Dolphin, the GameCube and Wii emulator - Forums

I really want a portable dolphin machine, to like play pikmin in bed and at school and such. I have a budget of about $600 USD but I'd like it to be in the form factor of something portable so it can double as a machine for school.

I had my eye on the surface pro 3 i3, will this all-in-one run dolphin very well? Or should I just get an nvidia shield tablet k1? OR should I wait for the new tablet? I really don't want to wait very long. Is the shield tablet K1 for $199 a good deal even with a new one likely coming this year? Would I get a better deal with the Google Pixel C with its Tegra X1? I don't hear the best of reviews out of the Pixel C.

(01-17-2016, 06:15 AM)BFCE Wrote: [ -> ]I really want a portable dolphin machine, to like play pikmin in bed and at school and such. I have a budget of about $600 USD but I'd like it to be in the form factor of something portable so it can double as a machine for school.

I had my eye on the surface pro 3 i3, will this all-in-one run dolphin very well? Or should I just get an nvidia shield tablet k1? OR should I wait for the new tablet? I really don't want to wait very long. Is the shield tablet K1 for $199 a good deal even with a new one likely coming this year? Would I get a better deal with the Google Pixel C with its Tegra X1? I don't hear the best of reviews out of the Pixel C.

Nothing other then the nvidia shield android tv runs anything close to playable. I would recommend buying the best laptop you can get for 600 and just use the desktop version of dolphin.

(01-17-2016, 06:50 AM)Shadicbypass Wrote: [ -> ]Nothing other then the nvidia shield android tv runs anything close to playable. I would recommend buying the best laptop you can get for 600 and just use the desktop version of dolphin.

The Pixel C has the exact same SoC as the Shield TV. the K1 tablet runs Pikmin 2 very well but its 32-bit. The surface actually IS a desktop but I don't know how well it performs.

(01-17-2016, 07:27 AM)BFCE Wrote: [ -> ]The Pixel C has the exact same SoC as the Shield TV. the K1 tablet runs Pikmin 2 very well but its 32-bit. The surface actually IS a desktop but I don't know how well it performs.

The pixel c does not feature full opengl like thenvidia shield android though. You are better getting a 600 dollardesktop or laptop

(01-17-2016, 07:35 AM)Shadicbypass Wrote: [ -> ]The pixel c does not feature full opengl like thenvidia shield android though. You are better getting a 600 dollardesktop or laptop

This does not matter.

(12-09-2015, 06:29 PM)Sonicadvance1 Wrote: [ -> ]I guess I'll post here.
Google is shipping the Pixel C with Nvidia's OpenGL ES 3.2 driver. They have disabled desktop OpenGL again.
Luckily though, since it is Nvidia. They have all the extensions required to not have a visible impact on performance anymore.

There are only /very/ minor things missing when running under Nvidia's latest ES 3.2 driver. Here's a list of the things still broken or not working there in Dolphin.
- EFB Color peeks - This can be fixed, I just haven't felt like it. We expect BGRA, we give it RGBA under ES.
- Video dumping - This can actually be enabled on Tegra since they support an extension that would work around the issue. Wanted to implement it differently so all ES devices could use it (Mainly for FifoCI)
- LogicOps - Who cares, these aren't available in ES 2.0 or higher.
- Texture LOD bias - This isn't supported by ES or by an extension. We could emulate this ourselves fairly easily. This will most likely never be noticed in any game.
- Texture dumping - Another thing that I can't care enough to make work under ES. It's fairly easy to fix, haven't seen a reason to spend time fixing it.

And that's it, that's all that is different between running in ES 3.2 + all of Nvidia's extensions versus their GL 4.5 driver.
Everything else is properly implemented for performance and correct emulation(In the GPU emulation at least), so no one will notice anything different than running it on another Tegra device that has desktop GL. Unless of course you hit those specific things(EFB color peeks being the big broken item there).

I'll also leave with this remark. Just because Nvidia does this well under their ES 3.2 driver, doesn't mean the other mobile vendors will do this well.
The other mobile vendors don't support near as many extensions as Nvidia, so they will still hit performance issues and feature losses depending on what they've implemented. I'll be able to find out exactly what they are missing in the future when they release their drivers.

(01-17-2016, 07:47 AM)BFCE Wrote: [ -> ]This does not matter.

I forgot all about that my fault. You are still better off buying a 600 dollar laptop.

(01-17-2016, 09:02 AM)Shadicbypass Wrote: [ -> ]I forgot all about that my fault. You are still better off buying a 600 dollar laptop.

I want something a little bit more portable than a laptop. Surface pro 3????????/????/?

ultrabook

(01-17-2016, 10:35 AM)BFCE Wrote: [ -> ]I want something a little bit more portable than a laptop. Surface pro 3????????/????/?

ultrabook

I am playing games at full speed with my Intel Atom (Z8300) doing the following:

1. Lower desktop resolution to 640x480.  It does help with speed and it keeps the temperature low = no/less throttling.

2. On power options, select high performance (if available).

3. Use the ishiiruka build of dolphin.  On that version enable directx12 and also enable fast efb access.

Remember that this is on a weak Atom SoC. The Z8500 and Z8700 are stronger.

You can also buy a Surface Pro 2, which uses a ULV Core i5.  It is dual core so it works better with dolphin, and it can play games at full speed without using the tricks above, but you can use them too if you want.  Do not listen to the hate that ULV CPUs get.  Nowadays, Intel Ultra Low Voltage CPU are as strong as the MQ or HQ versions of mobile i5/i7.


My main device for emulation is my Asus Q552 laptop with a i7 6500U and 940M GPU. It is running all GameCube and PS3 games I throw at it at full speed in 3x resolution with no throttling. AND that is without using Directx 12, so using that is even faster, with even lower temperatures and power draw.


TL;DR Dolphin can run fine if you nowadays with ULV CPUs, and even on some Atoms SoC if it's supports DX12.

Okay but the reason we don't recommend ULV is *because* they throttle to hell.

Also, lol.

(01-17-2016, 10:35 AM)BFCE Wrote: [ -> ]I want something a little bit more portable than a laptop. Surface pro 3????????/????/?

ultrabook

Then yeah the surface pro 3 is your best choice.