[RESOLVED] Ideal pc for Gameex

[Jockinaus]

Hi guys

Will start off with a hello as this is my first post. Ive been building a mame cab for the past couple of years ( on and off time permitting ). The cabinet is complete externally , and even then theres not a lot to do internally. Once Ive got my pictures sorted out and uploaded onto photobucket I will share my results !!

I started looking at front ends about 6 months ago, and had Gameex suggested to me, as apart from looking cool and all those different configs, it has an easy to use setup for LED's ( I have LED WIZ on my cp).

I am currently have Gameex installed on a PC thats intel 2.4ghz, 4gb ddr ram, and onboard VGA. There is a fresh install of XP on it, and while Gameex works ok on it, its painfully slow to start , like 40 seconds from clicking the start up icon. I only have MAME32 set up in the emulators, and about 2000 roms . Incidently , does the amount of roms in the MAME32 roms folder slow things down the Gameex is trying to start up ?

Ive spent a lot of time and money on this project, and really want to improve this start up time problem to finish things off. Ive had a look for a suggested spec on this forum but couldnt find one.Is there a Linux version ?

If anyone could suggest a spec for a better pc, or some tweaks for what I have , I would very much appreciate it

Gary

[Draco1962]

Welcome to the forums! A little more info regarding your current setup would be good to have (multi-core?). Also, we may be able to assist with some tweaks, but that will require a copy of your log.txt and gameex.ini files to review.

Even though the newer systems are a bit more robust, I heartily recommend a standalone GPU as opposed to onboard video, as the onboard shares shares system RAM, whereas the GPU card will use its own RAM for graphics processing and can return some speed to you.

[simbamame]

You could also try "shelling" xp i believe this helps with speed by not loading drivers or applications not needed or really used, but as i have never used this cannot comment but im sure others here have done.

[Jockinaus]

Thanks for the info so far . Draco, just checked my processors actualy 3ghz dual core, 4gb ram. It was my intention of putting dedicated VGA in there. This is just the unit Ive been playing around with, its not necessarily the one I would use. I was wondering if other Gameex users could give me an idea what sort of spec they are running ?

Simbamame, shelling xp ? Ive shelled gameex so far the hide windows on start up, is this what you mean ?

Oh, heres some pics of my cab. For the most part the external stuff is done,still some wiring internally to do. Control panels complete. More pics to come .

http://s151.beta.photobucket.com/user/garynwendy/library/MAME%20CAB%20MK%20II

[KRC]

Hi,

My main setup is a Packard Bell Pentium 4 Desktop, 3.00ghz, Windows XP, 1gb Ram, ATI Radeon 512gb Graphics Card. Dont be fooled by the low spec, this machine is incredibly fast and emulates just about anything without a hitch.

My second setup is a Dell Insprion Pentium Dual Core T4500 @ 2.30ghz, Windows 7, 4gb Ram, and a pretty decent Graphics Card. Whilst its decent spec , this machine is absolute trash for emulation, and nowhere near as polished as my main setup. It suffers with the simplest of emulators like CPS3,AAE and ePSXe.

I just use the Dell for GameEx test purposes and use it for other programs like GIMP, XBMC etc.

I'm not saying either of my machines are ideal but just giving you a brief idea of what I use.

[Draco1962]

My setup for right now is as follows:

Dell XPS-420 Intel Q6600 Quad Core running Windows 7 Pro x64

8 GB DDR2 Ram

nVidia GT8800 1GB DDR3 (1 ea. Vga, DV-I, and HDMI ports)

Primary SATA Drive Samsung 320GB 5200 RPM

Secondary SATA Drive WD 1.5TB 5400 RPM

Overall works fairly well but, when I can afford to make the next move to a dedicated box, I will be setting up an HTPC with larger and faster drives.

[DazzleHP]

Hi there,

I guess utlimately it would depend on what it is you intend to emulate - for the real retro consoles (ie SNES, Genesis etc) your current setup will probably be fine but if you eventually want to emulate the more modern systems (PS1,PS2, Dreamcast, Gamceube) I would go for at least a dual core with a semi-decent GPU and a fast drive.

My specs:

2nd Gen i3 @ 3.4

4GB DDR3 @ 1333

Radeon HD5750 1GB GDDR5 @ 4600

Barracuda 1TB @ 7200

I can run most GC games at a steady 60fps and quite a few Wii games too. Same with PS2 and Dreamcast. Emulation for these consoles is faily new though so, for moment, you'll get troublesome games for each no matter your hardware

Good luck!

[Jockinaus]

Resolved !!!! At present I'm only interested in running MAME, and even then only roms leading up to around SF II tech level, so I went into options and turned off just about everything apart from the basics. Also took out most of the crap floating around in XP's start up folder. Gamex (shelled) now boots from cold in around 20 seconds. Perfect.

Thanks to those posting specs, will keep that in mind for the future.

[Draco1962]

Glad you got it working well!