What is the best processor for MAME arcade cabinet?

[ceevee]

Hello,

I think my next project is going to be a custom MAME arcade cabinet. Here is the deal, I am on a budget and wondering if I should get a very high frequency presler or a very low frequency conroe?

I have read that for MAME emulation higher frequency is sometimes more important than architecture. Seems counterintuitive to me, but could this be true?

TIA and I will post some pictures when it is complete.


ceevee

[Iconyu]

If you know how to do a stable overclock then a conroe.

Edit: I'll add some reasoning, my crappy old northwood at 2.8ghz has no trouble with Mame unless you count the non working model 3 stuff. A conroe at 2.8 should still be cooler than a presler and should have enough raw clocks to handle Mame.

[Jumba]

I'd say any reasonably modern CPU will be able to run MAME perfectly well. Anything from a 3.2GHz presler and up will do. A conroe, as Iconyu said, will also do the job admirably (even without being overclocked). Heck, I remember running some pretty demanding roms on my old 2.4C without any hassle. Good luck with it, keep us posted.

[Greenhead]

go with a memrom. similar clocks as a desktop, less heat

less heat in a big wooden box=good

[Lestat]

jesus people its MAME
a freaking P III 1ghz can run mame

go grab yourself a crazy cheap Athlon XP from some forum and a dfi board or othe mATX board and go nuts man. get something like a 9700 pro or similar thats all you need.

why on gods green earth would you need a powerhouse like a conroe.

hell if it was me,, and i been maming for ages.... go grab an AMD Sempron and a Biostar TForce 6100 and something like a cheap X800 or 6600 GT and go to town man.

if you been maming long enough and know how to make a cabinet.. then you should know that a conroe is going to be absolutely retarded. 1000% overkill.

[lowfat]

If you can find yourself an Asus S478 board and an Asus CT479 adapter for cheap. Then pick up a Celeron M from ebay. I bought mine for 12 cents, and it should easily be enough power.

[Jumba]

The reason I suggested a fairly quick processor is because there is a whole bunch of newer roms that are yet to be emulated by mame. Once these are successfully up n running, they will be needing a lot more cpu horsepower than most of the old stuff. No harm in making the setup a little future-proof too. But, yeah, for all current roms a more humble processor will be more than up to the task. An S479 rig will have the advantage of low power consumption and low heat output. Passively cooled it'll run nice n quiet. Throw in one of those new fangled thumb-sized ide flash drives for storage and you're all set. ;)

[Iconyu]

True. once the model2/3 stuff starts working and maybe even some PS2/XBox based stuff you'll need more power. I can see Tekken 5 & Soulcalibur 2 bringing tears to the eyes of a sempron.

[vengance_01]

I say a Micro-ATX Core Duo board. Emulation for everything under N64 does not need major speed.

[ceevee]

The reason I have asked this question is exactly as the last few posts have said.

3D games in MAME are incredibly slow. Some barely run at all. I was hoping to get as much bang for my buck as possible to have a chance on some of the more difficult roms in the future.

Also I did not want to overclock like crazy and create a furnace to burn up my cabinet :)

[deltarealm]

I think with some of the more newer games and such as those that are 3D, it is more refinement that is need to the mame code rather than raw power.

[sealion]

jesus people its MAME
a freaking P III 1ghz can run mame

go grab yourself a crazy cheap Athlon XP from some forum and a dfi board or othe mATX board and go nuts man. get something like a 9700 pro or similar thats all you need.

why on gods green earth would you need a powerhouse like a conroe.

hell if it was me,, and i been maming for ages.... go grab an AMD Sempron and a Biostar TForce 6100 and something like a cheap X800 or 6600 GT and go to town man.

if you been maming long enough and know how to make a cabinet.. then you should know that a conroe is going to be absolutely retarded. 1000% overkill.



This guy knows what he's talking about. Dont worry about Tekken 5 and all those 3d games; they barely run on a PC due to underdeveloped coding... not lack of cpu power.

[deltarealm]

I suggest a P4 overclocked to 5GHz to run Pacman 100%