Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

Yeah I see it now, but it's still tiny. Decided to go with Dolphin tho.

Still, no one suggested a good processor or told me how to do the overclock thing.

i-series processor at about 3+GHz (preferably sandy bridge)
your homework is to learn how to overclock if need be

(07-06-2011, 03:57 AM)Klemzo Wrote: [ -> ]I've also spent countless of hours on threads specially made to fix this kind of problems, I've tried many Dolphin settings for each and every game and had no luck so far.

The Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess GC
-Disappearing and reappearing sound (some people say they lose it entirely)
-A lot of FPS drop at the very beginning where you're in the small starting area.. I'm afraid what's gonna happen when I get in bigger places with more monsters and more combat.

Paper Mario: Thousand Year Door GC
- Huge FPS drop, making the game unplayable.

Super Paper Mario:
- FPS drop at times.

The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker GC
- A lot of FPS issues. Already at the beginning, everything seams to move slower.

Super Mario Galaxy 2:
- Huge, HUGE FPS drop making the game unplayable at the beginning. Starts to be better later, but with low FPS all the time.

Plus a lot of other games I don't care about so much, but still can't be played as intended. (For example, I can't play Mario Kart with my friends as it just lags too much)

Here are my computer specs. I'm not a big computer geek, but I know that this shouldn't get any better for any reason. I can run every game to the fullest graphics without problems. Yet, I have problems:

Code:

System: Windows 7 Ultimate 64-bit (6.1, Build 7601) Service Pack 1
               BIOS: Default System BIOS
          Processor: AMD Phenom(tm) II X3 720 Processor (3 CPUs), ~2.8GHz
             Memory: 4096MB RAM
Available OS Memory: 4096MB RAM
          Page File: 3555MB used, 4633MB available
Card name: ATI Radeon HD 4800 Series        
          Chip type: ATI display adapter (0x9442)
           DAC type: Internal DAC(400MHz)
     Display Memory: 2296 MB
   Dedicated Memory: 504 MB
      Shared Memory: 1791 MB
       Current Mode: 1920 x 1080 (32 bit) (59Hz)

First, check this page:
http://www.dolphin-emu.org/performance.html
set Dolphin exactly as shown in the screenshots there

and then change these settings, to avoid graphical glitches and speed up the emulator:

Skip GC BIOS -> enable this option
Framelimit -> Set this to 'Auto'
Fullscreen Display Resolution -> set it to 640x480
Start Renderer in Fullscreen -> enable this option
Render to main window -> disable this
Use Panic Handlers -> disable this
Show FPS -> enable this option
Texture Cache -> set it to 'Fast' (slider to the far right)
Fast Mipmaps -> uncheck this (!)
Disable Lighting -> uncheck this (!)
Disable fog -> uncheck this (!)
Hide Shader Errors -> enable this option
Audio Backend -> set it to 'XAudio2'

After applying the settings, close the emulator and start it again.

Check the speed. If your games still run like shit, try this super fast version of Dolphin:
http://www.dolphin-emu.org/download.html?rev=6515&bit=64&os=win
and configure it the same way as above.

If you still experience sluggish performance even with this version, you'll have to upgrade your CPU. Recommended for AMD users:

Phenom II X4 970 BE (3.5 GHz) or better

Overclocking is risky, voids your warranty and requires a better CPU cooler.
Upgrading to an Intel Core iX 'Sandy Bridge' is expensive (it requires buying a new motherboard + RAM),
So if you have an AMD motherboard, the cheapest option is to upgrade the CPU with a more powerful model (as suggested above).

Set your resolution to Wii's native and disable AA and any other graphical improvements, that's how Wii looks like. To be honest, it's not too bad at all.

(07-07-2011, 01:05 AM)Schwimmer Wrote: [ -> ]Set your resolution to Wii's native and disable AA and any other graphical improvements, that's how Wii looks like. To be honest, it's not too bad at all.

No, no. You're all wrong. It looks A LOT uglier then you might ever think or see on Dolphin.
I've turned everything to the lowest possible in Dolphin and I've sad to myself "huh, this actually isn't bad", but my friend brought his Wii over and we tried it on a 32inch PC monitor with HDTV plugin and it looks ugly as hell. It's amazing how ugly it looks, honestly. It looks 2x times better on a normal TV on my house, that's probably be cause the TV is old and it's base resolution is far lesser then the monitor's. So having a Wii on a PC monitor is completely implausible for me. I'll just spend few hundred bucks on better motherboard and processor and deal with a **** load of rage for not be able to listen to Super Mario Galaxy's music.

Yeah ...

It's a little bit unfair to make a comparison like this, of course the real hardware meaning Wii/GameCube will win at all points.

Of course Dolphin is a perfect substitute if you already got the consoles and want to play with more options and of course without the discs which is the main reason for me.
As a game collector since the beginning of 2000 I only see benefits with emulators, meaning I can still eat the cake and have it left.
I'll buy the games and dump them then store them safely.

It's actually quite unbelievable that you actually can play your games without using your console with just a simple software on a computer.
When I first dumped my SNES game with the Super Wildcard machine and used the ROM with a SNES emulator it was something amazing.
Save States, Game Genie/Pro Action Replay Codes, countless of cool options.

Ahem...
Dolphin is a great piece of software and despite that the real hardware is better I prefer Dolphin over it because Dolphin can make the games look way better and with my newer hardware I don't loose much performance wise.

(07-07-2011, 02:17 AM)Klemzo Wrote: [ -> ]It looks A LOT uglier then you might ever think or see on Dolphin.
I've turned everything to the lowest possible in Dolphin and I've sad to myself "huh, this actually isn't bad", but my friend brought his Wii over and we tried it on a 32inch PC monitor with HDTV plugin and it looks ugly as hell. It's amazing how ugly it looks, honestly. It looks 2x times better on a normal TV on my house, that's probably be cause the TV is old and it's base resolution is far lesser then the monitor's.

Wii looks like shit on a LCD TV/monitor, but on an old CRT TV, the picture quality is awesome - it looks almost like 960p HD (!)

Old TVs work differently than LCD monitors. They use analog trickery to improve the image quality, something similar to antialiasing + gaussian blur.
They also have higher pixel density than the large 'HD Ready' LCD flat panels with huge-ass pixels you have now, so the picture appears even sharper.

Also, when you run Dolphin on a PC monitor at native resolution, your graphics card does much better upscaling/filtering than most cheap LCD monitors do.

(07-07-2011, 04:30 AM)kirbypuff Wrote: [ -> ]

(07-07-2011, 02:17 AM)Klemzo Wrote: [ -> ]It looks A LOT uglier then you might ever think or see on Dolphin.
I've turned everything to the lowest possible in Dolphin and I've sad to myself "huh, this actually isn't bad", but my friend brought his Wii over and we tried it on a 32inch PC monitor with HDTV plugin and it looks ugly as hell. It's amazing how ugly it looks, honestly. It looks 2x times better on a normal TV on my house, that's probably be cause the TV is old and it's base resolution is far lesser then the monitor's.

Wii looks like shit on a LCD TV/monitor, but on an old CRT TV, the picture quality is awesome - even better than 720p HD (!)

Old TVs work differently than LCD monitors. They're 'optimized' for low resolutions and do something similar to antialiasing + gaussian blur.
They also have higher pixel density than the large 'HD Ready' LCD flat panels with huge-ass pixels you have now, so the picture looks even sharper.

Also, when you run Dolphin on a PC monitor at native resolution, your graphics card does much better upscaling/filtering than most cheap LCD monitors do.

Yeah I understand that, I pointed it out as well. It looks a lot better on my old TV then on a brand new LCD Tv or Monitor.

(07-06-2011, 09:59 PM)Klemzo Wrote: [ -> ]

(07-06-2011, 09:26 PM)jigglywiggly Wrote: [ -> ]This is foony.
You claim to be a pc geek, yet don't know how to overclock...(it's super simple) btw your cpu is a piece of shit for dolphin.
i7 2600 k here @ 4.4 ghz, some games still lag here and there. I think Sonic Colors is the most demanding of the games I've tested which is only a few.

I never claimed I'm a geek and I know shit about Dolphin. But obviously you had to tell me how good your computer is, how shitty mine is and how simple is it to overclock, yet you didn't tell me how. Honestly ..

Uh google it? You go into the bios and change the HT for AMD's.

(07-07-2011, 11:34 AM)jigglywiggly Wrote: [ -> ]

(07-06-2011, 09:59 PM)Klemzo Wrote: [ -> ]

(07-06-2011, 09:26 PM)jigglywiggly Wrote: [ -> ]This is foony.
You claim to be a pc geek, yet don't know how to overclock...(it's super simple) btw your cpu is a piece of shit for dolphin.
i7 2600 k here @ 4.4 ghz, some games still lag here and there. I think Sonic Colors is the most demanding of the games I've tested which is only a few.

I never claimed I'm a geek and I know shit about Dolphin. But obviously you had to tell me how good your computer is, how shitty mine is and how simple is it to overclock, yet you didn't tell me how. Honestly ..

Yeah I did google it. I learned that it can be risky and it needs a huge cooling system, so I rather not dive into it unless it's really necessary.

Uh google it? You go into the bios and change the HT for AMD's.