave this unchecked, since this comsume some specs)
DSP-HLE
only check the -Enable HLE audio
If audio isn`t good, go to thread of the game in this forum and choose the config for this game.
Of course, some games will need that you use texture cache, EFB to RAM, CPU->EFB access(wario world, for exemple), enable XFB (megaman 9, for example).
This configuration is the one of spend less resources if the game that you want to play show any problems, try to change some configs (look at the forum if the game have a thread).
13) I know a very smart way to play dolphin in full screen without wasting a lot of resources of your PC: After you enter in dolphin, choose fullscreen, run a game, do [alt]+[tab] until you reach the main screen for dolphin. stop. The main screen will be in the resolution of 640x400. Go to directx9 plugin config and uncheck the fullscreen. Choose a game and it will run in window, but filling the screen. Smart trick, don't is?
14) Frameskip:
after do all of that, test the game. If this is not in a good speed yet, close the dolphin, choose 1 or 2 frameskip and play the game again. The gain of speed is considerable! (but you have to choose the frameskip every time that you run dolphin, since it don`t load the last frameskip check yet - please devs, look at this issue)
Sorry for my bad english...
Anyone have more tips to runs well slow games or in gain speed in crap PCs?