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For certain If you have a laptop CPUs, some of them can overclocking will be overclockedseverely limited. A good way to acknowledge that you have Most laptops in circulation do not support overclocking, and may not be capable of handling the extra heat produced from an overclockable overclocked CPU is to check if it has an "Extreme" label on its name for Intel processors, or a "Black Edition" label on its name for AMD processors. As most For the few laptops don't allow overclocking that can be overclocked through the BIOS, third-party applications such it is more or less the same as ThrottleStop must how a desktop would be used configured to overclock these processors insteadthe CPU. However, if your laptop does For the majority that do not have enough thermal headroom for officially support overclocking, it is suggested that you don't may be possible to overclock. Otherwise, you risk it in a chance of purposely throttling the CPU's speed and getting slower results instead. This is due to the built-in temperature protection that exists in most laptop CPUs, which generally does not allow itself to exceed 100 degrees celsiusdifferent manner or method.
If It is possible to overclock your processor is unfortunately not laptop's CPU through third-party applications, such as ThrottleStop and CPUMSR. However, these applications only work with CPUs with an Extreme Edition/Black Edition/K/X label. Sometimes, special CPUs such as an engineering sample or a Black Editionqualification sample may also be overclockable. And always remember this, dondo not overclock your laptop if you are not confident in its cooling system. If you are able to force the cooling system't worrys fan to always run at its maximum speed, it is strongly recommended to do so. There Avoid hitting temperatures higher than 100C/212F at all costs, even if the CPU is an old way rated for a maximum of increasing 105C/221F at the FSB clock speed through the PLLtransistor-junction level. The PLL or otherwise known as the Phase For non-Lockedoverclockable laptop CPUs, you might be able to overclock it in a different way. Certain third-Loop is party applications are capable of controlling a chip that usually controls generates the FSB clock speed signalfor the front-side bus' clock, internally for desktops which is called the phase-locked loop. This is extremely unsafe and laptops alike. In this desperate casemay result in potential data corruption, we can use ClockGen or CPUCool or SetFSB to control as it follows the same principle of overclocking the PLL for increased speedsfront-side bus. A cautionary advice to take note of, is that All laptops mostly in existence do not come with have a PCI/AGP lock. This means that you will still face the potential data corruption that may occur at higher FSB clock speedseither, so keeping the desktop's 40MHz PCI dobus below 40 MHz is advised. The applications that can control the phase-not-cross-line mark still applies in this caselocked loop are: ClockGen, CPUCool, SetFSB, SoftFSB, SetPLL, and SysTool. However, this only applies if your laptop's PLL there is supported by one of a catch when using these mentioned programs mentioned; none of them supports every phase-locked loop in existence. You will be unfortunately, out Each one of luck if all them has a range of phase-locked loops they support, and you must use the correct matching program that has support for your phase-locked loop. There is also no auto-detection in these programs for the phase-locked loop, as they do not support have a way to report their manufacturer and model name, so be careful when selecting the correct phase-locked loop that resides in your laptop's PLL.
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==CPU==
===Megahertz Myth===
Just because a CPU has a high clock speed (Pentium 4 HT 672 @ 3.8 GHz), doesn't necessarily mean that it is powerful.<ref>http://www.computer-hardware-explained.com/megahertz-myth.html</ref> For example, a Celeron D 365 @ 3.6 GHz is less powerful compared to a Celeron E1600 @ 2.4 GHz. Most newer CPUs tend to fare perform better, though the particular architecture does matter determining its real-world performance. A common misconception is that a higher CPU clock speed guarantees improved emulation performance, which doesn't always apply. Although clock speed is one of the main factors for good CPU performance, it is not always the determining factor. For example, a Core 2 Duo E6600 @ 2.4GHz will always outperform a Pentium D 940 @ 3.2GHz. Even though the Pentium D 940 is clocked higher, the Core 2 Duo E6600 is still faster due to the reduced amount of pipeline stages and a wider execution unit. This improves the instructions-per-clock cycle performance it can output, which means better performance at a lower clock speed.
This comparison only points to AMD's Bulldozer microarchitecture versus Intel's Ivy Bridge microarchitecture, not currently: This is also true of many modern Intel vs AMD CPUs<ref>https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AunYlOAfGABxdFQ0UzJyTFAxbzZhYWtGcGwySlRFa1E#gid=1></ref><ref>https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AunYlOAfGABxdFQ0UzJyTFAxbzZhYWtGcGwySlRFa1E#gid=0</ref><ref>http://forums.pcsx2.net/Thread-CPU-Benchmark-designed-for-PCSX2-based-on-FFX-2?page=107</ref><ref>https://forums.dolphin-emu.org/Thread-new-dolphin-cpu-benchmark-no-game-required?page=15</ref><ref>https://forums.dolphin-emu.org/Thread-new-dolphin-cpu-benchmark-no-game-required?page=15</ref><ref>http://translate.google.com/translate?act=url&depth=1&hl=pl&ie=UTF8&prev=_t&rurl=translate.google.pl&sl=auto&tl=en&u=http://pclab.pl//art55934.html</ref>, as the high-end Intel CPUs are more efficient than the high-end AMD CPUs. Main reason for that is because Intel CPUs have higher performing floating-point units,<ref>http://wccftech.com/ultimate-cpu-gpu-floating-point-performance-battle-amd-intel/</ref><ref>http://www.anandtech.com/show/7711/floating-point-peak-performance-of-kaveri-and-other-recent-amd-and-intel-chips</ref> far greater cache/memory bandwidth/lower latency<ref>http://vr-zone.com/articles/ivy-bridge-e-i7-4960x-vs-amd-fx-9590-battle-2013-flagships/54295.html/2</ref><ref>http://www.extremetech.com/computing/159619-5ghz-showdown-overclocked-5ghz-amd-haswell-ivy-bridge/2</ref>.
===AMD vs. Intel===
As of Ryzen (Summit Ridge), AMD CPUs have similar single-threaded performance when compared to Intel CPUs, though still not exactly close to an equivalent Intel CPU of the same era. HoweverSummit Ridge is slightly slower than an equivalent Kaby Lake in single-threaded applications, both choices are but it is a good choice for emulation.
===Desktop vs. Laptop===
===More Cores and Threads===
Emulators generally only utilize 2 cores, or with hacks, sometimes 3 or 4 cores. Thus, owning a 6 or an 8-core CPU, or one equipped with Hyper-Threading/Simultaneous-MultiThreadingMultithreading, won't benefit you anymore than having a similar quad-core CPU. Although, certain exceptions such as newer system emulators (e.g: RPCS3) can utilize more cores by emulating the system's thread scheduler, which allows it to use as many cores as a game makes threads.
Still, the general recommendation is to go for a higher-clocked 2/4/6-core CPU, as most emulators currently can not fully utilize 6 cores or more. Examples include the Core i3-7350K, Core i7-7740X, and the Core i7-8086K.
Although special processors such as the Pentium G3258 are overclockable; you must be running the CPU on a motherboard that supports overclocking. The motherboards that tend to support overclocking features, comes with a chipset that also supports overclocking, which is required for the CPU to be overclockable. However, this only applies to the newer motherboards, not the older motherboards as they tend to vary from being overclockable to not overclockable. For Intel, the overclockable chipsets' name starts with an X or a Z. The other chipsets that were not mentioned, are not overclockable (B, C, H, and Q). For AMD, the overclockable chipsets' name starts with an X or a B. The other chipsets that were not mentioned, are not overclockable (A).
For older desktop motherboards with older chipsets, there might be overclocking available in the form of a front-side bus setting. Use that setting with caution however, as the front-side bus clock speed gets raised, so does the rest of the other components on the motherboard (which causes instability, data losscorruption, etc). Unless the motherboard has a PCI/AGP lock, it is advised not to use the front-side bus setting to overclock the CPU. In further depth, there is safer setting that can be used to overclock without suffering from instability. Called the 'CPU BSEL Select' or similar, it was intended to manually select the proper front-side bus clock speed of the CPU. Though, by this, it allows us to exploit that feature and use it to overclock while staying within the factory specifications of the motherboard. This does not affect the rest of the other components on the motherboard, as the front-side bus is not overclocked and is only following the rated speeds it can achieve. Therefore, it is safer than the dangerous front-side bus setting. Also, be aware that once the CPU has hit a certain clock speed, it can no longer overclock due to voltage issues. The reasoning behind this is because of how higher clock speeds require more voltage, and these non-overclockable motherboards have a high chance of not having the ability to modify the input voltage to the CPU.
However, if there is no 'CPU BSEL Select', proceed with the front-side bus setting with caution. As a safety precaution, do whatever it takes to not allow the PCI bus' clock speed to reach above 40 MHz. As anything higher than the 40 MHz mark will have a very high chance of inducing instability and possible data losscorruption, or worse. This is why the front-side bus setting is only recommended for motherboards that are equipped with a PCI/AGP lock, since they prevent the other components on the motherboard from being overclocked. Also, be aware that your motherboard can only supply a limited amount of current before it hits its limits. This is due to the voltage regulator modules not being rated to supply a large amount of current to keep the CPU and the rest of the other components stable, which is common for motherboards that are not meant for overclocking. The CPU's potential overclock may also be limited by the power supply unit, so a better power supply unit with better efficiency and wattage rating may be required.
==GPU==
The thing is, with 3D graphics, you can split the work up into hundreds of different parts and give each piece to a different core on the GPU to work on. Since it doesn't matter which order the pixels are rendered in, as long as they all get rendered for the same frame before moving on to the next frame.
File compression/extraction and bitcoin mining are also good examples of programs that can make use of parallel processing. However, most programs can not do this. Dwarf Fortress, for example, can't make use of a graphics card. Because every calculation it does is dependent on the one did performed before it. That obviously doesn't work if you try and do them all at the same time.
Pretty much any emulator is the same; it does not know what comes next until it has done what preceded it. It has to run off a single thread. It still needs some form of graphical output to output the final rendered 2D screen alone. This can be done via a GPU to put the 3D graphics on the screen, but any system capable of being emulated shouldn't be too taxing. This is called "'Hardware Rendering"'. Alternatively, all of the graphics processing can be done on the CPU and will be more predictable/consistent for it, but that is also costly. This is called "'Software Rendering"'.
Most 3D emulators have hardware and software renderers. Software renderers use more CPU power, which may mostly be slower. They may also run on their own threads separate from other emulator parts, which would likely reduce the performance loss, but the CPU must still be fast enough in the first place.
==Recommended SpecsSpecifications==
===[[PCSX2]]===
===[[Mednafen|Mednafen PSX]]===
;For good performanceOptimal:
*Windows: XP Professional x64 with Service Pack 2 (64-bit)
*CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 @ 3 GHz or AMD Phenom II X2 545 @ 3 GHz or better
*RAM: 1 GB or more
;For accuracyRecommended:
*CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8700 @ 3.5 GHz or AMD Phenom II X2 B60 @ 3.5 GHz or better
*RAM: 2 GB or more
===[[Higan]]===
;For performance and balanced (for most games at full speed)Optimal:
*Windows: 7 with Service Pack 1 32-bit
*macOS: Lion (10.7) or later
*RAM: 2 GB or more
;For accuracyRecommended:
*CPU: Intel Core i3-3250T @ 3 GHz or AMD Ryzen 3 1200 @ 3.1 GHz or better
