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Does Kega Fusion cause laptops to overheat?

Discussion in 'Technical Discussion' started by NHY, Feb 28, 2010.

  1. NHY

    NHY

    Member
    Hey there,

    I use Kega Fusion for most of megadrive / gensis rom needs, however, I've found that if I use it for extended periods, my laptop will overheat and as a result will shut down to prevent shit from getting totally fried. In contrast, I've never experienced a similar problem when I use SNES9x to play SNES game.

    I'm just wondering, is this a common problem with Kega Fusion or is it just my shitty laptop?
     
  2. Spanner

    Spanner

    The Tool Member
    My laptop tends to hit 100% CPU usage when Kega or Gens is running. I've not experienced shutdowns though but it is annoying.
     
  3. Eviltaco64

    Eviltaco64

    Hopelessly Lost in Aisle 5 Member
    I used to run Kega on an old Dell Inspiron. I don't remember it overheating too often..
     
  4. Afti

    Afti

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    I ran Kega on a Pentium M-based Toshiba Satellite with basically no cooling functionality.

    No overheats.
     
  5. Ritz

    Ritz

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    If a Genesis emulator is causing your laptop to overheat, just about any CPU-intensive program will. Try cleaning the fan out.
     
  6. Mr. Mash

    Mr. Mash

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    It ran fine on my old XP netbook, but on my new Vista laptop it doesn't work, it screws up the screen resolution, but it shouldn't really affect the CPU too much.
    So I play hacks on my psp and the regular games on my original hardware.
     
  7. Flygon

    Flygon

    Member
    I personally never had any overheating issues with this laptop and Kega Fusion.

    In fact, the only time it has overheated was on a 40c+ day.
     
  8. Chibisteven

    Chibisteven

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    KEGA Fusion and other CPU intense programs would cause my fans in my computer to rev up. Vacumming the dust off the heat sink, fans, and vents in the case with the system off helped elimate this completely. Although, I recommend compressed air, getting rid of any dust helps alot, although a really lite coating less 0.000001 mm thick probally won't cause any problems.
     
  9. SegaLoco

    SegaLoco

    W)(at did you say? Banned
    This, I have an old Satellite as well, works fine, albeit a tad slow. =P
     
  10. Chilly Willy

    Chilly Willy

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    I could also have to do with the post-processing filters you use for the video. Using the GPU to process the video at the same time the CPU is working hard doubles the heat in the system.
     
  11. Ravenfreak

    Ravenfreak

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    Oh yes, this always happens to me if I use Kega Fusion, or Gens. Regen does okay, but I usually hurry up and save my games before my laptop decides to shut itself off. >.> Thankfully I own 2 Genesis in real life, and all the Sonic games (besides Chaotix, but I need a new 32X adaptor anyway since my dad used it to "fix" my laptop charger. >.>) so I could just hook my Genesis up. My laptop also shuts itself off while I go to play ePSXe for a while too. I need a new laptop. >.<
     
  12. My desktop overheats with Kega or Gens to the point of shutting down, so I can't play MD/Genesis in it anymore. I used to, I don't know what changed. My laptop doesn't have this problem though.

    BTW, using the NTSC filter seems to make it heat up faster, but I'm too used to using it now, can't possibly play without it.
     
  13. Glisp

    Glisp

    That one weird guy that does stuff. Member
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    None at the moment I'm afraid.
    Its not Kega, its your ventilation. Poor ventilation will result in that. I have a metal wiring stand to elevate my Laptop up a little to help keep it cool. Its kind of hard to describe what I'm talking about but basically it helps raise my laptop at an angle and the metal screen that props it up allows adequate ventilation. Sometimes this won't help though.

    If your computer is using up a lot of CPU your computer may still get hot check task manager for processes that might be virus related. If that's not the case then close any programs you aren't using. It may be wise to not run Fusion on extremely high resolutions in full screen mode if your CPU is picky. 640 X 480, 800 X 600 or lower are good resolutions to use in this case.

    If this doesn't help then I'm an idiot.
     
  14. nineko

    nineko

    I am the Holy Cat Tech Member
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    I'm sure you meant 320x240, because there's no reason whatsoever to use any other resolution to play Genesis games (except for Sonic 2's 2P mode and a few other rare exceptions).
    Shame on my new laptop's video card which doesn't allow me to go any lower than 640x480 :(
     
  15. Glisp

    Glisp

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    None at the moment I'm afraid.
    There is a reason. It looks cool.
    You aren't an eye candy whore like I am are you? Buffing up the resolutions makes things look better and I like things with large resolutions actually. The only problem is CPU. Anyways, Windows 7 has a bug in full screen that doesn't make it go wide screen and displays black bars on both sides of the screen regardless of resolution. I've been trying to fix it but haven't had any luck. Not just Kega suffers from this but most older PC games as well.
     
  16. GerbilSoft

    GerbilSoft

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    Actually, rendering 320x240 as 640x480 with nearest-neighbor scaling results in the exact same image. Most video drivers don't support 320x240 nowadays since the driver developers dropped double-scanning. (Most PC monitors don't even support 320x240, which is why double-scanning was needed in the first place.)
     
  17. Covarr

    Covarr

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    Unless you're using an old CRT TV and composite or RF cables, there's a perfectly good reason to use 640x480: Blargg's NTSC filter. In fact, IMO there's not really any good reason NOT to use that filter, if your rig can handle it.
     
  18. SegaLoco

    SegaLoco

    W)(at did you say? Banned
    Personally my card DOES support 320×240 double scanned. I *think* my monitor supports raw 320×240, but my card won't do it. My suggestion would be to just leave the video raw and use the lowest possible res. I don't know about all of you, but I am perfectly fine with the smoothing achieved by doing that.
     
  19. Quickman

    Quickman

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    Please tell me you're not saying it's better to use a filter that alters the output from an emulator so it resembles the output of systems connected to outdated displays using a modulated signal which mixes everything together into a mush.
     
  20. My laptop heats up but it gets very hot anyway so that's not Fusion's fault.

    What I noticed is that when I use "Silent-Mode" on my laptop (clocks the thing down to 650MHz), it will not even let the fan turn on at all so it's pretty good.

    Flash video + Fusion simultaneously on my lappy is a no-go though.