PCSX2 - KOSMOS: ZeroGS Evolves

[CKemu]

Posted on PCSX2.net, the official site of PCSX2 a PlayStation 2 emulator:

 

Final Fantasy X: 35-128 FPS

Grandia 3: 37-60 FPS

 

...Yes you read that correctly, and no it's not April 1st!

 

WAIT!!..Okay so you knew there would be a catch

 

MTGS (Multi Threaded GS) has recently become much more stable thanks to zerofrog and his recent improvements to zeroGS (a GS plugin for PCSX2). MTGS allows for people with Dual Core CPU's to run PCSX2 at significantly improved speeds by putting the graphics side of PCSX2 onto a seperate core.

 

zeroGS itself has also gone through a major overhaul, making it significantly faster, even without the use of MTGS, so the Single Core crowd will also see a speed boost via this plugin!

 

zeroGS offers more features in the up coming release, with improved AA, wireframe mode, video recording, bilinear filtering and pre-defined resolutions to choose from.

 

So whats the catch? Well zeroGS requires Pixel Shader 2.0, so you need a graphics card capable of this shader model (I recommend the GeForce 6600GT for budget users).

 

The other catch is somewhat obvious, you will need a Dual Core CPU to support MTGS mode, eg; AMD X2's, Opterons and of course the new Conroe.

 

So when does this new zeroGS come out? Well for now no ETA, and please don't be nagging us about it!

 

Enough of the text, lets move onto my favourite section - eyecandy!

 

The shots where taken on the following spec machine:

• Opteron 165 1.8Ghz @ 2.5Ghz (9x280)
   
  
• 1Gb DDR550 Dual Channel @ DDR560
   
  
• Gainward BLISS 7900 GTX 512Mb
   
  
• SoundBlaster Audigy 4
  

Note FPS is reduced by ~50% in these shots because they where taken with Bilinear Filtering, and 4xAA enabled: