Which Pi 4?
-
Please excuse me if this has been posted before, but I'm full of headache ATM so resigned to asking after a brief search.
Disclaimer aside I'm finally thinking of making the leap and retiring my old Pi 2 for a Pi 4 - I'd like to get the latest for a bit of futureproofing and to make use of the extended functionality.
My main question would be: Which one should I get? They come at various price points for 2, 4, or 8gb of RAM but which one is really needed. I'd appreciate playing some of my PSP library on the big screen, and a few Dreamcast games in HD, but that'd be the upper limit of necessity - can I get away with a lower ram amount or does having more really equal more performance?
Thanks everyone!
-
@MRKane 2GB is fine for retropie. It barely uses around half of it. Getting more ram will not increase performance with games.
The only reason to get the models with more ram is if you want to use the pi4 as a desktop.
You can overclock it to get a slight boost but it still won't make all n64/dreamcast/psp games full speed. -
@MRKane said in Which Pi 4?:
I'd appreciate playing some of my PSP library on the big screen
If you wanna play God of War: Chains of Olympus or Killzone : Liberation ... it'll run like garbage no matter which Pi4 you get and no matter how much you overclock
For Retropie ... More Ram does not equal More Performance.
-
@MRKane Dreamcast runs in HD on redream with no problem on a stock Pi 4 2GB.
A good chunk of the PSP library is playable in great condition, albeit with a bit of tinkering, on a Pi 4 2 GB with no overclock, and you should be aware that even with a massively overclocked rig some of the games will not run well (God of War and Killzone are the best examples).I would say go with the 2 GB version, you'll never use more than one anyway.
-
Thank you so much for the feedback everyone!
I had a suspicion that the emulators wouldn't use massive amounts of RAM, and the only time I've really stressed my Pi2 RAM-wise was with a texture replacement pack for Mario Kart
-
If you're upgrading from a Pi 2, you are going to be blown away.
-
@Zering Have you tried to get Resistance Retribution to work? I find that crashing pretty hard on mine.
-
@AdamBeGood No, I haven't, it's one of those games that I've heard ran extremely poorly so I haven't really bothered. I could try though and let you know the results.
-
@Zering Nah, don't worry. Thanks though. I was just interested if you had given it a go. It's the worst of the lot for me.
-
@AdamBeGood Have you managed to get your games running without too much hassle? I find some of them require a bit of tinkering to get the best performance out of them, ie. Tactics Ogre.
-
@Zering said in Which Pi 4?:
@AdamBeGood Have you managed to get your games running without too much hassle? I find some of them require a bit of tinkering to get the best performance out of them, ie. Tactics Ogre.
Well, so far I've only tinkered with resolution and FrameSkip, nothing more than that. I have found some games get along with FrameSkip better than others, for sure.
I am not sure which other settings to mess with. The only games I've really got struggle with are the ones mentioned - God Of War, Killzone and Resistance. I read somewhere that Tomb Raider was a problem,but that was fine. Haven't tried Tactics Ogre as yet.
-
@AdamBeGood The resolution can go a long way, and I find that the Auto resolution setting causes worse performance than manually setting it. A few rare games run wonderfully without buffered rendering.
The reason I ask is I can't get any higher than 20 fps on both Gta stories games, even with frameskip. They play too slowly for my taste. Did you manage to get those running any better?
-
@Zering said in Which Pi 4?:
@AdamBeGood The resolution can go a long way, and I find that the Auto resolution setting causes worse performance than manually setting it. A few rare games run wonderfully without buffered rendering.
The reason I ask is I can't get any higher than 20 fps on both Gta stories games, even with frameskip. They play too slowly for my taste. Did you manage to get those running any better?
I had one running and I was happy with it, but didn't try the other one. Let me check on this, I can't remember details. I'll be back!
Edit: I'm back. I haven't played far, but all seems fine at 2x / FrameSkip=Auto and 2 / Buffered. In both games.
Further Edit: Have a look at https://retropie.org.uk/forum/topic/24999/getting-the-best-psp-experience-on-a-pi-4/10 - I think setting Resolution to 2x and the "Lower resolution for effects" to "Aggresive" does seem to work. There is a note that it causes glitches, but for problem games may be a winner (but not Killzone and Retribution, they seem to still struggle. God Of War: Chains seems to be a lot better but I need to play more).
-
@AdamBeGood Excellent, I'll try that, thank you.
How is God of war on your end speed wise?
-
@Zering said in Which Pi 4?:
@AdamBeGood Excellent, I'll try that, thank you.
How is God of war on your end speed wise?
I'm having to work at the moment (which seems very unfair), but I tried it quickly and with that setting it seemed like it might be playable, just about. I need to try for longer though.
-
@AdamBeGood I tried it myself in the end, it does seem fairly playable, as does the sequel. The agressive lower resolution for textures setting caused some serious graphical glitches for me though, but the first few minutes of both games run full speed albeit with a bit of choppiness here and there with an auto frameskip of 3 and a resolution of 1x.
I'm trying to get better performance out of Silent Hill : Shattered Memories now, but it seems like the agressive setting stops video from rendering during gameplay.
I've noticed an improvement with Liberty City Stories, but it still has some choppiness, so maybe some of my settings are wrong.
Good luck with work, it does sound very unfair ^^
-
@Zering said in Which Pi 4?:
@AdamBeGood I tried it myself in the end, it does seem fairly playable, as does the sequel. The agressive lower resolution for textures setting caused some serious graphical glitches for me though, but the first few minutes of both games run full speed albeit with a bit of choppiness here and there with an auto frameskip of 3 and a resolution of 1x.
I'm trying to get better performance out of Silent Hill : Shattered Memories now, but it seems like the agressive setting stops video from rendering during gameplay.
I've noticed an improvement with Liberty City Stories, but it still has some choppiness, so maybe some of my settings are wrong.
Good luck with work, it does sound very unfair ^^
I've got Chains of Olympus on AutoFrameSkip 4, 2x Resolution and Aggresive, and apart from some slight sound choppiness it seems very playable.
I haven't noticed any giltching. I'll try Silent Hill.
-
@AdamBeGood Could you share your settings? I'm thinking maybe the glitches come from a mix of two or three settings like the vertex option and whatnot.
-
@Zering said in Which Pi 4?:
@AdamBeGood Could you share your settings? I'm thinking maybe the glitches come from a mix of two or three settings like the vertex option and whatnot.
This is for God of Wars: Chains
Backend: OpenGL
Mode: Buffered rending
Simulate block transfer effects: tickFrame skipping: 3
Type: Number of Frames
Auto: Tick
Unlimited
DisabledPostprocess Shader: Off
Full Screen: TickRendering Resolution: 2x PSP
VSync: Untick
Buffer: Up to 2
Hardware Transform: Tick
Software Skinning: Tick
Vertex Cache: Tick
Lazy: Untick
Retain: Untick
Disable: Untick
Spine/Bezier: High
Tesselation: UntickUpscale level: Off
Type: xBRZ
Deposterize: UntickAnitsotropic filtering: 16x
Texture filtering: Auto
Screen scaling filter: LinearLower resolution for effects: Aggresive
Silent Hill: SM is a tricky one. Maybe borderline playable with 2x AutoFrameskip and 1x Resolution but it isn't perfect for sure. It hates more than 2x Frameskip.
-
@AdamBeGood I've tried a few different games with your settings. I'm still getting the same graphic issues with God of War ; there are white shapes on the screen that seem to shadow the movements of a couple of the enemies. Without Agressive LRFE the glitches disappear, but I have to bring the resolution to 1x. Which is fine, to be honest, I kind of like the jaggedness of original PSP graphics. It runs full speed then.
I can't get any video during gameplay for both Silent Hill games any longer, which is very strange. Not that it matters, they don't seem very playable ^^
Edit : Lunar Silver Star Harmony is another odd one. It runs fine but the text comes out of the boxes and is cut off on the side. Weird ^^
Contributions to the project are always appreciated, so if you would like to support us with a donation you can do so here.
Hosting provided by Mythic-Beasts. See the Hosting Information page for more information.