Building a new computer

[Kargaroc]

Okay, I was thinking about this for a few months, and I figured, I need to build a new computer. My current comp is 6 years old, and runs Dolphin at 1 fps, and does not display correctly.

 

The computer has to be able to run gamecube games at full speed, and Wii games at a playable speed. Now I wanted to spend about 500 to 700 dollars.

 

I don't even know how to build a computer.

 

Sure, I know how to put the parts together and "build" a computer, but with computer parts, there's over 9000 things that you have to look at when choosing parts, and that's confusing.

 

 

So... can anyone help me?

[Secant]

Sounds like you want a gaming computer, which isn't too difficult to set up. The three biggest components you need to worry about are the processor, the graphics card, and RAM.

 

For the processor, I recommend at least a Core 2 Duo at 3 GHz, but if you can find one, a quad-core is even better in some cases (just make sure to get an operating system that supports it, you'll most likely also want it to be 64-bit). I think some quad-core processors have managed to hit the 3 GHz mark now, so splurge for that if possible.

 

As for the graphics card, I would have to recommend nVidia. I've been using ATI Radeon cards for a while, but they just don't seem to perform all that well. Spend at least a good 60 dollars on one (for example, this is the one I'm thinking of upgrading to), and make sure it's got at least 1 GB of dedicated video RAM.

 

As for your computer RAM, you'll want enough to be able to handle intensive programs. DDR3 is a must, but how much of it to get depends on how much you like to multitask. 2 GB is probably the minimum you'll want, but to be safe, 3 GB will ensure you can run (for example) Windows 7 64-bit as well as several other programs without having to resort to virtual RAM, which slows things down considerably. I splurged for 3 GB, personally, which only costs 20 dollars more, so I'd say it's worth it. If you want to be extra safe, though (say, play multiple games at once while having music playing, IM protocols, a bunch of tabs in a web browser, etc.) then just go for 4 GB.

 

Hard drive space will also be something to consider in the long run; 500 GB should last long enough for you and isn't too expensive. SATA is, of course, a must (hell, comparable IDE/EIDE hard drives cost at least 3 times as much and run half as fast), and you'll want at the absolute minimum 7200 RPM on it.

 

I'm pretty sure mostly everything else isn't incredibly important, so just get the standards on the rest of the hardware, and if it turns out you're having problems, run a diagnosis on your hardware and see what might be causing the problem.

 

Long post is long as hell, but hope it helps.

[Kargaroc]

I looked at that GeForce 9800 GT card... It seems that it comes with 512 MB in it.

 

Do you know how that performs in Dolphin?

 

I honestly don't play "modern" games. I just want to play Wii and GC games at full speed.

 

I was thinking about an i5 or some AMD processor. Something relatively new, yet not bleeding edge.

 

I was thinking that the motherboard... I don't need integrated graphics or sound, but something I wanted (and I don't know if all motherboards have this or not) was that the board should have all solid capacitors, as well as at least 1 conventional PCI slot so that I can use my sound card that has a built in FM synthesizer.

 

 

Hmmm... the OS... I don't know if I could afford Windows 7...

 

It seems like the only choice for most purposes though.

[Secant]

You have to understand that for playing GC/Wii games, you'll be using Dolphin, which can't necessarily run games at full speed no matter how good your setup is. As it is, you'll still want a cutting-edge graphics card; the one I suggested is one Zeth recommended to me, and he said it was even better than his in terms of performance. 512 MB of dedicated RAM is still good for the purposes of most games. AMD as a processor should do okay with you, but I would definitely get at least a dual-core. You can also download a Linux-based OS if you can't afford Windows 7--Ubuntu is very user-friendly and operates similarly to Windows in many respects, and if you have trouble, there's a very large community that can answer questions.

[xdaniel]

For comparison's sake, some infos about how well Dolphin, v3.0 as released a few days ago, runs on my system...

 

AMD Athlon 64 X2 4200+ CPU, 2x 2200 MHz

Aeneon 2 GB DDR2-RAM, PC2-6400

ECS GeForce7050M-M mainboard, based on NVIDIA nForce 560

ATI Radeon HD 5450 PCI-E video card, 512 MB DDR2-RAM

Windows XP Professional SP3

 

As you can see, she's it's not much of a gaming powerhouse anymore. As for Dolphin...

 

Sonic Adventure 2 Battle: in-game (Hero side stage 1, City Escape) hovering just slightly below 50% speed, as given by Dolphin, generally between 45 and 48%

Metroid Prime: in-game (outside Frigate Orpheon, start of game) around 40% speed, which tends to drop to around 35% at times

F-Zero GX: in-game (Grand Prix mode, Ruby, Mute City) between 18% and 20%, which translates back into 3-4(!) FPS, completely unplayable - as far as I'm aware, F-Zero GX uses some insane floating point library or something, which is pretty intense to emulate correctly

 

I guess this gives a good idea on what kind of hardware you're looking at, especially if you want every game to run at a playable speed. Also keep in mind that, while there are triple- or quad-core CPUs, as far as I'm aware Dolphin itself can only use two cores - don't make this a point against buying a triple-/quad-core tho if you can get one for a reasonable price.

 

...but if I'm honest, if it's just about Wii or GameCube games, I'd just get a real Wii or GCN.

 

(Hope this made sense, very late and very tired...)

[Conker]

I stopped using Dolphin ever since I softmodded my Wii. The speed of Dolphin was horrible, and that softmod was the final nail in the coffin. Glad I did it.

[Kargaroc]

Sure... My Wii is softmodded as well. It's just so tedious to have to burn a disk every time you want to test a hack and AR codes are impossible without additional hardware...

 

I figured that Dolphin would help somewhat with that.

 

Hmm... Maybe I should look at Intel...

 

I was thinking an i5 2500 CPU (3.3 GHz quad core), possibly this motherboard, the video card that you linked me to, and 4 GB of RAM.

 

This is just preliminary though, of course.

[Arcaith]

I tend to get around 100% speed, the lowest drop I usually get is around 45% during loading. The rest of the time the range is about 100-90%.

 

That's on an i7 860 running at 2GHz per core (so running below spec), 16GB RAM at about 1033MHz and 2 Radeon 5770s.

[Secant]

I was thinking an i5 2500 CPU (3.3 GHz quad core), possibly this motherboard, the video card that you linked me to, and 4 GB of RAM.

 

This is just preliminary though, of course.

Now we're talking. That processor/motherboard combo is pretty epic, you've got (it looks like) support for up to 4 SATA hard drives, which offers plenty of space for games or backups or both, as well as three PCIe x16 expansion slots, which will provide tons of room for extra components you may want to add. This will also give you access to some of the best graphics cards on the market, as PCIe is much faster than AGP/PCI-based cards. One thing to consider when buying a graphics card is your monitor. Make sure you get a card that natively supports VGA or DVI, whichever you have (VGA plugs are generally blue 9-pin D-shaped male connectors, DVI plugs are usually white, 15-pin (?) rectangular male connectors). You can buy an adapter to fit a VGA connector into a DVI port on a graphics card, but this bottlenecks its capabilities, and it's really better in terms of performance if you just buy a card that natively supports VGA. Of course, if you have a really good DVI monitor, nothing to worry about there, the one I sent you should perform fantastically for you.

 

TL;DR? If that's in your budget, buy it naoz. That's a fantastic setup you've planned out.

[Vex]

I stopped using Dolphin ever since I softmodded my Wii. The speed of Dolphin was horrible, and that softmod was the final nail in the coffin. Glad I did it.

 

Dolphin requires a dual-core processor. Well, not requires, but it will make use of both cores if you have one. Once you have a dual-core of higher, you don't even need much RAM. Maybe 1GB?

[Kargaroc]

One of the things that I like Dolphin for is cheat codes on GC games with no additional hardware.

 

I'm thinking about getting This video card instead of the 9800GT that you linked to me. It seems to be much faster (and much more expensive X( ).

 

Plus I'd like to play Portal 2 soon...

[Secant]

I wouldn't recommend an overkill graphics card like that only because it's not particularly cost effective. You probably don't want to spend more than $150 on this component because beyond those prices, the processing power goes down per dollar spent, so it's not really worth it--you're mainly paying to have better hardware sooner rather than better hardware proportional to the amount of money spent. If you absolutely know for a fact you want the finest graphics card you can buy, though, go for it--I recently got a card that's barely half as powerful as that and it works wonders for me on all the games I've run it on (including Portal), just for a reference, and it was only about $70. This is the one I bought, in case you're interested in specifics.

[Zurg]

Graphics cards won't make much of a difference with Dolphin but I'm pretty sure a new processor would, like Naxy said a quad core at 3 GHz or a Core 2 Duo at 3GHz. Also if your using Ubuntu beware of driver issues on certain things like graphics cards. I upgraded my video card from a on-board chip to a GT 240 and I got like, a 10 fps increase in Dolphin.

[Malqua]

I had an NVIDIA Geforce 9800 GT, and its not the best. If you want a good card, try at least a GeForce GTX 480.