I'm just getting started with this. Love that I can play my old Wii games in high resolution! I'll be selling my Wii and playing my backups on some fresh hardware.
First, which OS runs Dolphin best? Windows, Linux, or OSX? I'm currently on a Macbook Pro, which runs Dolphin very nicely, but I don't want to have to hook up my laptop every time the kids want to play Wii.
Second, which hardware are you having the best performance with these days? Is there a sweet spot in terms of price+performance=value?
Thanks!
Windows and Linux both run Dolphin just fine in my experience. Windows has DX9 and DX11 backends, which may be useful to some users (speed mostly with DX9). Depending on the drivers and hardware though, DX9 performance on Windows should be more or less on par with OpenGL performance on Linux. AMD drivers are getting better, but Nvidia's still seem to have an edge in reliability. For Linux proprietary drivers are a must. Most people stick to Windows because it's easy and they get fewer hassles and headaches.
Unless you're a day-to-day Linux user and you don't dual boot into Windows often, just use Windows. There's no need to force oneself to use an unfamiliar OS, at least not for Dolphin's sake. I'm comfortable with Linux, so it's right for me. The "best" OS is one that fits your needs, and for a majority of people, this means Windows. Unless you have reason to believe otherwise, stick with it.
OS X will do fine as well if you 1) get a Hackintosh and use your own hardware and 2) use the latest revisions and latest OS X version. Macs (from Apple) have pretty underpowered hardware for Dolphin. OS X still has more issues than Windows or Linux (e.g. Pokemon XD has some Mac specific crashes). Dolphin's still doable, but getting it just right probably requires a bit of effort. Since you are running a MacBook, using BootCamp to boot into Windows would probably be the best option.
As for hardware, we generally recommend the i5-4670k, a decent cooler, and a suitable dedicated GPU. For the GPU, do you have a price range and what level of enhancements (HD gameplay, Anti-Aliasing) are you looking for?
It all depends on what game you want to play, but, in general, Windows has the best performance.
If you want to be able to play all playable games at fullspeed, then you're going to need an overclocked i5/i7 (best option is probably the i5 4670K paired with a Z87 motherboard/lower end ASUS motherboard and a decent cooler like the Coolermaster 212 Hyper Evo).
To make things HD, the thing that matters is the GPU. Which one you get depends on how much money you have, how pretty you want things, and whether you'll also want to use PC games.
To give more advice, we need to know which games you'll play. If they run well so far on a Macbook, then it's likely that they're not very demanding at all, and that means you may be able to go for a lower end system than the type I've suggested here.
Thanks for the tips so far. I've put PCs together in the past, so its doable, but is there any particular pre-built machine you'd recommend? I like the higher-definition I'm seeing from dolphin on my MBP, but after more testing, it looks like some games, like Skylanders (which requires a usb dongle) aren't working. How do you get non-working games to work? In the end, would you recommend just sticking with the old wii+usb loader?
Pre-built systems are practically always a lot more than they'd cost to build.
Also, I'd not use a Wii and a USB loader, I'd use a Wii and an original disk. Why? Because mention of anything that's probably piracy will get you banned. Of course, so far, there isn't anything to say you haven't just got the disks in your loft, and you use the USB loader as the HDD is smaller than a load of game cases, but it'd be a shame if you posted something more incriminating and got yourself banned.
(07-22-2013, 05:20 AM)mcaskey Wrote: [ -> ]it looks like some games, like Skylanders (which requires a usb dongle) aren't working. How do you get non-working games to work?
You can't. Skylanders games make part of these games that still can't be played with Dolphin.
(07-22-2013, 05:20 AM)mcaskey Wrote: [ -> ]In the end, would you recommend just sticking with the old wii+usb loader?
It's an alternative. But you'll have to deal with crappy resolution
There is the USB branch that does work afaik
(07-22-2013, 06:58 AM)ExtremeDude2 Wrote: [ -> ]There is the USB branch that does work afaik
That would suppose you can plug the portal. Is it really working?
Parlane's done plenty of testing with it, it works.
Interesting.
Then if it's working Wiki pages should be modified