Intel: Newer Core i5 and i7 processors such as the i5-4670K and i5-3570K are extremely fast and very affordable considering their relative power. The K series allows for overclocking, which can further improve the performance of those CPUs. Core i7 variants yield almost no benefit in IPC over the i5s they are based on, so save the cash if you’re building a Dolphin machine. For laptops, you can rely on the i7-4700MQ and i7-4930MX for the absolute best performance. Most games will run very well on any of those processors.
AMD: Due to very low IPC, AMD CPUs are poor choices for Dolphin. The FX8000 line of processors is the best they have, and even then most of those processors will be around half the speed of the 4670K’s performance with Dolphin.
I already have a new thin motherboard and an i3 4340 coming in the mail and with the 4600 Intel graphics and the hyperthreaging I should see MUCH better performance with my "SNES PC" Maybe I'll even be able to do 1080p 30fps emulation instead of 720p 30fps :)
The best CPU for a Dolphin machine for price to performance would be an i3-6100, as Dolphin (afaik) can only take advantage of 2 threads, unless they changed something. Unless you need the CPU for something else or you're overclocking the living daylights out of it, an i3 is all you really need.
The i5 4300U and Intel HD 4400 was cutting it tight for Gamecube emulation on V4.0.2. But the i5 4300U is like an underclocked i3.
Damn, how come I never noticed those graphical glitches with V4.0.2, I am getting V5.0 if my tablet PC can handle it (shouldn't be a problem with my desktop). I wonder if I can use my old memory card data and move it to V5.0.
I figured that if the i3 4300U could handle Gamecube emulation the FX 8000's CPUs could too, maybe with a slight overclock, reasons why AMD needs to make Zen good.
A Pentium G3258 would be even better price/performance for Dolphin especially if you cared for overclocking, but an i3 6100 would be much more viable for modern gaming. Not that I recommend Pentiums anymore in this day and age.
True, but bear in mind that those cores will be occupied doing other things besides. That's why the hyperthreading in an i3 would be a better idea. 3.7GHz worth of hyperthreading is worth more than 1GHz of a couple of cores.
True that. Would be nice if the Zen CPUs got what it takes to handle Dolphin. I thought about getting an FX 8320 but Dolphin was one of the reasons why I avoided it and went X99.
the FX-series were nice back in 2011 but they're really not that hot anymore, especially when even benchmarks on level playing fields are putting Intel parts way way way ahead of AMD's current lineup. Even the Excavator-based Athlons aren't doing all that great.
I ran a CPU-Z benchmark with a 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo E6550 that puts it just over 18% slower than a 3.7GHz A10-7850K in single threads. In fact, using the FX-8150 at 3.6GHz produced results that were actually 13% SLOWER than the E6550 in single threads. I don't know how biased the benchmark is or how effective it is at accurately measuring performance, but if it holds any water then holy crap, that is some sad, sad stuff there.
Wow, this Dolphin 5.0 emulator is very playable on the Surface Pro 2 compared to Dolphin 4.0.2, I been running the emulator at 2x Native Resolution so far on Zelda Wind Waker, and at Balanced and High Performance power settings, I only had any problems in places with a ton of grass but other than that, ran flawlessly. I am going to test it at 1.5x and Native Resolution and then try other games. Damn System is using extra CPU power for something else for some reason, might be making my results worse than they should be. Should run fine on a modern desktop, maybe even one with the AMD FX 8000's CPU or any of AMD's CPUs with a relatively high IPC (of course not as high as Intel's as of now).
I use Ishiiruka variant personally, and my graphics settings is set to DX12 which fixes the performance issue with AMD. I wish they would make it multithreaded though, so more compatibility with lower end CPUs.