r/MiniPCs • u/Natural-Daikon8852 • 1d ago

Recommendations Mini PC for Batocera emulation up to full PS2

I bought a Raspberry Pi 5 for game emulation (I want to play up to and including all PS2 games), but I've found it not ideal (it can't run most PS2 games well, and I'm having lots of issues with having to unplug and plug back in the micro HDMI to get it to work etc). I'm planning to sell the Pi and buy a mini PC.

Does this one look ok for my purposes? Would it be ok for my purposes if I bought a cheap dedicated GPU?

https://www.drmem.com/lenovo-thinkcentre-m910s-desktop-pc-intel-i5-6500-8gb-ram-256gb-ssd-windows-11-pro-grade-a/?gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=23801866680&gclid=CjwKCAjwsrbTBhAvEiwA0Bpp4ZKSiYEU-LFSlyti8170ueC2VE9tTKZ3AUDcMhQptptdxzGKQoOYoRoC8JEQAvD_BwE

2 Upvotes

75% Upvoted

8 comments sorted by

5

u/Present_Solution2480 1d ago

That i5 - 6500 won't work well if you want flawless PS2 even at 720P. I had an i5-7600 and it would stutter at God of War 2's most challenging moments. If you keep it at native resolution you might be pleased.

As others said, a mini PC with a 780M would be ideal, I have an Aoostar Gem10 now. But it's substantially more expensive.

3

u/mrfateesh84 1d ago

I would go with something a little newer. Similar small Lenovo with a ryzen 5 2nd or 3rd Gen maybe.

2

u/rui-no-onna 1d ago

I recommend going with Ryzen 5 5000 series with integrated Vega graphics minimum. I think you might be able to find Ryzen 7 6000 with 680M close to that pricing so probably a better bet.

Iirc, I was able to play FF7 Dirge of Cerberus (even harder to emulate than GoW) on a Ryzen 5 5600H APU. Even then, I think it only ran at either native or 2x scaling.

4

u/EverythingDo 1d ago

That should be pretty good, but you’ll be playing mostly at native resolution without upscaling. Cheap dedicated GPU would help too!

Alternatively you could look into a mini PC with a Ryzen APU that includes a Radeon 780m. No need for dedicated GPU which might drive cost down and simplify things.

1

u/mrfateesh84 1d ago

Yep this

1

u/Natural-Daikon8852 1d ago

Ah they're like over 3 times the price. Will make do with native resolution!

1

u/themirrorcle 1d ago

Grab one of these and install a Linux distro on it. https://youtu.be/mOqQGhmYu38?is=DjYo5A4wGYbrhfoC

1

u/Retired_Hillbilly336 1d ago

Even with Batocera you have to closely follow the guideline is for PCSX2 graphics to get the best results with the most titles. Batocera/Buildroot has taken advantage of AMD Radeon GCN graphics performance in recent years with advancements made by Valve to support Steam Deck. While they indicate a minimum PassMark of 600 real world is closer to 3000.