PCSX2: Difference between revisions

PCSX2 (view source)

Revision as of 04:06, 29 August 2013

1,171 bytes added , 29 August 2013

→‎Hardware and Software

JonahtheMann

59

edits

@@ Line 21: / Line 21: @@
 ===Hardware and Software===
-Harware requirements are very game-dependant although it must be noted that the bottleneck of this emulator in most cases is the CPU rather than than the GPU (video card): basically, a faster CPU should net you better PCSX2 performance. Some games however can be slowed down because of unoptimized GFX code or even because of weak GPU cards (for example [[Final Fantasy XII]] is said to use your GPU fully). Intel CPUs perform better than AMD ones although both can run the emulator.
+Harware requirements are very game-dependant although it must be noted that the bottleneck of this emulator in most cases is the CPU rather than than the GPU (video card): basically, a faster CPU should net you better PCSX2 performance. Some games however can be slowed down because of unoptimized GFX code or even because of weak GPU cards (for example [[Final Fantasy XII]] is said to use your GPU fully).
-Even though clock speed is one of the main factors for smooth PCSX2 emulation, clock speed is not the determining meter of success with PCSX2. Newer CPUs generally tend to perform better than the old ones using the same frequency. For example, a 2.4 GHz dual-core Intel Core 2 processor will generally outperform a 3.2 GHz dual-core Intel Pentium D processor. Even though the Pentium D is clocked higher, the Core 2 Duo is faster due to the Core microarchitecture of the Core 2 Duo being more efficient than the Netburst of microarchitecture of the Pentium D.
+A common misconception is that a higher clock speed determines the overall emulation performance. However, despite the fact that clock speed is one of the main factors for smooth PCSX2 emulation, it is not the determining meter of success with PCSX2. Newer CPUs generally tend to perform better than the old ones using the same frequency. For example, a 2.4 GHz dual-core Intel Core 2 processor will generally outperform a 3.2 GHz dual-core Intel Pentium D processor. Even though the Pentium D is clocked higher, the Core 2 Duo is faster due to the Core microarchitecture of the Core 2 Duo being more efficient than the Netburst of microarchitecture of the Pentium D.
-However, although Intel CPU's perform better than AMD ones, AMD Processors can still offer great emulation performance at half-the-price, provided that the clock rate is high enough. For example, a Multi-Core AMD FX Processor with a clock rate of 4 GHz will often match the performance of a Multi-Core Intel Processor with a clock rate of 3.5 GHz.
+Overall however, the most important factor when it comes to the CPU's effect on game performance is that Intel Processors almost always perform better than AMD Processors. The main reason for this is because Intel's are more appropriately designed for running advanced computer softwares, whereas AMD's are more ideal for PC gaming. PCSX2 is definitely the former, since it is a complicated software that is meant to run Non-PC-formatted games.
+For comparison, AMD FX is currently the most prominent series of AMD Processors, and they will not match the performance of the Intel i7 series; an Intel i7-4770K 3.5 GHz will perform better than an AMD FX-8350 4.0 GHz, even though the FX-8350 has a higher clock-rate. The main reason for this is because in the current AMD FX micro-architectures (Bulldozer and PileDriver), the number of Floating-Point Units is half the number of total CPU cores. This means that each unit is shared between two cores. If one core is currently using the FPU, the other core sharing it must wait to do the same. It is only free to perform integer operations. PCSX2 makes heavy use of floating-point.
+It is also important to note that having more than two cores does not increase the emulation performance of PCSX2. This is because PCSX2 currently uses only two cores, so having a greater number of CPU cores above two will not atone for a lower clock-rate. It can be improved by enabling the MTVU hack in the Speedhacks menu, but not by much.
 Below are the minimum and recommended requirements to run PCSX2:
@@ Line 35: / Line 39: @@
 * CPU: Any that supports SSE2 (Pentium 4 and up, Athlon64 and up)
 * GPU: Any that supports Pixel Shader model 2.0, except Nvidia FX series (broken SM2.0, too slow anyway)
-* 512MB RAM (note Vista needs at least 2GB to run reliably)
+* 512MB RAM (note that Windows Vista needs at least 2GB to run reliably)
 '''Recommended'''