What is an Emulator? Part 2 Benefits
Emulation plays a crucial role in digital preservation, helping combat the issue of obsolescence. By recreating an original computer environment on current machines, emulators allow users to access any application or operating system without alterations to their functionality. This process can be time-consuming and challenging but is essential for maintaining authenticity with digital objects.
Emulation offers several benefits: it can enhance graphics quality compared to the original hardware, particularly in games. Additionally, emulators may provide extra features that were not available on the initial system. They also preserve the look, feel, and behavior of the digital object, which is just as important as its data itself.
In terms of cost-efficiency, while developing an emulator can be expensive initially, it might prove to be a more economical choice in the long run. Many open source emulators are available under licenses like GNU General Public License, enabling widespread collaboration among developers.
One key advantage of emulation is its ability to enable software exclusive to one system to function on another. For instance, an emulator can allow playing PlayStation 2 games on a PC, which is particularly useful when the original hardware is hard to find or incompatible with modern equipment.
