Powerful Machine... will it help ?

[kayoto]

Hello everybody, I'm new to your community.
I'm currently working with a Powerful machine compare to regular home-user machine, and my friend suggest me to try ask the development of Dolphin if it will help to test it, but I didn't know how to contact with the developers because I didn't see any contact on the official dolphin site (maybe I missed it ?)

current equipment:
Dual Xeon 3.0 Ghz (2 cpu's of Intel Xeon )
4 GB Ram
1 TB HD Sata2 (using HighSpeed Scsi Raid system)
Nvidia Quadro Fx 540 (Will upgrade to something much more stronger ASAP)

I never tried the emulator before (I just downloaded it first time) and If I can help in anyway to test specific stuff such as FPS or anything else, I will be happy to help.

If it's nothing to help with its ok, I just thought I can help test specific stuff with your development, so please feel free to ask at anytime.


Sorry about my Bad English.

[Coco]

It's a pretty good machine but they don't need someone with a faster machine to test it. Odds are it would run a little faster for you then most people, but they arn't worried about the speed right now. Plus they already have a full beta tester crew. Of course you're more then welcome to test it yourself and see how it goes, but as far as an actual beta tester goes having a faster machine isn't really important.

[Falcon4ever]

Well coco explained enough I guess.
From my point of view I would suggest you to just tryout the dolphin 1.03 beta which is posted in this forum. And post some results here...

[Toasty]

4 Ghz Ram
Yes, I'm a nitpicker - but I think you mean 4 GB. :P

[kayoto]

Thank you guys for the kind respond, (Toasty - Hehe yeah, my bad I just fixed that).

I will try it on that computer propably, I wonder if it will run ok I'll be happy to tell you guys :)

any recommanded Game that should work almost perfect or perfect that you recommand me to test ?

[LegendOfStern]

I was just wondering a similar question about my machine.

Specs:
Athlon 64 FX-53
GeForce 7800 GTX (non-sli :()
80GB 7200rpm WD IDE HDD
250GB 7200rpm SATA1 WD HDD
1GB Kingston ValueRam (nothing special)

To give you an idea of how it performs, I can run Luigi's Mansion up to the start screen at 1024x768 with ps 2.0, hal, 4x multisampling at an average of 40fps.

Can I be of any use testing?

[Blacklord]

Hehe i like the intel Xeon. I too wanna know how it'll work(i'm gonna get Xeon's brother this summer i think it was called Itanium?).

[Guru64]

If the developers need more testers, they will ask for them. Also:
http://www.emutalk.net/dolphin/18442-rules-forum-faq-read-before-posting.html

You can't ask to be a beta tester.

[GCFreak]

Nvidia Quadro Fx 540 (Will upgrade to something much more stronger ASAP)

A quadro FX won't help as it's not made for gaming. The 7800GTX will do nicely.

[Coco]

A quadro FX won't help as it's not made for gaming. The 7800GTX will do nicely.

It's not a huge issue, as long as you have a video card that supports all the needed features. In otherwords any fifth gen nvidia card or anything above a 9800 from ATI will run dolphin just as well. The bottle neck is entirely on the CPU right now. Most people can play at 1600x1200 or 320x240 at exactly the same speeds.

[LegendOfStern]

Do dual core cpu's perform better than single cored ones? And does anyone here have a Athlon 64 FX-60? Just curious as to how that performs with Dolphin.

[Coco]

No dual cores don't help as dolphin isn't programmed to make use of dual cores at all. Quite a few have tried.

[Urok]

As with most emulation goes, CPU speed is key. Your best bet to getting a good framerate is get the fastest single core processor you can get your hands on. I personally would recommend an Opteron 146/148 which runs a stock 2.0/2.2GHz respectively, but since it's server-grade construction, many of these chips can overclock to 2.8GHz and beyond which is equivalent to the sub-$1000 AMD FX-57. I would hold off on dualies for now until nearly all programs can natively supprt both cores. The FX-60 runs at only 2.6GHz so it would only do you good if you do lots of multitasking. I've got an Opteron 146 (CABYE 0540FPMW) myself which runs at FX-59 speeds (3GHz) on air. Now I'm just waiting to get a 7800 GT and I should be set for gaming once again.

[DOGG]

Hehe i like the intel Xeon. I too wanna know how it'll work(i'm gonna get Xeon's brother this summer i think it was called Itanium?).
You realise that itanium has a completely different instruction set? What this means is it won't run anything made for normal AMD/intel cpus.

Besides that, why invest in such an expensive CPU when you can get a cheap one and overclock it?

Like the guy above said, opterons are good for overclocking. But i got myself a 3700+ 'san diego' (KAB3E 0546FPAW) (AU$348). It overclocks from 2.2ghz to 2.85hgz on it's stock cooler. That's faster than an FX-57 (AU$1600+). If i got high end air cooling i could push it to 3ghz i reckon.

[Trev0r]

Wow, I didn't even know anyone on this forum knew anything about computers and overclocking. I have my x2 3800+ running @ 2.5ghz (faster than x2 4600+)

I need to update my sig lol

Edit: sig updated

[Trev0r]

Dual Xeon 3.0 Ghz (2 cpu's of Intel Xeon )

Theres no point in using a server cpu for games, plus they usually need registered ram which have horrendous timings and such.


4 GB Ram

Having 4 gigs of ram will not make any difference in game(that are out today)
and would make no difference with dolphin. I might make a difference if you want to have a zillion programs running and use dolphin at the same time though.



1 TB HD Sata2 (using HighSpeed Scsi Raid system)

Neither would this make a difference with dophin except the rom might take a few more miliseconds to load and you would be able to hold loads of gamecube roms. Of course that would be a fortune spent on roms unless...

Sata2 and scsi are totally different interfaces and do not have to do with each other.



Nvidia Quadro Fx 540 (Will upgrade to something much more stronger ASAP)

Waste of money, the only difference with quadro series are are some extra features for CAD or something and costs more than double the price.

The quadros are exactly like the geforce except that and don't have any extra speed in games. Infact I believe the geforce can be modded to quadro.
correct me if i'm wrong on this.

Oh I think the differences is better driver support for compatability or something. It's stupid.

[GCFreak]

Infact I believe the geforce can be modded to quadro.
correct me if i'm wrong on this.


They can, I've got my GeForce FX 5600 Softmodded to Quadro FX 1000.

[Blacklord]

I don't know about cpu overclocking and what it is but i know that it's best just to get a inteligent cpu(like my current gateway laptop whose cpu runs faster than a dual macitosh@2.0ghz). So i guess buying a itanium would be a waste but it's still worth it(i like expensive stuff). It indeed has been demonstated that a fast cpu isn't always the best for example my nx9100 laptop had a intel 3.2 Ghz cpu(fastest laptop yet) But the gateway GZ(see sig) laughs in its face with just a 1.6@ghz prossesor.

[LalaKSlayer]

I don't know about cpu overclocking and what it is but i know that it's best just to get a inteligent cpu(like my current gateway laptop whose cpu runs faster than a dual macitosh@2.0ghz). So i guess buying a itanium would be a waste but it's still worth it(i like expensive stuff). It indeed has been demonstated that a fast cpu isn't always the best for example my nx9100 laptop had a intel 3.2 Ghz cpu(fastest laptop yet) But the gateway GZ(see sig) laughs in its face with just a 1.6@ghz prossesor.

Overclocking means: making your cpu runs faster than it's supposed to run, but it's dangerous to do it when you doesn't have good hardware experience, because you can exagerate and than, well, your cpu will die...

[Doomulation]

But there are lots of nice guides out there how to do it :) It's relatively safe if you follow them. As long as you don't push the hardware too much, you shouldn't have to worry about much.

[_PeloMan_]

overclock a system isn't dangerous if you know what are you doing and you know your hardware limits

[TerraPhantm]

Overclocking nowadays isn't dangerous at all, as long as you don't overload your cpu with too many volts (most motherboards are incapable of this anyways). A dual core gives no performance boost to dolphin because dolphin is not programmed to run in SMP. I have an Athlon 64 X2 4400 at 2.7GHz, and my framerate is not better then anyone elses.

Also Quadro's are useless unless you do things like CAD and 3d modeling. They are generally based off of GeForces, but sell for 300%-500% more then the comparable GeForce. Also not all GeForces can be modded into Quadro's, the 6800s were the easiest to mod however.