Hey, I'm very new to Wii emulation in general and I have some concerns about emulating on my PC.
I'm running both Mega Man 9 and 10 on Dolphin and I've noticed that the game kinda lags quite a bit while I play it but sometimes goes to normal speed. While it does so I can notice my graphics cards fan blowing rather hard and loud while doing so. It used to flicker, but I tinkered with external frame buffer to fix that.
I want to be sure that I don't blow up my CPU or ruin my graphics card or anything. So please tell me if my current rig is fine or if I need to upgrade something to play it without fear.
OS: Windows 7 64bit
GPU: Nvidia geforce 9500gt
Processor: AMD Athlon™ II X2 235e Processor 2.70 GHz
Ram: 6 Gigs
Dolphin ver: 3.0-692-dirty
Good evening Ray,
Your PC looks pretty old. To emulate most GC/Wii games at a reasonable speed, you'll have to upgrade your whole PC.
Emulating games is especially taxing for the CPU, and if you also increase the graphical settings, it will also be pretty taxing for GPU's.
Therefore your CPU and GPU temperatures might be higher than when you´re playing PC games.
Could you monitor both your CPU and GPU temperatures with Realtemp(CPU) and GPU-Z(GPU)?
Have both programs running, play Megaman for a minute or so and report back with the maximum temperatures of both.
Realtemp said that it couldn't use the program due to my processor being unsupported. Though the GPU went up to 79.0C during gameplay.
So I take it that I really need to upgrade, huh? I know my graphics card will need to be, but what of other things?
The CPU... AMD Athlon is a weak CPU.
If you want to stay with AMD, get the Phenom II X4.
Otherwise: Get an Intel Core i5-2500k or 3750k.
So I need a new processor, huh? I'm new to upgrading that kinda thing. Would changing the processor effect anything like the ram cards I use?
Also I opened the case to my PC and my graphics card has tremendously cooled down, even when playing Mega Man, though its still rather laggy. I suppose I need more airflow going through my PC tower somehow?
If you get a new CPU, and do go for the two rather excellent Intel ones we recommended, then you'll need a new motherboard, and I doubt that your RAM is DDR3, so you'll also need new RAM. It may be simplest to build a whole new PC, as you'll benefit from a new everything.
(06-14-2012, 06:58 AM)Ray_Slimelight Wrote: [ -> ]So I need a new processor, huh? I'm new to upgrading that kinda thing. Would changing the processor effect anything like the ram cards I use?
Also I opened the case to my PC and my graphics card has tremendously cooled down, even when playing Mega Man, though its still rather laggy. I suppose I need more airflow going through my PC tower somehow?
Depending on how old your rig is, try cleaning it out first. Dust is your computer's worst enemy, and is probably chocking it and heating it up. Make sure you clean the fans and fan vents. There are videos online showing how to do it properly.
You may also want some more fans. I have 3 fans and my GPU has a fan and it runs pretty cooly, but I'm also in an air conditioned room.
When you upgrade your CPU, you need to make sure you have a motherboard that supports it. You don't necessarily need to upgrade your ram, but it's cheap and can give you a bump in speed. Don't buy more than 4 gb though.
Make sure to look up online how to upgrade. I'm not going into too much detail here, so if you're not careful, you could end up wasting a lot of money.
(06-14-2012, 07:02 AM)AnyOldName3 Wrote: [ -> ]If you get a new CPU, and do go for the two rather excellent Intel ones we recommended, then you'll need a new motherboard, and I doubt that your RAM is DDR3, so you'll also need new RAM. It may be simplest to build a whole new PC, as you'll benefit from a new everything.
I built my computer in under $600, and it runs great. If you're lucky, you may be able to reuse some parts from your current build to save even more money (hard drive, graphics card, case, power supply).
Quote:you may be able to reuse some parts from your current build to save even more money [including] graphics card
We've already kind of recommended he changes his GPU if possible, so that can't be reused unless he can't afford it.
Quote:You don't necessarily need to upgrade your ram
Also, as I said earlier, he most likely will have to get new RAM, as he is most likely on DDR2, but there are no DDR2 socket 1155 boards, so no compatibility with Sandy/Ivy bridge without DDR3. Hence, why I said he would need new RAM.