I’ve been wanting to get into Saturn for a while and finally game the Beetle Saturn core a try for the first time and it seems to work well so far, but there’s one problem…I’m hearing what sounds like faint audio pops in the background. Tried with multiple games to make sure it wasn’t just the console itself but everything is effected and I’m not sure how to fix it… I’m running Windows 10 64bit w/ G-Sync and “Sync to Exact Console Framerate” enabled
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Usually that means the core and/or your settings are too demanding for your CPU. If you have hard sync on, set hard sync frames to 1. If using vulkan, set max swap chain images to 3 (2 is about as demanding as hard sync frames 0 in gl). Set frame delay to 0 and turn off runahead and rewind. Try setting the Windows power plan to max performance, and the same in your Nvidia or AMD control panel.
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I found both Beetle PSX and Saturn run slow when Runahead is Active
Here are my specs. 
I don’t have runahead enabled and my machine should be more than enough for this. At most, I have CRT Geom and Discord Rich Presence. I even tried keeping my browser closed since I was afraid that could be hogging resources. PSX Beetle didn’t have this issue from what I remember… Played more Fighter’s History Dynamite and I still those very faint pops in the background.
Yeah, I have a 2500k (+ GTX 970), so your CPU should be fine. I can run Beetle PSX with hard sync frames 0 or max swap chain 2, but Saturn requires frames 1 or swap chain 3 or I get pops/crackles, so Saturn is quite a bit more demanding in comparison. I’m also using gsync with sync to exact content framerate which doesn’t cause issues in these cores. Geom shouldn’t hurt performance; I use crt-guest-dr-venom which I think is a little heavier. Surprisingly, I can leave my windows and nvidia power options at defaults and don’t seem throttled by them, but some people have reported setting those to max performance helping.
Does the same thing happen with the other Saturn Core’s?