Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

I'll tell you that i'm well aware that no previous Phenom II's could even put a dent in some of the weaker Core 2 Duo's. I had asked to see if that advantage was gone with the x6's. Unfortunately, it would appear that the chip line is pretty new, enough so that no one actually has one to test it out.

I'm currently running on what you see in my sig. I'm sure a lot of my speed issues have to do with my horrendous GPU, but i'm lucky to get 30fps in Mario Galaxy 2. It often chugs downwards to 20 or even the teens. And i'm pretty sure that even if i got a better GPU, i still wouldn't even reach 60fps... Even games that go 70%-80% are kind of annoying. I have to say that having a smooth experience is more important than 1080p to me. Although i find half speed playable, it's very annoying and disorienting. At least in games like Mario Galaxy, the music always runs fullspeed giving the illusion of better performance. But that won't help much when the LLE sound plugin is finished, because it seems to force the music to sync with the onscreen graphics, so the sound will slow down with the game itself.

I'm going to bite the bullet soon and get the best i can for less than $1000. I think i can still get an i7 within that range, but the real problem there will definitely be the motherboard. I'm already inexperienced with mobo's, but intel even more so. I need an inexpensive one that will allow me to overclock the i7 to around 4ghz and of course one that won't die or whatever easily. From what i've seen, not only are i7's more expensive overall than AMD's, their motherboards are as well... I'd prefer to find one for no more than $150 there, which i'm not sure is doable to have a somewhat decent mobo.

And it doesn't help either that most AMD motherboards are compatible with all the AMD CPU's (AM2/3/whatever). But Intels are quite a mess to me... I would suspect upgrading would be an issue too. I have heard some fair rumors that the new Bulldozer chip will be back compatible with AM3 motherboards too, so there's another possibility if i want to wait until well into next year.

I do want to clarify that my goal is not to beat the i7, but to basically get fullspeed in Dolphin as much of the time as possible. Overclocking will be something i intend to do, as far as possible on air as i can. If the Thuban can manage fullspeed in every game the i7 can, it would be good enough for me. I think life would be much simpler with it too, with the motherboard mess. I'm not someone who needs to have like 120+ fps in every game, but i'd like to get 60 or the top of what any game would be. I don't need to have an EXCESS of power, just enough to run the games like they were meant to be running. If fullspeed is out of the question with overclocked Thubans though, i guess i will HAVE to go with an i7.

And lastly, on the other end of the spectrum, i guess i could go with an i5 quad. I'm not sure how accurate this statement is, but i've heard they're the same as i7's without hyperthreading. And i'm not sure if i'd even need hyperthreading either. If that's the only major difference, i could get an i7 at AMD prices and have another beast of an overclocker. Again, IF they're almost identical. At any rate, they break even in price with the Thubans. Decisions decisions...

(08-14-2010, 05:12 PM)Granville Wrote: [ -> ]I'd prefer to find one for no more than $150 there, which i'm not sure is doable to have a somewhat decent mobo.

Not sure, but I think you're going to have to spend $200 to $250 for the mobo, regardless of AMD or Intel. I do not expect today's Intel mobo's to be future-proof.

i got phenom 2 x4 965 on air i stable 3.9ghz 4.0ghz
the x6 is more powerful in oc that my phenom 2 x4 965 l
my pc is really fast i play very big game crisys , mass effect 2 , dirt 2 ,grid ,gta 4 ,metro 2033 and more my phenom 2 x4 965 3.4g stock do really good intel are to expensive they dont do any difference in gaming only if you use monters application intel will rock compresse video my 965 is stronger in many game that i7 920 930
more graphic high more amd will rock go see benmark intel is good in game 800 by 600 no aa more you increase aa and resolution more the amd perform vs intel
if your are not i work you pass more of the time playing and thing like that i recommand you amd intel is for working amd gaming and the pricing intel is freak

(08-14-2010, 06:04 PM)skid Wrote: [ -> ]

(08-14-2010, 05:12 PM)Granville Wrote: [ -> ]I'd prefer to find one for no more than $150 there, which i'm not sure is doable to have a somewhat decent mobo.

Not sure, but I think you're going to have to spend $200 to $250 for the mobo, regardless of AMD or Intel. I do not expect today's Intel mobo's to be future-proof.

They're not, the newer processors built on 32-22nm lithography and 8-12 cores will require a new socket called LGA 2011.

AM3, though, will probably stay around for a while, so admittedly that's one positive side to buying such a mobo& processor, (if you generally prefer many cores at low price), at the cost of somewhat less performance per clock

I'm kind of at a loss here to be honest. I've seriously not seen anyone on these forums who has a Thuban, so it's hard for me to make a judgment. I can't say what the real world application of the processor with Dolphin will be. I am now considering getting an i5 as well, their prices are almost identical to the Thuban and they are apparently in the same league as an i7. So much in the same league that it won't make any difference whatsoever when using Dolphin, i can apparently expect a Core i5 clocked at 4ghz to perform identically to an i7 clocked at the same speed. Am i correct in this assumption?

Here is an extensive article explaining the differences between i5 and i7 (and i3 at the bottom). Essentially, i5 is a newer mainstream architecture based on the nehalem series of processors.

Besides a different socket and dual-channel memory, there isn't really that much difference. They also have the same amount of L3 cache, though i5's do consume less power at full load and are slightly less expensive.

http://www.brighthub.com/computing/hardware/articles/48391.aspx

For gaming use you could just opt for i5 instead of a more expensive variant. They are very overclockable as well

Phenom II x6 OC's to ~4ghz on air.
Core i7 930 OC's to ~4ghz on air.

Every test I've seen shows the 930 @ 2.8ghz beating the 1090t @ 3.2 ghz.

Now, let me explain this for the 2 main types of applications: Multi-threaded and Single-threaded.
In a single-threaded app, the Core i7 wins because of it's superior architecture. The Phenom II series was designed to combat the Core 2 series, not the i7 series, and they do so well.
In a multi-threaded app, the Core i7 wins because of it's architecture + Hyperthreading. Basically the PII x6 is in a very bad position as a chip.

In Dolphin, which only uses 2 threads, a Phenom II x6 is the exact same speed as a Phenom II x2. A Core i7, once again due to architecture will be faster. It's a moot point however, because both are more than fast enough to run pretty much everything on Dolphin.

I use the smartest cheapest way to build a PC.

Heres the figures for my newest PC:

Case: FREE (From old workstation 2000 model)

Power Supply: REUSE (Antec 550w, About $59 if you buy one)

Motherboard: Gigabyte LGA775, DDR2 Ram, $129.00

RAM: 4GB 667 (Yes 667 is faster than 800 due to latency differences, besides I easily overclocked my 667 to 800 anyways)

CPU: Intel E5500 Pentium Dual-Core (Just a rebadged Core2 duo, they clocked it down to 2.7, I clocked it back up to a healthy 3.24 hehe)

Videocard: Ati 5500 Series PCI-E 2.1, 1GB Ram, Overclocked to maximum, I think it was $129


Anyways I have never spent more than $600 on a new gaming system, I avoid the enthusiast gimmicks and go for raw power, it dont need to be pretty, I dont mind using "rebranded" discount versions of CPU's as the performance is the same.

Reusing old parts isn't much of an option for me if i wished to do so. I have never built a PC before. All my desktop pc's are Dells and i seriously doubt i could reuse any of those parts. Case is unlikely to fit with new custom parts. Power supply i KNOW is horrible (i think Dell really craps out on their PSU's, mine is only like 250-300 watt, i forget but it's not enough to power a new Core i processor). Same sort of issues with the motherboard being cheap and under performing. As for the video card, CPU, and memory... Well those are the primary things i want to change in the first place. I already know how well they perform (rather badly, especially the GPU) so i won't be reusing them.

If i want a really good rig built to my specs, i'm going to have to do it from scratch here as the Dell parts i already have are unlikely to work. I asked my friend who builds PC's for a living and he was quite sure i can't just take apart the Dell and build from the spare parts.

Besides all that, i will be giving my current PC (sig) to my mother as a present once i get my new rig built and running good. She's running an extremely old single core Pentium 4 and she constantly complains about speed issues. She'll be thrilled to have a non-crappy PC.

(08-15-2010, 06:43 AM)zurginator Wrote: [ -> ]In Dolphin, which only uses 2 threads, a Phenom II x6 is the exact same speed as a Phenom II x2.

u're rite.. i searched it online. all phenoms have identical spec (exept the cache memory), and they all use this chip: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_K10

phenom II x3 for example have 3 of those chip (1 disabled), phenom II x4 have 4, phenom II x6 have 6.. but its the same processor.

so if more cores are not used, like withdolphin, there is no perfomance diff. per core at all betwenn a phenom 2 and phenom 6. at the same clock (3.2ghz phenom2 = 3.2ghz phenom 6 when just use two cores)

but clocks is not so simple with, core 2 duo and i7 core.. bcoz they are massively different. not same chip, architecture, memory controller etc.. all is changed.