Wich upgrade path should i choose?

[xb-0]

Hello everyone! . I recently came out from shadows(real life, you know ), and try to tackle te ps2 emu scene once more... Back in a day i  was have a very capable system, but it suffers from graphical glitches and slowdowns in a . So i made a decision to move completely on a sw rendering, as it was more compatible and accurate(in terms of a picture quality) than a hw dx/gl render, wich is fast, but give graphical problems (ace combat zero and jak 3 is a prime examples of this). Judging from the rigs mentioned in a wiki (thanks "generalplot" and the others), i ended up with the idea of a somewhat fast(3.0GHz and up) multicore (4 to 8 cores, 8 is a best of course) system. Searching the web revealed, that two upgrade paths exist for me, both deepending on a different CPU makers (you know these rwo). both require me to build a new system from the ground up, wich is expensive now. So they are:

Intel way: move to a 1150/51 v2 socket with latest CPU's on a Coffe/Caby Lake architecture with 4 to 6 cores at 3.0+Ghz. With DDR3 Ram, wich is no expensive than DDR4 nowdays...

AMD way: Take their latest AM3+ System with at least 4-core CPU on a Wishera architecture.  Of course use DDR3 ram at 1600-1866MHz in both cases.

The GPU in both systems will be my old EN560 Ti from Nvidia/ASUS, wich i plan to upgrade to something like GTX 7xx Ti; 9xx Ti or 10xx Ti not lower than 50 or 60 model. Just seeking the right price for it.

So, the question i want to ask the community is wich upgrade path i should choose for best perfomance at a reasonable price. To give you an idea from what i upgrade, i just list my current specs here, except i plan right now to add a final touch to maximize my current perfomance on this platform.

I might say it bouldly, but i have right now most poverful Dual-Core system on a old LGA775 socket...

CPU: Core2Duo [email protected] on a 533Mhz bus.
Mainboard: an old ASUS P5Q SE2 with dead HDA controller...
RAM: 2 Channel DDR2 RAM cloacked at 800Mhz, and aslarge, as 8Gbit. (two kingston, one crucial, and one hynix board, if i remember correcly...)
GPU: as i mentioned before, its a  old ASUS/NVIDIA card based off a Gefoce 560 Ti chipset, with 1 Gbit GDDR3 Ram, wich i plan to replace to something more advanced and agile too.
HDD1: ST1000DM003
HDD2: WD 2.5 160Gb drive reflashed as 120Gb Hitachi HDD for fat Xbox 360 for some reason...
ODD1: LG DVDRW DL Drive.
ODD2: ASUS DVDRW DL Drive...
PSU: FSP550PNF PSU...
Monitor: CRT SyncMaster 17DF set at 1280x1024@60hz or 1024x768@75-85hz sometimes...
As a sound core, i plan to retrieve my old SoundBlaster Audigy 2 OEM, wich is sounds great than any realtek or via chips together...
OS: Windows 8.1 Pro x64 wich i plan to replace with Windows 10 of the same edition/Latest Ubuntu LTS x64 release...

On a this system i can play GTA IV almost without any slowdowns, the only thing i wish to make, is a new Core2Quad Q9XXX/Xenon E5XXX(almost free nowdays), and to move on a new system.

Will it worth the risk? Sould ibbuild a new system on a AMD CPU? Or just stick with last xenon for 775? please answer...

The games i currently have on ps2 dvd's, and wished to see again:

Ace Combat series
JJak 2 and 3
Tekken 5
Final Fantasy 12
Blade 2
Ford racing 3
Crash Bandicoot Mind over mutant
Tomb Raider Legend
NFS Hot pursuit 2
Okami
TMNT
Sonic Heroes
Gran Turismo 4
GTA Vice city/Liberty city stories and San andreas
BIonicle Heroes
F1 '06
BUrnout 3 tqkedown and Dominator
OPSM2 Bonus demo dvd.
and a Xenosaga ep. I: Also spratch zarathustra...

Shame i do not hav3 a real console, so thats why i turned to PCSX2.

Merry Cristmas Everyone!

[refraction]

Shame i do not hav3 a real console, so thats why i turned to PCSX2.

Sorry but you need to own a PS2 to use the emulator legally as downloading the BIOS file is illegal.

[xb-0]

I know, refraction, i just have a dead 7708 model, just searching for old 5500X, wich is damn rare in my area.?. To be safe, i also got 4 PSX(2 fats and 2 PSOne's) and a PSP-2008 in a working state. And its a odd, that pepole try use emu without the system files, or even original dvd's, wich is wrong. Anyway, what will be better? Raw power of a 8-core Wishera or a architecture efficiency of a, say, Coffe lake chip? I just stucked with a new system building, cause my old C2D will not be enough here...

[refraction]

You will be better off with raw single core performance. High IPC on a quad core (or higher) is the optimal configuration for pcsx2

[TkSilver]

You would be better of performance wise with a pentium kaby lake\coffee lake then the fastest Xeon LGA 775 CPU or any non Ryzen CPU (and honestly for pure emulation performance any non OC Ryzen CPU)

here is a good single core comparison https://www.cpubenchmark.net/singleThread.html

If you add in modern native PC gaming and other tasks that might be better optimized for multithreaded workloads then you might want a full quad core kaby lake \ coffee lake and an upgraded GPU (a GTX 1050 non ti would be an upgrade and the ti version would be a bigger upgrade for a reasonable price). The only down side to newer GPUs would be possible lack of support for your CRT if you want to keep that.

https://pcpartpicker.com/list/T2ztcc
here is CPU\ Motherboard (ATX style chose a different one if you need a different size)\ RAM\ and GPU (a 1050 non ti since it is more balanced to the performance of the pentium, but get a ti one if you want 4GB or have to have a ti) for $384.82. Other parts were not picked in case you want to aalvage parts from current PC or get cheaper used parts.... though I would recomend a SSD Boot Drive (the mobo supports sata and M.2 Boot drives)

[xb-0]

Refraction, you mean that latest equivalent of a of a 4-core C2Q/i5 (cloacked at 4.0Ghz nowdays...) will have more total IPC score (all cores combined) rather than a 3Ghz previous generation(as far as i know with AMD) but, 8-core CPU? Is the additional cores will be useful for sw rendering? Thats because when i last checked GSDx, he have a bad graphical glitches and artifacts. (Black eyeballs in Jak 3 and broken TGT's With texture garbage in Ace combat Zero comes to mind...) And another thing: Currentlu, if i replace my C2D with C2Q, will be it a big diffenence? Im not a big fan of a big resolutions and big internal resolutions, rarely use 2x res or something like that. Thanks ahead!

Offtopic: What everyone thinks about recent things like Vulcan API/DirectX 12? Will they benefit our graphic emulation? I wonder...

And a second thing: im not a coder yet, (just starting with my arduino uno) but, can we use some hw audio like (in)famous Creative SoudBlaster cards, either trough OpenAL or proprietary EAX api? I'd love to hear famous PlayStation Boot sequence of a PSX (the reverb is great here!) Without audio glitches and cutoffs... If someone need a tester, i have an a Audigy2 PCI card. Ill help!

Thanks again for hearing me out! Merry Xmas

[refraction]

Yes, basically get the fastest intel i5 or higher CPU you can get for the best experience. Yes more cores is better for software mode, but hopefully you won't need that too often.

[xb-0]

TkSilver, nice mention about my CRT box, but i'd think i will replase him with 22-24' 1080p60 touchscreen LCD.I wear medical googles with a -4.5 - 5.0 dioptries glass... So CRT is a no go. (but i wish for a old CRT TV fo my preciouus megadrive/genesis over an pure RGB cable... or at least Component one.)

About GPU: i rarely upgrade pc parts generally (once in a 3 or 5 years or so), but now i'd choose a 1060-1070 Ti with 8 Gigs of a VRAM... if they exist of couse. My main fail here is what i run a old techprocess of a gpu (45nm or so) and have no NVENC wich superseed CUDA encod3rs.

About parts you picked up for me - very interesting, but i also gone thru the process myself, and come up with my own dreamy pc setup, except the monitor should be the Lenovo ThinkVision T2364t touch lcd monitor. Here it is: https://pcpartpicker.com/list/yK4rzM. Of course its VERY expensive, so i plan to move on this gradually in parts, starting with PSU or SSD...

Again, i must say that, i rarely do upgrade (i come from console universe), and can invest somewhat more in pc parts, but must plan carefully, and not be afraid of aftermarket/used/salvage parts (if its worth the price/risk/efficiency taken) from local dealers.

Offtopic: i also plan to build a system for old games, probably designed to run on Win9x and 3.xx up to 2005/6 year and capture them with live gamer extreme...

Sorry for overposting, i cannot use normal windows pc, so i wrote all that from my precious galaxy note 10.1 2012 ed. And thanks again!...

[xb-0]

Thanks for clearing out this a bit, the main battle is on a 4-core systems now. And we optimising the sw render for this type of a setup. (more or less ). Can i propose to you , to test the hw acceleration on my current system (with some changes of course!) with buggy games, to debug some problems, and show the others that how low(or old hw) we can go on a 3D scenes right now. We can confirm the details after you agree on this.

Hope that ill help the devs and make some history to tell! ^_^

[TkSilver]

Since the total system draw is around 1/3 of the PSU I would recomemd a cheeper (good quality) lower rating PSU something in the 500W would easily cover you.

For the GPU I would definitely not go with a 1070ti and that CPU since you are going to limit the performance of the GPU and basically waste money unless you are aiming for 4k or other high resolutions on newer titles since high refresh rate will probably end up more CPU bound with that set up.

On your offtopic
https://www.philscomputerlab.com/ (and the accompanying Youtube channel) are a wonderful resource for clasic PC building. Peraonally I use a Dell C640 for anything that I really have to run on old hardware simce the 2GHz P4m and radeon 7500 32MB setup is good for a lot of classics that don't run in dosbox well.