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Question for computer builders and MAME
shateredsoul:
If you go with intel I would suggest the i7 920, not too expensive and if you want higher cpu speed you can overclock the hell out of it. I overclocked mine to 3.5 ghz pretty easily (and staying within ok temps). Without overclocking I was able to run any game pretty well in mame, I overclocked it mainly for the dolphin emulator. Some have overclocked it to 4ghz .. but you'd need some time of water cooling system. I still think it's crazy that liquid nitrogen is used as cooling in some systems.
bpark42:
--- Quote from: LeedsFan on December 05, 2010, 03:48:09 am ---I don't know too much about AMD processors but I hear they do give the best bang for the buck. But I still decided to go with an i3-550 on my latest build. It was under £100 and will OC to 4.0GHz easily. That's overkill for Mame ofc but I want this system to play modern games reasonably well too.
--- End quote ---
I was a strictly AMD guy for 10 years or so (built maybe 15-20 systems) because they always won out when it came to price vs. performance. Lately I am an Intel convert again. The i7 processors are beasts. My personal machine is based on an i7 920 overclocked to 3.6GHz or so. It will run just about anything at 100%, including Blitz, etc.
I also recently built myself a personal server and decided to base it around an Intel i3. I did the research, and the i3's represent a really good value, especially if you don't need high end graphics in your system, since the cpu itself has integrated graphics.
The i3 processors are probably one of the best possible choices for a mame system right now. Inexpensive, high-performance per core (the limited number of cores isn't really a drawback for mame right now), easily overclocked, decent integrated graphics.... Best bang-for-your-buck deal, IMO.
JODY:
If you can afford a Pentium 7 they are nice. If you are on a lesser budget, I'd recommend an AMD Phenom II X4. I built one using the 3.4 Ghz version as part of a combo deal from NewEgg about a month ago. Regular price is higher but still a good deal. There is also a newer 3.5 Ghz version. The other thing I did that makes it run MAME well is to add high speed RAM to it. Went with 4GB of DDR3 1600 with a 7-8-7-24-2N timing which is faster than some of the other models. Blitz is very playable on a lower end 2.8 Ghz triple core AMD I have wth the lesser DDR3 1600 RAM. On the Phenom II X4 it is full speed using 64 bit MAME. Games like Cruisin USA run at 120% using the X4 while they run at 85 - 100% using the 2.8 Ghz triple core.
That is with no overclocking of the CPU. I used Gigabyte motherboards, which I have had very good luck with. Using only the onboard sound and video so only 3.5GB of memory is available to the OS. Running Windows 7 on both machines. The very high speed RAM requires setting the BIOS properly as it will not default to the correct settings to make use of it.
newmanfamilyvlogs:
I've been curious how much the speed of the ram matters. Have you run specific benchmconfigs different ram speeds or is this just observations from different configs?
JODY:
--- Quote from: cotmm68030 on December 06, 2010, 10:11:44 pm ---I've been curious how much the speed of the ram matters. Have you run specific benchmconfigs different ram speeds or is this just observations from different configs?
--- End quote ---
I just read on a few websites technical details regarding the memory specs and their meanings and impact on performance. The memory was priced identical to some of the other by the same brand so went with what should give better performance. The other RAM had flashier metal fins painted red so I guess that accounted for the price vs. the plain looking RAM that actually had better specs. I have not swapped RAM between the two machines and ran benchmarks to actually tell what kind of difference it makes in MAME. It would depend on where the bottleneck is. The RAM in both machines is DDR3 1600. Just that the specs are better for the RAM in the quad core machine.
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