Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

Corsair Carbide 300R

thats my case and it should be big enough.

are you sure your cooler fits on my mainboard? im pretty sure it fits, but if it doesnt in the end..

Yeah, the case won't be a problem.
You haven't specified which motherboard you are going for.

Asrock Z77 Pro3 Socket 1155 Mainboard


seems the best to me, moderate price, and all what I need. I looked at a picture and Im thinking it has more than enough space for the cooler, am I right?

That motherboard is a great choice.
You shouldn't have problems placing the cooler.

Thx for your help but i dont want to praise the day before it is finished (in other words before i have built the components into my pc)

Hey guys, I’m hoping you could help me out with a few things regarding upgrading my CPU. I will greatly appreciate any sort of help, but since I’m a novice when it comes to building a pc, I’d prefer getting help from people who really know what they are talking about. I basically have 3 questions.

1. I am thinking of buying a new CPU and since I have never built a pc before, I require some help with selecting the parts as I am not sure exactly what I need and what I don’t need. I have searched on the internet and so far and I am thinking of buying this upgrade package, which contains a CPU, a motherboard, and RAM. Here is the link. The site is in Danish, but it shouldn’t be too hard to figure out. CPU is an I7 3770K.
http://www.komplett.dk/k/ki.aspx?sku=757242
There are 2 things which I am not sure about regarding this. First of all, what kind of power supply would I need for this? My current pc has a 600w power supply (don’t know the brand) and I have no idea if this is enough for the intel core i7 3770k or not.

Also, what kind of cooling would I need for this CPU? As far as I can see, this package comes with a CPU cooler, which should be efficient enough on its own, but I am thinking of trying to overclock this CPU at some point, in which case the standard cooling won’t do. What kind of cooling would I need and how easy Is it to install this thing?

2.
My current pc has what I believe is a medium case. Would I need a bigger case if I decide to buy this CPU?

3.
This question isn’t as important as my other 2 questions, so if you don’t want to answer all 3, please just help me with my other questions. Anyway, I would like to know what kind of performance improvement I can expect from this CPU compared to my current phenom II, in terms of fps. Like, I’m going to be replaying Tales of Symphonia with LLE. With my current CPU, the game is playable with LLE, but I can’t go through most battles without fps drops. Would this be possible with this CPU? I’m also thinking about replaying Xenoblade with LLE. ATM, I can still get fps drops in xenoblade using hle if enough action is happening on the screen. Could I eliminate these drops completely with this CPU?

Sorry for the pretty long text but I want to include as much info as possible. I you need additional info just as me thanks in advance guys.

1. I don't really know how to compare that bundle to other available bundles in your area (I use dollars). I can tell you, however, that the 3770K is completely pointless unless you plan on doing a lot of video encoding. The 3570K has a 100 MHz lower clock rate (which won't matter once you overclock) and doesn't have hyper threading (useless for Dolphin and most tasks). Get the 3570k instead ($100 cheaper here). The 16 GB of RAM is pretty pointless since you can't really use more than 8, but what the heck if you find a good price go for it. The mother board is fine.

If you plan on overclocking, get a decent cooler I got mine for $20 on sale (from $35) and it works fine.

2. It really just depends on what cooler you get. My cooler is monstrously huge so it probably wouldn't work. Just get a cooler that fits your case.

3. Performance will be like heaven vs. hell. Full speed all of the time if you OC to 4.2 GHz or higher.

(10-14-2012, 05:51 AM)Axxer Wrote: [ -> ]1. I don't really know how to compare that bundle to other available bundles in your area (I use dollars). I can tell you, however, that the 3770K is completely pointless unless you plan on doing a lot of video encoding. The 3570K has a 100 MHz lower clock rate (which won't matter once you overclock) and doesn't have hyper threading (useless for Dolphin and most tasks). Get the 3570k instead ($100 cheaper here). The 16 GB of RAM is pretty pointless since you can't really use more than 8, but what the heck if you find a good price go for it. The mother board is fine.

If you plan on overclocking, get a decent cooler I got mine for $20 on sale (from $35) and it works fine.

2. It really just depends on what cooler you get. My cooler is monstrously huge so it probably wouldn't work. Just get a cooler that fits your case.

3. Performance will be like heaven vs. hell. Full speed all of the time if you OC to 4.2 GHz or higher.

Thanks for getting back to me on this. As i said, i am a bit nervous about building the pc up from scratch as i've never tried this before.

Anyway, I have greatly considered wheter to get the I7 3770k or the i5 3570k, i thought i might aswell get the i7 because the other 2 bundles on that site which contains the i5 3570k is more expensive since they also come with a graphics card, and i dont really need that.

The reason why i,m considering the bundles in the first place is because i'm not entirely sure which parts are compatible with others parts, only thing i know is that with an i5/i7 cpu, i need a new mobo aswell, and i know the z77 is compatible.

Also, i've read that the capacity of the L3 cache is quite important to dolphin, and while the i7 has a 8mb L3 cache, the i5 only has 6mb, which is actually the same as my phenom II. Or is this difference not THAT important? I am NOT planning on doing alot of video encoding, so if the 2mb difference in the l3 cahce is'nt that important, i might go for the i5 if i can find a cheaper option. I'm solely upgrading to get a better experience with Dolphin. I think i should also be able to use the 8gb RAM i have in this pc, so i don't really need the RAM that much.

Last, and most importantly, would you hapen to know if i would need a new power supply aswell? i litteraly have no clue regarding this matter.

Thanks again, i really appreciate the help

The cache does make a very minute difference, but not enough of a difference to be worth the extra cash. Once you can run everything full speed, that minute difference doesn't really mean anything. My 3570K can run every game I have (including SMG 1&2) full speed with 0 lag.

As long as you buy an i5 3570K and any Z77 mobo you are good to go. Certain mobos are better than others, sure, but you don't need a super high end MSI one (like the one in that bundle). Mine works fine and I got it for $45 on sale. That is a fraction of the cost of that MSI.

The reason your Phenom II is so slow in Dolphin is because the micro architecture isn't nearly as good as Intel's Ivy Bridge architecture (in the 3570K and 3770K).

You power supply should be fine. I have a 500 watt supply and it is enough for my system.

Thanks for the info, My phenom II has actually served me quite well in dolphin for the 2 years iv'e this pc, and i can run most of my games full speed with HLE most of the time, but of course, I'm upgarding my CPU because i know i can get so much more from an I5/i7. As i said, i am thinking about overcloking the CPU that i'm going to buy, but i won't do it immediately unless it is of absolutely neccesary. Hopefully the I5 37570K should still perform alot better at stock speed compared to my Phenom II.

Glad to know i won't have to buy a Power supply, i don't want to spend so much cash that i might aswell go out and buy a new pc altogether, because this pc is only 2 years old. Thanks, Axxer, you've answered my questions and cleared my doubts for now. If i need any more help, ill be sure to ask again.