Even overclocked if emulation of 6th generation (GC generation) or newer is your goal and you want the most compatibility with your collection of games then honestly a CPU with better STP (Single threaded performance) would be a good choice.
If you are willing to buy used a Haswell i5/i7 can possibly be found cheaply and can handle what you want easily. If you would rather only use new parts a Pentium G4560 based system can easily come in around the $400 range (less if you have good parts you can already use.... though your ram would need to be changed to ddr4/ddr3l depending on the motherboard).
Here is a part picker UK (so depending on where you live prices will vary) that Helios likes to post
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/hkYKm8
The nice advantage is that this system will not only handle most of Dolphin 1080P (there are always edge cases), but the nice graphical upgrade a 1050 gives you will easily handle some new PC games (GTA 5, Overwatch, and other).... though it is not a future proof system for New PC gamesand newer games made to push the limits or for what ever console generation comes next will probably start to make this setup show its weaknesses (2cores with hyper threading only, 2GB Vram, to name a couple).
(08-11-2017, 10:19 AM)TKSilver Wrote: [ -> ]Even overclocked if emulation of 6th generation (GC generation) or newer is your goal and you want the most compatibility with your collection of games then honestly a CPU with better STP (Single threaded performance) would be a good choice.
If you are willing to buy used a Haswell i5/i7 can possibly be found cheaply and can handle what you want easily. If you would rather only use new parts a Pentium G4560 based system can easily come in around the $400 range (less if you have good parts you can already use.... though your ram would need to be changed to ddr4/ddr3l depending on the motherboard).
Here is a part picker UK (so depending on where you live prices will vary) that Helios likes to post
https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/list/hkYKm8
The nice advantage is that this system will not only handle most of Dolphin 1080P (there are always edge cases), but the nice graphical upgrade a 1050 gives you will easily handle some new PC games (GTA 5, Overwatch, and other).... though it is not a future proof system for New PC gamesand newer games made to push the limits or for what ever console generation comes next will probably start to make this setup show its weaknesses (2cores with hyper threading only, 2GB Vram, to name a couple).
I'm fine with buying used, since it would save me money. I am guessing if I did so, I wouldn't have to buy a 60 dollar cooling system. Are you saying the Pentium isn't future proof, or the i5/i7, or both? I really would like for it to be futureproof so I don't have to spend so much money in the future.
I would also need to replace the motherboard. Is there a way to get a good mobo and ram on the cheap (I.e. 20-40 instead of 60-90), that way I could focus on the CPU. Thanks!
So the Haswell i5/i7 (4000 numbered series) are both compatible with your ddr3 ram (that is one reason I recommended those). The Haswell motherboard socket type is LGA 1150. And technically (depending on the resolution you really "have to have") you could replace the Processor and Motherboard and really keep the rest (at least temporarily) and have a well working emulation PC. Higher internal resolution and enhancements (AA/AF/ect) might not work great on your GPU and newer native PC games will have issues with your CPU.
Recommended (i5 46xx or i7 47xx with a base clock of 3GHz and a boost of 3.5GHz or higher for the most compatibility in 6th gen emulation)
The Pentium system would need a different motherboard and Ram since it is not compatible with your current equipment but the GPU/power supply/case/storage are all fine to use. The advantage of the Pentium system is that as long as you get a LGA 1151 compatible Core (i3/i5/i7) processor (skylake/or kaby lake) you can upgrade it in the future with a used chip to extend the life of the motherboard (and ram or anything else in the system dependent on the motherboard/chipset) and get a performance boost cheaper. (This is the riding the backside of the Computer power curve, buying used from people who have to have the latest). So in 2 or more CPU generations when Skylake and Kaby lake are a cheap as haswell is now you can use a high end used one to get more life out of your system.
Nothing is future proof. Currently going form a 4th gen intel core i7 top end to a 7th gen intel core i7 as yeilded better performance (7700k stp -- 2,333 vs 4770k stp -- 2,254) but not that much better.
Btw the G4560 compared using this test is stp -- 1,992 and a haswell i5 4460 (a nice mid range i5 you can find used) is 1946. These perform fine in Dolphin and really most of the other CPUs in this range should also be fine (PCSX2 in case you are curious recommends a score of 1600 for moderate PS2 games and 2000 for demanding ones)
https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.html
The GPU future proof is going to really depend on the native PC games you want to play. For emulation 1080p a 750ti level of performance or higher should do fine, but native PC games are a lot more demanding on the GPU (less on the CPU usually)
A good rule of thumb for Nvida (someone who knows AMD better will have to handle team red's cards) is each generation your card goes down 1 level (or more) Example the 780Ti in modern AAA games sits right around the 1050-1050ti-1060 range of cards (this is a mix of architecture changes and VRAM amounts). Eventually even a GTX 1080ti will not run a game even at low settings.... it will just take it longer then a 1050.
So if you have to play the latest and greatest you will pay for the privilege or you can buy lower end newer cards and dominate the settings of older games for a lot less. (up to you)
Finding an ivy bridge based system with a non overclocking motherboard should be doable if you don't mind lookinh at used OEM system like HP/Dell and the like. Otherwise you are going to spend quite a bit trying to get an overclockable motherboard for Ivy bridge/haswell meaning it would be cheaper and easier just to by a whole new intel setup. So yeah my i5 ivy bridged based system is pretty decent for my needs with the 4.2ghz oc I have. The only reson I would replace it is if something happens and the hardware gets fried or if I feel like I need more cores in which case I would go the amd ryzen route over intel.