Emulator

New-AX-HLE was changing constantly over the past few days, and was just merged. Get the latest development version and try that.

I jumped the gun a bit on that. I think it's because of the OpenAL backend. Try changing audio back ends to XAudio maybe. I was having sync issues until I moved back to XAudio.

Using DSound produces the same problem. Don't think I tried XAudio though... But I did, and while it is better (acceptable for most games), it's still noticeable in DDR. So I'm guessing any fix would come to XAudio first. Maybe it should be made the default, because I believe DSound is currently.

The latest dev version sadly did not resolve the issue. There seem to have been no changes. Maybe there's something wrong with the audio output that delays it?

Wind Waker doesn't use New-AX-HLE, so that hasn't been affected. Dunno about the other game, though.

JMC4789: Any game that's not a Nintendo game almost inevitably uses AX or AXWii. If not, it's a crazy custom µcode we haven't seen before and therefore it requires LLE.

Audio latency is kinda inevitable in an emulator like this. There's ways to reduce it (e.g. better lower-level audio APIs, more optimized code, possibly optionally disabling timestretching once Billiard puts it in every backend), but some sources of latency may be unavoidable. There's a lot of room for improvement here, though, so don't fret.

Audio also seems to drift over time. This is more apparent in older revisions with the old AX HLE code (in HLE mode).

Kinda disappointing to find that out, but at least there's still hope.

Here's an idea: maybe the video can be delayed, and by some behind-the-scenes (well, I guess it's very much in-front-of-the-scenes with an open-source project) magic the input works properly too, then this can be fixed more easily. Of course, that's a pretty hackish solution and probably should only be used as a temporary fix.

Have to +1 this, this is definitely the case. Probably the most reliable way to test this, if you have any sort of rhythmic capability, is to load up Rhythm Heaven Fever. First thing that happens on a new save file is the game tests your rhythmic skill by seeing how accurately you can push the button to a beat. It visually displays how late you are:

http://imgur.com/FQ5Dy9F

Ideally in that screenshot the orange dots would be as close to the light line at the center as possible. I've played and taught drums for about 13 years, and do not have systemic difficulty keeping a straight quarter note beat, but the delay is long enough that if I play with what's coming out my speakers, it doesnt even show most of the marks.

In order to get it to register correctly, I have to press the button somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of a beat early. The tempo is approximately 112 beats per minute, meaning that beats are approximately 500ms apart. (If my math is right, I feel like it is wrong though - 112/60 = 1.86 bps; 1/1.86 = .535 sec per beat) That would imply the delay is on the order of 200-300 ms, which is very significant.

The last version of dolphin I used that did not have this lag was before the new AX HLE branch was merged, so its probably a safe assumption it has to do with that. (but, rhythm heaven was close to unplayable)

I understand that an emulator will always be inaccurate, but prior to the merge, I would be able to get pretty consistently close to the center line. Same hardware too, so I doubt that has any effect, but for the record I'm on a Windows 8 x64 with Intel HDA.

This literally happens in every game for me.

Ive got the same type of delay in Xenoblade Chronicles.

You can feel a delay by switching throgh the menues.

It wasnt there in every build before 3.5-1154 with the new ax hle 2.

The delay exists in Super Paper Mario wii.
When I jump , the jump sound comes like half a sec after the actual jump.
when landing it happens aswell. the landing sound is half a second off.

Assuming you're in windows, try using the xaudio2 back-end rather than dsound or openal. It may not be perfect, but it should be better.

I encountered this issue as well while playing the Taiko no Tatsujin series (also a rhythm game, so it's more apparent).

I tried xaudio2, openal, and dsound with permutations of HLE and LLE audio and it still occurred. I also tried limiting the framerate to audio to see if that would help, but no luck.

Using 64-bit Dolhin 4.0.2 on Windows 7 64-bit.

This remains Dolphin's biggest issue, in my opinion. I try not to mention it too often because I don't want to seem pushy, but I really wish it was a higher priority.

Happening in Linux 64bit using either alsa or openal.

OpenAL will always have more lag than any other backend because of its timestretch features. Alsa, I don't know, but I was unable to reproduce it on my end. It sounds like whatever issues you are having are your own problems, or a game specific problem. Unfortunately, you left no information at all that would be useful.

Hey guys, sorry for the delayed feedback, but I just tried out Rhythm Heaven Fever for the first time since the latency fix was merged. It plays really well, there may even be less latency now than on my real Wii (which is hooked up to a receiver + HDTV). Great stuff guys, lots of awesome progress being made on the audio front.

Thank you for your feedback, glad your issue was fixed :)