Reply 60 of 144, by Tertz
wrote:Even today, the best console and PC emulators cannot be perfectly transistor-for-transistor accurate. Why? Because that level of emulation would be so slow that even monster PCs of today would be worse than a slideshow.
Mainly, because it's not needed for games. Almost all of them have no significant or even noticable difference with playing on real hardware. For example, such situation is with DOSBox, if you'll use it with CRT and XP.
every software emulator is essentially an approximation
Every hardware device is also kind of approximation, as there are differences between models, revisions and even samples, different software also may affect. The developers used one device, while users use another. Sometimes this defference is noticable.
Even though it's a pain in the ass messing with software emulation
You say like there is no "pain in the ass" to mess with real hardware, because it's not less comfortable than emulation or has not own compatibility problems. Computers are "pain in the ass", often.
go real hardware
The main problem is free space. While today emulation is close to perfect, for example, of DOS games. And you'll don't need a bunch of PCs to play almost all games you want, but just change emulator's configuration.