Core i7 notebooks and pcsx2: SLOW
#41
Xellon, creating a 4-threaded program (optimised for quad-cores) isnt as easy as it sounds; It's not going to run well on dual-cores especially if it doesnt have a single thread or dual thread mode. Developers are going to end up alienating the vast amount of users that are not using quaddies, and quads are NOT cheap. There could only be a few group of programmers just as experienced as pcsx2 devs in terms of multicore development.
Reply

Sponsored links

#42
(11-16-2009, 03:35 AM)mackoyski Wrote: Xellon, creating a 4-threaded program (optimised for quad-cores) isnt as easy as it sounds; It's not going to run well on dual-cores especially if it doesnt have a single thread or dual thread mode. Developers are going to end up alienating the vast amount of users that are not using quaddies, and quads are NOT cheap. There could only be a few group of programmers just as experienced as pcsx2 devs in terms of multicore development.

O, I know its not easy, I'm just concerned that quad cores won't be effective as they should be for a very long time. And as air said, Not many people are creating effective coding (well, besides these guys) for multiple threads. So I'm really skeptical about buying a quad core as far as emulation goes.

If the turbo boost works (edit) at a constant speed on this emulator, I'll defiantly be buying the mobile i7 processor. If it doesn't, I might still get it. I want to use it for other reasons as well.
Windows 7 - Asus G73jh-a1 - 17-720qm @ 1.6 GHz (2.8 GHz)(2.4ghz)(1.73ghz) - ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870 @ 700/1000 (sometimes oc to 800/1100) - 8 gig ram
Reply
#43
So what you are saying is that you want the Mobile Core i7 processor no matter what, but you WISH that the CPU would be more effective in PCSX2. Tongue
Laptop: Apple MacBook Pro Retina 15' | Intel Core i7-4850HQ @ 2.3-3.5Ghz | Optimus Powered nVidia Geforce GT 750M (2GB GDDR5) + Intel Iris Pro Graphics | 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600Mhz RAM | Intel HD Audio | Apple Magic Trackpad | Samsung 512GB PCI-E Based SSD |
Reply
#44
(11-16-2009, 03:54 AM)Xellon Wrote: O, I know its not easy, I'm just concerned that quad cores won't be effective as they should be for a very long time. And as air said, Not many people are creating effective coding (well, besides these guys) for multiple threads. So I'm really skeptical about buying a quad core as far as emulation goes.

If the turbo boost works (edit) at a constant speed on this emulator, I'll defiantly be buying the mobile i7 processor. If it doesn't, I might still get it. I want to use it for other reasons as well.

PCSX2 will be faster if it was running on a quad core, because it utilises 2 cores completely, and that would leave another 2 cores for the scheduler, background processes, plugins, and other things that windows could want to run. (about 40-60 of them depending on your system)
i7 @ 3.2Ghz /w Noctua
6GB Dominator 1600Mhz
5770 Vapor-X
1.5 TB Raid 5 /w 3ware 9650SE

Reply
#45
That's only if PCSX2 is the only process using those specific cores. There usually is a chance that another process will use the same cores that PCSX2 does. Unless there is a way for something (or the emulator) to manually set which cores the emulator will use.
Laptop: Apple MacBook Pro Retina 15' | Intel Core i7-4850HQ @ 2.3-3.5Ghz | Optimus Powered nVidia Geforce GT 750M (2GB GDDR5) + Intel Iris Pro Graphics | 16GB (2x8GB) DDR3 1600Mhz RAM | Intel HD Audio | Apple Magic Trackpad | Samsung 512GB PCI-E Based SSD |
Reply
#46
Yes realistically context switching still happens, but it is minimised with more cores available to the scheduler. And modern schedulers tend to minimise expensive context switches on busy cores in some cases, prefering unutilised cores for all the other processes.
i7 @ 3.2Ghz /w Noctua
6GB Dominator 1600Mhz
5770 Vapor-X
1.5 TB Raid 5 /w 3ware 9650SE

Reply
#47
(11-16-2009, 03:15 AM)Air Wrote: Oh, I got a new idea! Maybe we're looking in the wrong pace. Maybe the problem is the video card going slow, and not the i7. The reason I bring it up is because f@H might be using the video-accelerated folding stuffs, which works a video card quite aggressively, and that would cause PCSX2 to run even slower than before.

Likewise, if PCSX2 is stalling waiting for the video card, it idles, and that allows the CPU to drop clock speed. The more it idles against the video, the lower your i7 clock will drop due to the increased idling.

I'll bet you're right, Jake. It's just too bad you don't have access to one of these platforms (I'm guessing from your posts) or we could corroborate results. Hey - want this one? Smile Seriously though, it goes back to Dell probably some point this week and then I'll lose this rare opportunity to test against two platforms with equal specs excluding the CPU. Well, and one other: the new system has a 256gb SSD - one of those new Samsung works of wonder - and boots into Win7 in maybe 3-5 seconds after the bootup screen.

It would be VERY interesting if someone else with a different core i7 notebook could test pcsx2 on their platform. At least then we could conclude if Dell and their BIOS is really at fault here, as remote as that seems.
Reply
#48
(11-16-2009, 05:09 AM)decode1984 Wrote: So what you are saying is that you want the Mobile Core i7 processor no matter what, but you WISH that the CPU would be more effective in PCSX2. Tongue

Yes, but mainly I want the turbo boost to work on the emulator properly so I'm hoping it is a hardware issue with dell.
Windows 7 - Asus G73jh-a1 - 17-720qm @ 1.6 GHz (2.8 GHz)(2.4ghz)(1.73ghz) - ATI Mobility Radeon HD 5870 @ 700/1000 (sometimes oc to 800/1100) - 8 gig ram
Reply
#49
@Shoegazer: Do me a favor and download r1888 and use that sot hat you can see the GSdx CPU usage stats. Tell me what it reads (it'll read something between 7% and 99%). If it consistently reads 85%+ then your problem is, in fact your video card and not the i7.

The new gui doesn't have those measurements implemented yet, so you need to use r1888.
Jake Stine (Air) - Programmer - PCSX2 Dev Team
Reply
#50
(11-16-2009, 04:13 PM)Air Wrote: @Shoegazer: Do me a favor and download r1888 and use that sot hat you can see the GSdx CPU usage stats. Tell me what it reads (it'll read something between 7% and 99%). If it consistently reads 85%+ then your problem is, in fact your video card and not the i7.

The new gui doesn't have those measurements implemented yet, so you need to use r1888.

Done. Left all set at defaults and tested with Tekken 4. Results:

With MTGS checked, I get 35-45% CPU ingame.
With MTGS unchecked, I get 20-30% CPU ingame.

Guess it isn't the video card then? Also the other platform has the same video card - though given the difference in other aspects of the platform it could still be the bottleneck. Didn't think of that. Anyway I'm certainly happy to run more tests for you if you'd like, as long as I have this thing. Just post here or PM.

One other thing I should mention that may not have been obvious from previous posts - Clarksfield, being of Intel's Nehalem microarchitecture family, is a quad-core CPU that supports up to eight threads, four being "virtual". More info here. To be honest I'm actually quite impressed with the fact that pcsx2 even runs games at the meager 30-35fps on this platform, given our discussions of late. Not that it won't stop me from cursing Intel left, right and sideways. Wink

Thanks for your time, Jake.
Reply




Users browsing this thread: 1 Guest(s)