Gaming Why does my PC emulate GC/Wii and PS2 so slowly

[rasputin]

weird, is your friend running them at a low resolution?

 

[exangel]

Fudge I was able to get some older RPG's & platformers running okay (not all games! just FFX & I think even Kingdom Hearts after a bit of tweaking) even on a 2007 laptop: A dual core, 2 ghz turion 64 laptop (with 512mb dedicated Radeon HD 2600 graphics/4gb RAM) (ASUS F3Ka-A1)
Running Windows 7 64 bit of course.

What game(s) are you using to test your emulation speed? Do know that YMMV with every single game. I get better performance on my 3.5ghz Phenom II x6 system with Final Fantasy 12, and Digital Devil Saga gives me problems that I haven't solved even now in most of the environments.

edit: technical detail

 

[Fudge]

I'm using Okami and Gitaroo Man. Do they have problems with PCSX2?

 

[DKAngel]

try some less demanding games? maybe start with ffx and go from there? see how the emulator runs. even with my setup i cant get certain games running at fullspeed.
i can get 100fps+ out of ffx and ffxii on my rig

oh and sorry i didnt realise the bulldozers supported sse4.1 and 4.2

 

[exangel]

I don't know. I have Okami but probably can't test it on my laptop all that soon.
If I can get it working at playable speeds on it, you should by all means be able to as well. If the problem is specifically Okami I have a little insight as to why (if you get a game like FFX running smoothly yet Okami still lags).

But I just thought of something else that would be very easy to overlook. What are your SPU settings? See if you get a different framerate with sound emulation completely disabled.
Sound was one of the things I had to pare down to the barest in order to get Kingdom Hearts to playable speed on the laptop.

 

[DKAngel]

might go look through my ps2 draw for okami see if i have it but isnt it a really intensive 3d game?
the sound wouldnt be a problem since its on its own core now would it?

 

[exangel]

I don't understand what you mean by the sound being on its own core.
I never heard anything about PCSX2 allocating a whole core for SPU emulation alone. I don't know what else you could possibly mean.

Okami's entire game environment appears to be dynamically rendered 3D; in contrast, a game like FFX is heavily prerendered leaving less work for the emulator to do, to achieve realtime emulation speeds.

 

[DKAngel]

rofl ignore me was thinking of something else =]

 

[Fudge]

Where do I go to turn sound emulation off? I can find my SPU2 settings, but their isn't any option to completely disable sound.

 

[exangel]

SPU2-X Settings
Mixing Settings pick:

• Interpolation - 0 - Nearest
• Disable Effects Processing

Output Settings pick:

• Module - 0 - Emulate SPU2 only

everything else can be default. This is the maximum possible reduction in CPU time used on sound processing, but I'm only suggesting this to see if it has any effect on your emulation speed. please also describe your results with FFX, if possible, instead of Okami, since FFX is one of the known best games for success & comparison

 

[sweenish]

Well maybe you should check out techradars review of said processor here's some of what they say:

"for a quad-core PC processor, even one designed for laptops rather than desktop PCs, the AMD A8-3500M's raw CPU performance is mediocre. That's because the clockspeed is limited to just 1.5GHz when all four cores are crunching numbers. In fact, in our testing we never detected any cores running beyond 1.5GHz, though AMD says it does happen when only one or two cores are under load."

I'm resigned to the fact that intel has never let me down in a side by side comparison to AMD CPU's.

never? the P4 and athlon would like to have a word with you.

 

[RchUncleSkeleton]

I'm resigned to the fact that intel has never let me down in a side by side comparison to AMD CPU's.

never? the P4 and athlon would like to have a word with you.

My P4 Northwood 2.4Ghz HT wiped the floor with my buddies Athlon Barton 2800+, which had the supposed performance rating of 2.8Ghz,
and it wasn't overclocked at all.
Maybe you thought you were talking to a dummy, but on the contrary you're talking to someone who's been building computers and working on them for 10 years.

 

[Originality]

10 years of building computers badly and working on them to fix them up... That's impressive.
Only kidding. The point is that it doesn't matter how long you've been working with computers or how experienced you are, the only thing that matters is how you can answer the question in the OP. Take off-topic arguments to the private messages where you can go wild.

On topic, which would emulate with faster performance, the PS2 copy of Okami, or the Wii port?

 

[Fudge]

SPU2-X Settings
Mixing Settings pick:

• Interpolation - 0 - Nearest
• Disable Effects Processing

Output Settings pick:

• Module - 0 - Emulate SPU2 only

everything else can be default. This is the maximum possible reduction in CPU time used on sound processing, but I'm only suggesting this to see if it has any effect on your emulation speed. please also describe your results with FFX, if possible, instead of Okami, since FFX is one of the known best games for success & comparison

I just tried this with Gitaroo Man. I actually got worse performance.

 

[exangel]

-snip-

I just tried this with Gitaroo Man. I actually got worse performance.

Spoiler: Notes about SPU2 Plugin from Official 0.9.8 Config Guide

SPU2-X
The latest and best sound plugin at the time of writing this. It was first based on Gigaherz's SPU2 and later modified by Jake Stine (Air) of the PCSX2 team.
This is the only SPU2 plugin that supports effects processing (like reverb) and Dolby Pro Logic (II) (if your sound card is able to decode it).
It's also the most advanced in emulating the chip correctly. Many games only work with SPU2-X!

• Interpolation: Here you can select 1 out of 5 options:
  1)Nearest: As the description says, no interpolation is done in this mode and is the fastest one.
  2)Linear: Does linear interpolation on sound, fast.
  3)Cubic: This is another type of interpolation. Slower, with good highs.
  4)Hermite: This is the recommended option. Closest to what the PS2 would produce, thus the most accurate, but a bit slower than the above.
  5)Catmull-Rom: This is another type of interpolation. Slow, higher quality.
• Disable effects processing: Checking this will disable any emulation of effects like reverb, lowering sound quality but increasing speed.
• Reverb boost factor: As described, boosts by the selected factor the intensity of reverb effects. Can cause sound bugs.
• Enable debug options: Checking this will make the Configure Debug Options button available. When clicked it will present you with various logging options which can be enabled for debugging purposes. Should only be used by developers.
• Module: Here you can select 1 out of 5 settings, which are different ways of outputting sound in your system:
  1)No sound: Will not produce any sound (mute) resulting in best speed.
  2)X Audio 2: This is the recommended method, works better under Vista so XP users might want to try the third option.
  3)DirectSound: Should be slightly worse than X Audio 2,use it if it works better for you.
  4)Wave out: Not recommended, option 2 or 3 should always work better.
  5)Portaudio: Uses a crossplatform library called Portaudio. This is the only option aside from no sound in Linux.
• Latency: The lower the latency value the smaller audio delay you will have. Note that setting latency too low WILL cause cracks and pops in sound, so change the values until you find the lowest one that works with your game without causing cracks.
• Synchronizing mode:
  • TimeStretch: The default and recommended setting. This keeps audio and video in sync, and also helps eliminate cracks and other sound problems. Note that if your speed is low, your sound will also be as slow as your video with this setting.
  • Async Mix: Makes the audio out of sync with the video, so you will get normal sound speed even if your frame rate is not optimal. Can cause games to hang or crash so use with caution!
  • None: Audio will skip if you set this mode and you don't get max speed with the game you're running. Small FPS boost.
• Advanced: Here you can fine tune how your selected time stretcher will work. As described in the GUI, larger values are better if you are not getting good speeds while the opposite is true if you're running your game above full speed. Pressing Reset to Defaults will set all values here back in their initial setting.
• Audio Expansion mode: Here you can choose if you want the audio produced from the plugin to be expanded to your whole speaker configuration and not just in 2 channels (stereo). Only usable with the XAudio2 module.
  • Stereo: Default setting, no audio expansion when this is selected.
  • Quadrafonic: Will expand audio to 4 speakers
  • Surround 5.1: Will expand audio to 5.1 surround speakers
  • Surround 7.1: Will expand audio to 7.1 surround speakers
• Use a Winamp DSP plugin: If you don't know what this is, leave it be. (Not available in Linux at the moment.)

I don't understand why you're getting less performance from reducing the amount of information your CPU has to process. It's possible that dynamic underclocking features in your laptop's architecture (not that I know if it happens to have any, but my 2007 laptop doesn't) -- could be causing your issues with framerate. At this point I think I have to give up and either let someone else take over helping you, or hope that you'll look to the PCSX2 official forums for others who have gotten success with similar specs.

 

[sweenish]

I'm resigned to the fact that intel has never let me down in a side by side comparison to AMD CPU's.

never? the P4 and athlon would like to have a word with you.

My P4 Northwood 2.4Ghz HT wiped the floor with my buddies Athlon Barton 2800+, which had the supposed performance rating of 2.8Ghz,
and it wasn't overclocked at all.
Maybe you thought you were talking to a dummy, but on the contrary you're talking to someone who's been building computers and working on them for 10 years.

wikipedia says: (emphasis added)
By the time of Barton's release, the Northwood-based Pentium 4 had become more than competitive with AMD's processors.[24]

however, before that time, the P4 was getting its trash kicked by athlon chips. that's a fact. the original thunderbird (circa 2000) athlon ran circles around the P4 of the era, and that continued right up until this barton/northwood (circa 2003) generation. that's three years smack dab in the middle of your 10+ years of experience that you decided to conveniently forget. add to that athlon "classic" was no slouch, either, and the window is potentiall longer.

don't pretend that calling me stupid and touting personal experience are supporting arguments. i also happen to know exactly what i'm talking about.

 

[RchUncleSkeleton]

wikipedia says: (emphasis added)
By the time of Barton's release, the Northwood-based Pentium 4 had become more than competitive with AMD's processors.[24]

however, before that time, the P4 was getting its trash kicked by athlon chips. that's a fact. the original thunderbird (circa 2000) athlon ran circles around the P4 of the era, and that continued right up until this barton/northwood (circa 2003) generation. that's three years smack dab in the middle of your 10+ years of experience that you decided to conveniently forget. add to that athlon "classic" was no slouch, either, and the window is potentiall longer.

don't pretend that calling me stupid and touting personal experience are supporting arguments. i also happen to know exactly what i'm talking about.

Did I ever claim to have experience with athlon's and P4's in 2000, sorry but I didn't. Can you even count? Or did you forget what year it was? Also you can say anything you like but saying P4 vs Athlon is a general term and doesn't single out a specific model, that's like saying that Toyota is better than Honda just because the 2005 Corolla had more horse power than the 2005 Civic(Not that it does).

The whole point is that I said Intel has never let "ME" down in a side by side comparison, I wasn't claiming that Intel has always pwn'd AMD. If you took the time to actually read what I wrote you'd know that.

 

[Originality]

That's enough kids. Stop stealing the thread.

 

[sweenish]

wikipedia says: (emphasis added)
By the time of Barton's release, the Northwood-based Pentium 4 had become more than competitive with AMD's processors.[24]

however, before that time, the P4 was getting its trash kicked by athlon chips. that's a fact. the original thunderbird (circa 2000) athlon ran circles around the P4 of the era, and that continued right up until this barton/northwood (circa 2003) generation. that's three years smack dab in the middle of your 10+ years of experience that you decided to conveniently forget. add to that athlon "classic" was no slouch, either, and the window is potentiall longer.

don't pretend that calling me stupid and touting personal experience are supporting arguments. i also happen to know exactly what i'm talking about.

Did I ever claim to have experience with athlon's and P4's in 2000, sorry but I didn't. Can you even count? Or did you forget what year it was? Also you can say anything you like but saying P4 vs Athlon is a general term and doesn't single out a specific model, that's like saying that Toyota is better than Honda just because the 2005 Corolla had more horse power than the 2005 Civic(Not that it does).

The whole point is that I said Intel has never let "ME" down in a side by side comparison, I wasn't claiming that Intel has always pwn'd AMD. If you took the time to actually read what I wrote you'd know that.

i can count. 10 years ago is still 2002, which still makes me right, since your gen didn't launch until 2003. and i did use general terms. you know why? generally, it's a correct statement. P4 may have caught up at the end of the athlon's life, but the fact is that athlon chips were for the most part better than P4 chips. of course there are blips.

i should also note that you've called me names and insulted me. i have not flamed you at all.

also, nice edit. changed 10+ years to just 10. Should have changed it to 9, but i'm guessing you didn't want to be too obvious.

and as far as never letting you down personally, that's fine. i came in for a civilized side-debate (apologies to originality, he seems to be taking way too much offense. especially since the thread question was answered on page 1. inferior cpu == inferior emulator performance. clocks aren't everything), and you started with the name-calling. you'll note that i never stooped to that. at worst, my mistake was assuming that you were my age, which is something that i tend to to.

 

[DinohScene]

I haven't kept up with the discussion but I have 1 thing to say.

If you're annoyed by the fact that your PC can't emulate it well just buy the damned console and hack it for crying out loud.
The fact that you're emulating a console already says that you're pirating the games as well.

There is your "perfect" emulation speed and it doesn't cost you a fxcking fortune to get a PC that is capable of emulating it on full speed.

I might get a lot of reactions to my reply but I cannot be arsed to reply to them.

tl;dr.
If you want perfect speed on a PS2/GCN/Wii/Xbox then buy the console and hack it for piracy.