Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

Hello people,

First of all, I have done research on this topic, but was unable to find an answer, so I hope you guys can help me.

As most of you probably know, Nintendo will be shutting down WiFi in a few days, which means that I practically won't have anyone to play against.

So I thought, why not buy a laptop to play via Netplay? But because I don't really have an idea how laptop hardware compares to desktop hardware, I'd like you guys to help me.
I know that to run Dolphin fluently, a good CPU is necessary, but other than that i really have no idea and the people I asked also couldn't really help me.

So my question is: What should a laptop have to be able to run it fluently? Both Smash games would literally be the only thing that I would play, because I usually play on console, so I just want to know if I'll be able to run Dolphin without buying a high end machine.

I WOULD consider a desktop over a laptop, but only if it's going to be way too expensive.



I really hope you guys can help me, thanks in advance and sorry again if someone already asked a similar thing, but I didn't find anything using the search function.

Any laptop with an i7-4700MQ/i7-4900MQ would be good for almost any game.

I have a laptop with a 4700mq and it runs flawlessly. To be honest you can probably run both full speed on something a bit weaker, just make sure you do NOT get a mobile AMD processor (i.e. A series). However, you could build a much cheaper desktop that will run both full speed. It will be about 25-50% cheaper to have a desktop over a laptop. Laptop does have the advantage of being mobile, however I favor a desktop for online play. If you buy a laptop, probably shoot for a 4700mq (and don't bother getting a dedicated graphics card to reduce cost), and make sure the processor you do choose isn't the U series (ultra low power). If you opt for a desktop, the Pentium G3220 will run both at full speed and its like $50. If you can wait until Summer the Pentium anniversary cpu's are coming out which should be good and affordable as well. However an i5 4670k will run most Dolphin games at full speed and be good for everything else as well. Hope this helped