[darthveggie]

Hey everyone! I, like almost every other PCSX2 user I've ever met, once owned a PS2. It however decided to randomly stop working and will no longer read discs.

So, me and my old PS2 games have turned to an emulator. I'm somewhat familiar with PCSX2 have it installed and everything. I do not, however, know exactly how to configure it. I mostly want to be able to play Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II. I can get the cutscenes of Final Fantasy XII to run at 60FPS (which isn't much of a feat, I assume considering they're only cutscenes); but the game itself only goes to about 15-25 FPS. Sometimes 40.

Could someone please help me out? Or is this just an abysmal feat?

My setup is:

Compaq Presario Laptop
Windows 7 Ultimate 32-bit
2 GB DDR2 RAM (going to have 3 soon)
Intel Dual T3200 @ 2.00GHz
Integrated Gfx Chipset (Nasty, but can run up to Call of Duty 4 on low quality without a problem)

EDIT: This may need to be moved, my mistake.

 

[nanaya]

Start here : PCSX2.net - Guide

 

[darthveggie]

Start here : PCSX2.net - Guide

Thanks for the guide! Very informative indeed. I played around with some of the graphics settings and speedhacks. I can still only get 60FPS in the cutscenes and between 20-35 in the actual game. If I'm lucky. It also freezes during loading screens alot. What if I were to use an ISO of my disc? Would that run any better? Or is it better just to run it off of the disc?

 

[Princess Garnet]

Running it as an ISO is more ideal to prevent skips whenever the game may need to load from the disc and the disk may be stopped, but it won't magically make the frame rate itself better. It'll just eliminate the skips and hitches during loading.

The problem is both the CPU and GPU. They're both too slow. It's probably the GPU that's holding you back a bit more though.

Also, as this is a laptop, beware of temperatures. Make sure it's not freezing due to overheating.

 

[darthveggie]

Running it as an ISO is more ideal to prevent skips whenever the game may need to load from the disc and the disk may be stopped, but it won't magically make the frame rate itself better. It'll just eliminate the skips and hitches during loading.

The problem is both the CPU and GPU. They're both too slow. It's probably the GPU that's holding you back a bit more though.

Also, as this is a laptop, beware of temperatures. Make sure it's not freezing due to overheating.

I will watch the temperature as it gets pretty hot if I'm running on high performance.

Is there anything I can do to speed it up? A particular plug in configuration?

 

[nanaya]

Try the latest beta, found on the download section of pcsx2 site. Turn on some if not all speed hack, beware you can/will break the game in some way though.

 

[Princess Garnet]

Yeah, using the latest PCSX2 version and plug-in versions would be a wise idea, and specifically keep the video options minimal (native for sure). Experiment with speed hacks, but they can, and will, break some games if used to excessively. Even then, you might now be looking at full speed. The IGP is just too slow to render as fast as the CPU would even with all sorts of speed hacks on.

 

[darthveggie]

All right you guys. I've played an ISO I made of Kingdom Hearts. The ISO itself runs just fine. During the first practice fight against the giant heartless was just fine when it came to framerate and when I was running around everything was fine. A nice solid 45-60 FPS without any noticeable lag. I do, however, have a problem when I get to Destiny Islands and I run around, collecting the items Kairi needs and whatnot. Also, during the non-cinematic cutscenes, I get a lot of lag. During these two, if I let them run for a minute or so, they go from 10 up to about 42 FPS if I'm lucky.

I've got almost every speedhack on at 800x600 windowed native res with no texture filtering and "allow 8-bit textures" unchecked. I'm also running it on Direct3D9 hardware with no interlacing. The plugin I use is GSDx SSE2.

Any suggestions? I'd hate to be this close just to have to give up!

 

[Princess Garnet]

Give up on what? You're already getting good speed considering the hardware.

All I have to say that may help are these two things.

1. Window mode is slower than fullscreen (but 800x600 fullscreen on an LCD is going to look like utter rubbish, so you make that call).

2. Check your power profile configuration (in both the OS and the BIOS). It might be clocking you down.

 

[darthveggie]

Give up on what? You're already getting good speed considering the hardware.

All I have to say that may help are these two things.

1. Window mode is slower than fullscreen (but 800x600 fullscreen on an LCD is going to look like utter rubbish, so you make that call).

2. Check your power profile configuration (in both the OS and the BIOS). It might be clocking you down.

Well that gave me hope.

I will try it in full screen mode and play with the resolution.

How do I know if it's clocking me down? I've never bothered to really look at it before. In to BIOS, I mean. I've got a set up for the OS power config.

 

[Doronetty]

In latest SVN's (last version I used is 2168) I can't find option to make CPU speed at 100% - so PCSX2 runs too fast sometimes... Anybody can help me?

 

[SeraphiPod]

Doro,

You mean the game?
making the frames speed to normal, or if you want the "SO SLOW MAKING WASTE OF TIME", to go faster, just set the speed frames to limit, and press tab.

 

[Doronetty]

Yes, it's working now - all I'll had to do is to press TAB Thank you, SeraphiPod for help!!!