Emu System hardware best practices (Not that dead horse again...)

[atomikbohm]

Hi everyone,

I've been away from emulation for a couple of years and find myself back at it again.  I'm building 2 new PCs (1 arcade cab and 1 HTPC / console emu) and was hoping to call on the community to help me put together a resource for all of us to use.  I've spent the last week trying to spec these two systems using info from the web and I'm having a lot of trouble sorting thought it.  Most of the "How good of a computer do I need?" posts are quite old and completely out of date with where the current version of the mentioned emu is at today.

So, I'm hoping to put together a thread that will give a basic idea of where you should be investing your $ if you want to run a specific emulator.  Example: MAME

MAME
CPU - High clock speed, more than 2 or 3 cores are wasted
GPU - a good one but don't go crazy
RAM - 4GB should cover it, more is good but again don't go crazy
HDD - I could find almost nothing on HDD impacting performance for good or bad.  Anyone?

Keep in mind that I found articles that dated back to when MAME only used 1 CPU core and didn't use the GPU for anything so this article will need some maintenance too.

Lastly, please don't turn this thread into an Intel vs AMD or AMD vs NVIDA hissy fit.  I'm hoping for a resource for the community, not yet another troll party.

Thanks everyone.

[keilmillerjr]

A hard drive can definitely effect performance! The OS will definitely load quicker with an SSD, but they tend to cost more. SSD might be feasible if your only going to have a few games. Otherwise, I'd just get a large frisbee drive.

Ram is finally cheap. You can get 8gb stick for cheap and call it a day. No need to skimp too much here.

I went with an i3 with built in graphics and have had zero issues. Other people have had some issues with built in graphics. I don't know. I'm happy with my purchase. Runs gauntlet just fine, as well as steam games.

1 x Intel Core i3-2100 Sandy Bridge 3.1GHz LGA 1155 65W Desktop Processor Intel HD Graphics 2000 BX80623I32100

[ark_ader]

Pickup a cheap xbox and mod it.

[kahlid74]

Runs gauntlet just fine, as well as steam games.

I'd be interested to see you run NFL Blitz 99 or SF Rush.  From my tests and original gatherings 8Ghz of processing power is needed for NFL Blitz 99 and SF Rush.  I want to say Gauntlet needed 6 Ghz of processing power so that may be how you think it's running nicely.  You should run the FPS command and see what you actually get for FPS on Gauntlet.

Processor - To run all MAME games including NFL Blitz 99, SF RUSH, Gauntlet, etc.  you need ~4 Ghz of processing per core with two cores.  So obtaining a 3.X and overclocking to 4 ish.
Memory - 8 Gb or more.  You can get away with 4 if rolling XP but there's no reason, memory is so cheap.
GPU - GPU helps with many things and as emulators advance they'll loop in GPU's more and more
HDD - PC Games and boot up are the only real receivers of benefits to a faster HDD.  Typically not worth it.  a good 1 TB 7200 SATA will be fast enough for everything you could want to do.

[Generic Eric]

Pickup a cheap xbox and mod it.

Everyone should do this for the punch hole on their geek/nerd card.

[Generic Eric]

Hi everyone,

I've been away from emulation for a couple of years and find myself back at it again.  I'm building 2 new PCs (1 arcade cab and 1 HTPC / console emu) and was hoping to call on the community to help me put together a resource for all of us to use.  I've spent the last week trying to spec these two systems using info from the web and I'm having a lot of trouble sorting thought it.  Most of the "How good of a computer do I need?" posts are quite old and completely out of date with where the current version of the mentioned emu is at today.

So, I'm hoping to put together a thread that will give a basic idea of where you should be investing your $ if you want to run a specific emulator.  Example: MAME

MAME
CPU - High clock speed, more than 2 or 3 cores are wasted
GPU - a good one but don't go crazy
RAM - 4GB should cover it, more is good but again don't go crazy
HDD - I could find almost nothing on HDD impacting performance for good or bad.  Anyone?

Keep in mind that I found articles that dated back to when MAME only used 1 CPU core and didn't use the GPU for anything so this article will need some maintenance too.

Lastly, please don't turn this thread into an Intel vs AMD or AMD vs NVIDA hissy fit.  I'm hoping for a resource for the community, not yet another troll party.

Thanks everyone.

Whether you want it to or not, this will turn into that.  This boils down to budget vs horsepower.  I've tried to introduce a similar concept.

Buy the fastest PC your money can buy.  You can upgrade now, or later, meaning you could put 4GB in, but don't get 8GB or 16GB as your budget allows.

I'm not sure where we are in the up/down cycle of this generation.  In the old days I'd have looked at Sharkey Extreme's buying guide, but a quick check reveals they don't update their main page, but the forum is active, so who knows.

I'd tell you to look to buy a mainboard that supports USB3 and 1GB LAN.  Personally, I'd like to get a small board.  I'd like to be able to drive 3 monitors in some fashion.  Other than that you have to choose which CPU brand you want, which you don't want to talk about.

Boot from SSD, don't play more than 1 PC game at a time and store all your downloads, movies, mp3, photos,
tax returns on your network, not your PC.

The other thing to consider when formulating your budget is do you intend this computer to last 3, 5, or 10 years?  The longer you need it to last as the primary computer, the more you should invest.

The concept I was trying to introduce was similar to yours.  If someone was investing $500 at the end of 2013 for the "best in class of 2013" what would they get.  I think +$600 gets you a more rounded machine, but whatever. 

Consider Aluminum 2013, Bronze 2013, Silver 2013, Gold 2013, Platinum 2013 classes.  But if you don't frame this from a best in class per budget, I don't think you are going to get where you want be. 

At some point performance will suffer in the RAM aspect.  You can run TinyXP on a machine with less than 2G, but why?  Your going to have to limit something in your overall consideration.  It probably won't run new additions or run games like NFL Blitz 99, SF RUSH, Gauntlet.


How about sharing a google spreadsheet doc with your parameters and then ask for input?

[keilmillerjr]

Runs gauntlet just fine, as well as steam games.

I'd be interested to see you run NFL Blitz 99 or SF Rush.  From my tests and original gatherings 8Ghz of processing power is needed for NFL Blitz 99 and SF Rush.  I want to say Gauntlet needed 6 Ghz of processing power so that may be how you think it's running nicely.  You should run the FPS command and see what you actually get for FPS on Gauntlet.

Processor - To run all MAME games including NFL Blitz 99, SF RUSH, Gauntlet, etc.  you need ~4 Ghz of processing per core with two cores.  So obtaining a 3.X and overclocking to 4 ish.
Memory - 8 Gb or more.  You can get away with 4 if rolling XP but there's no reason, memory is so cheap.
GPU - GPU helps with many things and as emulators advance they'll loop in GPU's more and more
HDD - PC Games and boot up are the only real receivers of benefits to a faster HDD.  Typically not worth it.  a good 1 TB 7200 SATA will be fast enough for everything you could want to do.

False. I'll run tests on my arcade machine tonight, but my 2.7mhz iMac can run gauntlet at 248.59%.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,133583.msg1376327.html#msg1376327

[kahlid74]

Runs gauntlet just fine, as well as steam games.

I'd be interested to see you run NFL Blitz 99 or SF Rush.  From my tests and original gatherings 8Ghz of processing power is needed for NFL Blitz 99 and SF Rush.  I want to say Gauntlet needed 6 Ghz of processing power so that may be how you think it's running nicely.  You should run the FPS command and see what you actually get for FPS on Gauntlet.

Processor - To run all MAME games including NFL Blitz 99, SF RUSH, Gauntlet, etc.  you need ~4 Ghz of processing per core with two cores.  So obtaining a 3.X and overclocking to 4 ish.
Memory - 8 Gb or more.  You can get away with 4 if rolling XP but there's no reason, memory is so cheap.
GPU - GPU helps with many things and as emulators advance they'll loop in GPU's more and more
HDD - PC Games and boot up are the only real receivers of benefits to a faster HDD.  Typically not worth it.  a good 1 TB 7200 SATA will be fast enough for everything you could want to do.

False. I'll run tests on my arcade machine tonight, but my 2.7mhz iMac can run gauntlet at 248.59%.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,133583.msg1376327.html#msg1376327

Good ole false.  The MAME devs were the ones who originally threw out the 6 and 8 Ghz numbers.  Not sure what to tell you.  Two cores, 4Ghz per core or more is what was stated.

Are you running Gaunlet or Gaunlet Dark Legacy.  If Gaunlet, version 1.2 or 1.6.

[keilmillerjr]

Good ole false.  The MAME devs were the ones who originally threw out the 6 and 8 Ghz numbers.  Not sure what to tell you.  Two cores, 4Ghz per core or more is what was stated.

Are you running Gaunlet or Gaunlet Dark Legacy.  If Gaunlet, version 1.2 or 1.6.

gauntleg.zip (Gauntlet Legends (version 1.6))

I updated results from my new arcade-pc I built with the i3-2100 3.1ghz processor.

You can see the results in my updated benchmarking post. Not as good an my iMac, but still more than needed. Very happy.

http://forum.arcadecontrols.com/index.php/topic,133583.msg1376327.html#msg1376327