I've just recently got into emulators and things like that. I heard of it before but never really thought about it. I keep wondering how do you play nintendo games or whatever console on your computer. But now I know how. lol. I sort of feel late and slow.

What if you own the console but its broken lol? Atleast I still have the console. haha.

i have been using game emultors for quite some time now, it really come in handy since my ps2 crashed.

ps1 games run with 32mb video card, but ps2 need 1gb of ram and 256mb video card, maybe a console are the best choice o/

Nowadays is not that expensive thing buy a pc with 2gb of ram and a 512mb video card, it is even cheaper than an actual generation console (xbox 360, wii, ps3). The another problem is the emulator, no one fully support all the games at the moment. But the emulation experience can be great, reaching the real console level in some times.

But remember, emulation is illegal, except for testing porpouses.

i have a file called PCSX2_0.9.2_Setup on my pc.
my brother uses that software.
i am basically ont a gamer
if you want that i can mail you that.
ist just 4.35Mb in size

Not quite, emulators are perfectly legal because they are programmed using reverse engineering. It is the roms that are illegal because creating and publishing roms cannot be done by reverse engineering but only through a pirate copy infringing the licensor's rights.

I remember when the first N64 emulators were released Nintendo forced down many sites offering N64 roms. I think by now they don't care for N64, SNES and NES roms offered in the net. You can find a bazillion of them even on non-anonymous sites. Some sort of a legal grey zone, as long as nobody is offended you can download and use them.

Of course it is always better to own the games. Actually I am glad the new Wii offers retro games on its virtual console and I already paid a fortune to download many of the old classics

Does anybody emulate the C64, Amiga or older PCs? Many of the good old games can be found on abandonware sites and still make a lot of fun to play. For older PC games I recommend DosBox as it runs Dos games with sound and at reasonable speed (meaning not too fast). Fot links you can PM me, though I believe it is perfectly legal to download from these sites. Of course you can always google

emulators are only good till PS1
Now, even PS2 emulation is not perfect (you cant play any games at full fps i think)
So, it will be a real long time before you can emulate PS3. You may need a real strong sys like quadcore/DX10 card to play.. LoL
In the end, emulators will be forever behind consoles, so if you want to play the latest and greatest console games, buy the console!

Exactly, emulators will always be behind. They don't intend to be up to date. They are being used to revive games you cannot play anymore (because it is a retro game) or for some it is the best substitute for a real console because they lack the money to buy one.

Many users of emulators are PC gamers, they'd never buy a console nor console games. For free (and sometimes ilegally) they can however play medium aged console games in addition to their pc games. So in the end it is the pc gamers laughing at console gamers. At least, I haven't seen a console seriously running pc games lately...

Out of a technical point of view emulators often run games even better than the original mashine. Take the N64 emulator: On your tv screen you could run the game at the natural NTSC or PAL resolution, which is something around 700x500 pixels. The emulator on the pc allows to run the same games at a resolution of 1600x1200 pixels with Antialiasing and anisotropic filtering activated. That is pretty neat, don't you think?

For one thing I always buy the console and don't emulate: The "collector" in me. For me it is great to have all these small consoles and collect all the game-modules and cds. Somehow it satisfies more than having a game folder on a harddrive...

Yeah roms are only legal if you are using the rom as a backup of the game that you own yourself, and if not you can only use it for 24 hours. Although really how is anyone going to find out that you are playing rom games that you dont have, and really no one cares. Roms are great though and with the controller for the pc it makes it even better. I know they have out now like ps2 emulators and what not but i found it to be a waste of time. Theres no good emulators out, your computer takes a strain when using it and really i have only found very few roms that are even available for it. Well i guess we will just have to wait until it gets as old as the SNES and then there will be a bunch of games available.