Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

Quote:Have you ever run into a PS2, Gamecube or Wii game suffering a 10fps or more drop in the framerate at any point? I have just played through Metroid Prime and Ratchet & Clank on my current main gaming rig (920 @3.2) and suffered pretty bad slowdown in parts. I need to know if IvyBridge can cope both at stock speeds and with some overclocking. If not I will just wait. I really don't want to overclock the hell out of it.

That would depend not only on the game but what settings he's using (among other things).

There are plenty of games that will require OC if you plan to use accurate settings.

Quote:Out of curiosity have you tried just running Dolphin or PCSX 2 on the HD 4000?

I'm using an HD 4000 right now so I can answer any questions you have related to that. You will need to lower your IR in a lot of games down to 1x or 1.5x but it does manage to run pretty much anything I throw at it fullspeed without bottlenecking the cpu. Cranking up the IR though is not a good idea unless it's a lightweight game.

I would wait for haswell if I were you. It should deliver significantly better performance at stock, performance per watt, and IGP performance/features. All of which are very important for this type of setup.

Thanks for the reply. The updated GPU is one of the reasons I'm very interested in Haswell. It may be just good enough that a discrete card isn't required at all, which would be fantastic for a HTPC.

I am pleasantly surprised the HD 4000 can hold its own at native. In saying that I would really be after x3 but its a good sign. Haswell is probably 8 months out which is a real kicker.

It driving me nuts right now as my current rig just can't cope. I could overclock it more but the increased power consumption makes my eyes water.

If you're comfortable with 2x IR (which is somewhere between 720p and 1080p) then haswell's IGP will probably be good enough to meet your needs.

Quote:I am pleasantly surprised the HD 4000 can hold its own at native.

It's not that surprising considering you're talking about running GC/Wii games at native resolutions. Dolphin is not very demanding at 1x (as it shouldn't be, even with the emulation overhead GC/Wii games are still designed to run on a fixed function graphics accelerator that was considered extremely weak even by 2001 standards). People exaggerate how demanding dolphin is on the GPU because they run it with their internal resolutions set extremely high without really realizing it. 4x IR for example is 2560 x 2112, over 5 megapixels. Modern PC games would perform terribly on almost any graphics card at a resolution that high.

Quote: I could overclock it more but the increased power consumption makes my eyes water.

?

You mean because you're an environmentalist?

Quote:Dolphin is not very demanding at 1x

Depending on the game
SMG 1&2 kill Intel HD 4000 at 1xIR , this was proved by many members

Yup I can confirm as well. 50 fps in places where I should be getting 70 even at 1x IR. For some reason this game is at least 10x as demanding on the IGP as most games.

I've also noticed that the openGL backend is having major issues on the HD 4000. Apparently CGSL still isn't properly supported by Intels drivers.

Not only SMG
If you plug a dedicated GPU in , most games will have huge speed-boost even at 1xIR

Well so far SMG/SMG2 are the only games that give me slowdowns, and even those run almost fullspeed, never dipping below 50 fps. All the others I have tried so far run at fullspeed. I have over 40 GC/Wii games in my collection so I still have quite a few more to try.

Hey all, sorry for not replying for a while! I had my final projects and
such this quarter to wrap up, and now I've got a week for Thanksgiving
so I hope I can wrap up most of this guide in the meantime. I'm also
getting a Wii U tonight, so... yeah. :p

(11-16-2012, 07:41 AM)Runadumb Wrote: [ -> ]Very impressive. I am going back and forth on whether to build an HTPC
setup now or wait for Haswell. Waiting for Haswell would probably mean I
would have spare GPU as I assume I will upgrading my new PC next gen
and it bring other performance/cost benefits. However, it also means I
don't have a new bit of kit RIGHT NOW! See my dilemma?
I am wanting to do this with a SilverStone SUG08 which looks the part but is stupidly expensive.

Have
you ever run into a PS2, Gamecube or Wii game suffering a 10fps or more
drop in the framerate at any point? I have just played through Metroid
Prime and Ratchet & Clank on my current main gaming rig (920 @3.2)
and suffered pretty bad slowdown in parts. I need to know if IvyBridge
can cope both at stock speeds and with some overclocking. If not I will
just wait. I really don't want to overclock the hell out of it.
Out of curiosity have you tried just running Dolphin or PCSX 2 on the HD 4000?

I see your dilemma lol! I'd say if you don't need it ASAP, wait a bit. Also, Cooler Master's new Half XB case looks amazing. Iwish I would have waited now :p

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811119265

Withmy settings (I'll post the pics later), 90% of all games run at full speed, or rarely drop any more than 5 FPS, on both Wii / GC / PS2.
Obviously the ones not suited to emulation or have trouble running stably in an emulator won't run as well, but I can play SMG / KHII / Wind Waker at full speed and with rarely any slowdown.

At stock speeds I can't say, but with the parts I used it's easy as anything to OC the 3570k up to my clock speed of around 4.2-4.3 GHz, stably.

I haven't tried running it on the HD4000 stock, but I know a lot of HTPC people do.

NaturalViolence Wrote:It's not that surprising considering you're talking about running GC/Wii
games at native resolutions. Dolphin is not very demanding at 1x (as
it shouldn't be, even with the emulation overhead GC/Wii games are still
designed to run on a fixed function graphics accelerator that was
considered extremely weak even by 2001 standards). People exaggerate
how demanding dolphin is on the GPU because they run it with their
internal resolutions set extremely high without really realizing it. 4x
IR for example is 2560 x 2112, over 5 megapixels. Modern PC games
would perform terribly on almost any graphics card at a resolution that
high.

This is true, but I wanted that fidelity. We still don't know if the Wii U will upscale at all (Firmware update to allow emulation comes out tomorrow), so I wanted to cover my bases. Alsohaving my full library in one place in High Def is the best
But you could theoretically do without the large cooling / GPU and make a smaller and cheaper build, of course you'd be playing at Wii resolution which doesn't look all that hot on my TV. I also wanted Steam Games to run well too, hence the overkill GPU wise :p

As for the power draw OCing adds, it's not all that much when you factor in I used to also power A PS3, A DVD Player, A Set Top Cable Box, and a Wii.
Now all of that is consolidated into one system that manages it's idle power draw much better than those 5-6 year old components.

Double Post to update! The guide is complete
Feel free to ask any questions, or let me know if I made any grammar / typo errors.

Also, Dolphin still smokes the Wii-U's upscaling of Wii games.

(12-16-2012, 05:40 AM)SN3S Wrote: [ -> ]Double Post to update! The guide is complete
Feel free to ask any questions, or let me know if I made any grammar / typo errors.

Also, Dolphin still smokes the Wii-U's upscaling of Wii games.

Congratulations SN3S, it looks very nice I must say.