Hey Boys and Girls: Lets Start a Benchmarking Thread!

[mark shaker]

All;

The PC in my MAME Cab was 7 years old, so I finally replaced it. Now I'd like to see how well I've done.

Is anyone else game to picking (say) three games, and posting your configuration and the games performance? I'm looking for something that would take less than 10 minutes for each participant.

My PC is configured like so:
   CPU: Intel Core i5-750
   RAM: 4GB PC-10600
   Graphics: GT 9500
   OS: Windows 7, 64-Bit
   MAME: MAMEUI64.139.2

If there is intrest: Any suggestions for what 3 games we should test?

If there is not any intrest: I'll go away...

   - Mark

[Smeghead]

You win, the end








I kinda hate these computer spec gloating battles. Just find me something that plays ridge racer and ill be happy

[releasedtruth]

It's not so much a battle as it is an interesting hardware selection thread for those interested in playing those final missing games. I do know people are pretty interested in things like Blitz, Gauntlet Legends, Dolphin and a few others. You can find the unmastered games in other benchmarking threads.

[shan1784]

I like the idea.. I'll be upgrading my machine early next week so I'll be able to take part then...

I bet that i5 kills the games doesn't it...

[releasedtruth]

Mark, you'll want to list your clock speed as well because many run seriously overclocked systems, even with MAME. I've seen several stable overclocks on the 750 to 4Ghz on air so there's room to grow. The 750 will beat down an 870 in many areas if done right.

[mark shaker]

I kinda hate these computer spec gloating battles. Just find me something that plays ridge racer and ill be happy

I *really* didn't mean it to come across that way. 

If I wanted to brag, I would have bought an I7.

I figured that if a bunch of different builds were posted, it would enable people to find the performance to $ sweet spot.

I'm actually kinda worried that my stock clocked I5-750 would perform relatively poorly, as MAME does not seem to use extra cores very well. I was curious if a cheaper dual core processor would thrash it.

   - Mark

[releasedtruth]

The 4GHz+ E8500s do a pretty amazing job from what I've read in past threads. A couple guys have run benchmarks on a variety of games so you could use that data to revive a database of benchmarks if you wanted to get started, then compare yours from there. I've been interested in seeing how the X6 performs, especially since the added cores don't seem to assist much.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=72776.0
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=99114.0

[Jasonmm]

I would love to see a recommended system requirements for ..... in one central location ....

the classics .... dk and pac ect ...

the high resource games ... street fighter 4 , blitz and others

new shooters , daphine games  ...

mame pinball  ...

jukebox ... touch screen jukebox ....

I would love to know .... that uses what .... roms use RAM ? How much ram do I really need ? Mame only uses X amount of ram ? My OS also has limits ? Others are CPU driven ? Dont I really want a single core processor ? Video Card ? Where does my Hard Drive coming into play ? Can I put all my roms or mp3s on a 5400 rpm HD ? And my OS and frontends on a SSD drive ?

Jason

maybe this topic could morph into that ...

 

[CheffoJeffo]

Wait a minute ... somebody said something about girls .... 

[mark shaker]

Wait a minute ... somebody said something about girls .... 

Perhaps I was being a bit optimistic.

[Gatt]

I would love to see a recommended system requirements for ..... in one central location ....

the classics .... dk and pac ect ...

Pretty much anything in the last 5-7 years should run these fine,  including most cell phones most likely.

the high resource games ... street fighter 4 , blitz and others

4ghz+

new shooters , daphine games  ...

About the same,  and daphne runs fine on anything in the last 5 years easy.

I would love to know .... that uses what .... roms use RAM ?

Yes,  they're loaded into RAM during gameplay.  CHD's are streamed into memory IIRC.

How much ram do I really need ?

About as much as the largest ROM you're going to load + OS req's.

My OS also has limits ?

WinXP and older is limited to 4gigs,  Vista 64 and Win7 adress tera's.

Others are CPU driven ?

All of them are at present,  this may change in the foreseeable future,  Mamedev has been rumbling about some GPU offloading.

Dont I really want a single core processor ?

No.  At least dual core.  First,  Mame can use multiple cores,  thought atm it's optimized for 2 cores.  Further,  your OS is still running in the background,  so it's eating some CPU cycles.  Ideally a quad-core would be best with Mame set to use 2 cores,  leaving the OS two cores for it's work is ideal for multi-core performance.  You'll see a benefit,  but it's not going to make Blitz playable on a 2.8ghz.  Just give you some added percentages.

Video Card ?

Now,  they vid card doesn't matter.  It's possible this may change in the foreseeable future.

Where does my Hard Drive coming into play ? Can I put all my roms or mp3s on a 5400 rpm HD ?

The drive is used when the ROM is loaded,  and that's all.  So if you don't mind waiting a few extra seconds,  5400 is fine.  Though with 7200rpm drives costing less than a video game,  I can't imagine why you'd want to buy one.  CHD's may perform a little better with 7200rpm drives,  as they're streamed (more or less).

Any my OS and frontends on a SSD drive ?

Keepign your OS on one drive,  and the stuff you're running on another is always a good idea.  An SSD has benefits,  but not for their price right now.  With terra's under $100usd,  there's no reason to buy an SSD  for hundreds.

I'm kinda getting the impression you're trying to use Mame fon a laptop.  This will never be optimal.  Laptops have all kinds of performance reducing issues,  they're heat-limited,  dependent on power cords for full speed,  and slower than a desktop.  Any performance ratings for a desktop is going to be lower than what you'd need with a laptop.

[Jasonmm]

Thank you Gatt , be looking for that info ...

jason

[shan1784]

I kinda hate these computer spec gloating battles. Just find me something that plays ridge racer and ill be happy

I'm actually kinda worried that my stock clocked I5-750 would perform relatively poorly, as MAME does not seem to use extra cores very well. I was curious if a cheaper dual core processor would thrash it.

This is why I went with the E8400 which should be here on Monday... Although I did test on my i7 930 just to see how the Tekken series performed and it was nuts.. I actually had to use the "speed" mame.exe command line option to slow it down a little... That was at stock settings with no overclock... The i5 750 is a great chip as well so I'm sure you won't see much of a difference at all with a higher end dual core...

A couple guys have run benchmarks on a variety of games so you could use that data to revive a database of benchmarks if you wanted to get started, then compare yours from there.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=72776.0
http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php?topic=99114.0

Thanks for these links... I've was looking for something like this when I was trying to figure out what to upgrade my processor to...

[Malenko]

I'm kinda getting the impression you're trying to use Mame fon a laptop.  This will never be optimal.  Laptops have all kinds of performance reducing issues,  they're heat-limited,  dependent on power cords for full speed,  and slower than a desktop.  Any performance ratings for a desktop is going to be lower than what you'd need with a laptop.

Slower then a desktop? my i5 lappie passes benchmarks set by my quadcore phenom desktop (not flexing my epenis, my GF bought me the laptop as an anniversary gift). Also, you can have the laptop run full on without a power cord, it just kills the battery faster. Heat limited? I dont really understand this. my lappie blows out hot air, but all the monitoring says everything is where it should be. Maybe youre talking about OLD laptops?

[LeedsFan]

I'm interested in what is the best "bang for the buck" system for latest 64 bit Mame right now. Is it still dual core the best? Or is i5 670 good?

[Turnarcades]

I kinda hate these computer spec gloating battles. Just find me something that plays ridge racer and ill be happy

Use pSX emulator and you can have RR 1-4 running sweet, with more features than the arcades, on even a 1.6Ghz P4 with 256mb RAM.

[JODY]

I'd be curious too.  I have a fairly newly built AMD triple core low end CPU with onboard graphics and 4GB of very high speed memory connected to an HD TV via HDMI.  It works better for some of the more demanding games than I thought it would.  When I build my showcase Mame cabinet I plan to use a higher end CPU but not sure as to model, memory, etc. so would like to know how various configurations benchmark.  BTW Intel has a new CPU coming out next year that should do significantly better than any of their current offerings.

[releasedtruth]

There's always a new chip to best all previous chips so catching up with the tech is just madness. How that'll translate to mame performance is anyone's guess, but GPU offloading would go a looooong way.

[mark shaker]

Benchmarks for:
   CPU: Intel Core i5-750 (4 - 2.66GHz Cores)
   RAM: 4GB PC-10600
   Graphics: GT 9500
   OS: Windows 7, 64-Bit
   MAME: MAMEUI64.139.2

Conditions:
   Norton Anti-Virus placed in sleep mode.
   Task Manager Running (to monitor CPU usage)
   MAME Throttling Disabled
   MAME Multi-Threaded Rendering Enabled

   CPU% given for actual game play.
   (First minute of so of Level 1).

BLITZ:  
   100%-105%
   All 4 cores running at or near 100%.
   Note: I could not enter game play with Blitz 99 or Blitz 2000.

Gauntlet Legends:
   90%-110%
   All 4 cores running at or near 100%.
   Note: The game would lock-up after a minute or two of game play.

Dolphin Blue:
   15%
   1 core running at 100%.
   3 cores running at 0%

   - Mark

[releasedtruth]

Nice, Mark. Might want to add some Cruisin and SF Rush, some other chd games, too. There was a web site out there that had a pretty decent database of benchmarks, but I've lost the bookmark. I'd post mine, but until I swap CPUs there'd be no point.

[Turnarcades]

There's little point anyway, as the OS, software, front-end, background apps etc. all make the difference in reality, and by the time you got half a dozen results there'll be another MAME build along. There's so many variables involved in emulation performance (particularly MAME) it's not worth trying to print results - it's like how I constantly keep posting about how good the performance is I get from low-spec machines and often asked how I accomplish it, as others don't believe it or simply can't achieve the same.