What is the difference between emulator and rom

Another way to look at it is as a real-world translator rapidly relaying a conversation between two people who speak different languages. Even if the translation is very fast, you will always encounter some loss in speed. The more complex the languages, the slower the translations. Virtualization is very similar to emulation, but there are important differences between them.

In particular, virtualization usually refers to the use of virtual machines. Virtualization and emulation accomplish the same thing, but they go about it in slightly different ways. Both are designed to run the software in an isolated environment. Virtualization focuses on the isolation while emulation focuses on the environment.

What this means is that emulators simulate a larger range of hardware than virtual machines can. You can't run a PlayStation system in a virtual machine, for example. But you could run a PlayStation emulator in a virtual Windows environment.

However, because of this, virtualization is often faster than emulation. Rather than emulating a system, a virtual machine allocates processing power to an isolated subsystem.

Importantly, this means the CPU is not emulated. As such, the target audiences of the two differ somewhat. Emulators tend to be designed for video game consoles or other systems that are completely different from regular computers whereas virtual machines are more likely to be found running in businesses. This is because they provide a fast and secure environment in which to run programs. However, this is mostly nit-picking.

Practically speaking, virtualization and emulation are functionally the same in that both mainly exist to translate from one "instruction language" to another. There are a few ways you can take advantage of emulation. You might even be using it now without even knowing! Here are a few notable examples.

Ideally, you should be able to look into the simulation and observe properties that you would also see if you looked into the original target. In practice, there may some shortcuts to the simulation for performance reasons -- that is, some internal aspects of the simulation may actually be an emulation. MAME is an arcade game emulator; Hyperterm is a not very good terminal emulator. There's no need to model the arcade machine or a terminal in detail to get the desired emulated behavior.

They model as much as possible every detail of the target to represent what the target does in reality. EDIT: Other responses have pointed out that the goal of an emulation is to able to substitute for the object it is emulating. That's an important point. A simulation's focus is more on the modeling of the internal state of the target -- and the simulation does not necessarily lead to emulation.

In particular, a simulation may run far slower than real-time. SPICE, for example, cannot substitute for an actual electronics circuit even if assuming there was some kind of magical device that perfectly interfaces electrical circuits to a SPICE simulation. A simulation does not always lead to emulation If a flight-simulator could transport you from A to B then it would be a flight-emulator. An emulator will always have to operate close to real-time. For a simulator that is not always the case.

A simulator is an environment which models but an emulator is one that replicates the usage as on the original device or system. Simulator mimics the activity of something that it is simulating. It "appears" a lot can go with this "appears", depending on the context to be the same as the thing being simulated. For example the flight simulator "appears" to be a real flight to the user, although it does not transport you from one place to another.

Emulator, on the other hand, actually " does " what the thing being emulated does, and in doing so it too " appears to be doing the same thing ". It's a difference in focus. Emulators 1 focus on recreating the behavior of a system, with no regard for how the system functions internally. Simulators 2 focus on modeling the components of a system.

You use an emulator when you care mostly about what a system does, and a simulator when you care about how it does it. As for their general English meanings, emulation is "the endeavor to equal or to excel another in qualities or actions ", while simulation is "to model , replicate, duplicate the behavior, appearance or properties of". Not much difference. I don't think emulator and simulator can be compared. Both mimic something, but are not part of the same scope of reasonning, they are not used in the same context.

In short: an emulator is designed to copy some features of the orginial and can even replace it in the real environment. A simulator is not desgined to copy the features of the original, but only to appear similar to the original to human beings.

Without the features of the orginal, the simulator cannot replace it in the real environment. An emulator is a device that mimics something close enough so that it can be substituted to the real thing. The emulator will be plugged into the device in place of the real ROM. The motherboard will not see any difference when working, but you will be able to change the emulated-ROM content easily. Said otherwise the emulator will act exactly as the actual thing in its motherboard context maybe a little bit slower due to actual internal model but there will be additional functions like re-writing visible only to the designer, out of the motherboard context.

So emulator definition would be: something that mimic the original, has all of its functional features, can actually replace it to some extend in the real world, and may have additional features not visible in the normal context.

A simulator is used in another thinking context, e. The simulation will take care only of some aspect of the actual thing, usually those related to how a human being will perceive and control it. The simulator will not perform the functions of the real stuff, and cannot be sustituted to it.

The plane simulator will not fly or carry someone, it's not its purpose at all. The simulator is not intended to work, but to appear to the pilot somehow like the actual thing for purposes other than its normal ones, e.

So simulator definition would be: something that can appear to human, to some extend, like the original, but cannot replace it for actual use. In addition the pilot will know that the simulator is a simulator. I don't think we'll see any ROM simulator, because ROM are not interacting with human beings, nor we'll see any plane emulator, because planes cannot have a replacement performing the same functions in the real world.

In my view the model inside an emulator or a simulator can be anything, and has not to be similar to the model of the original. This comparison of both terms will contradict the currently selected answer from Toybuilder which puts the difference on the internal model, while my suggestion is that the difference is whether the fake can or cannot be used to perform the actual function in the actual world to some accepted extend, indeed.

Note that the plane simulator will have also to simulate the earth, the sun, the wind, etc, which are not part of the plane, so a plane simulator will have to mimic some aspects of the plane, as well as the environment of the plane because it is not used in this actual environment, but in a training room. This is a big difference with the emulator which emulates only the orginal, and its purpose is to be used in the environment of the original with no need to emulate it. Back to the plane context Its benefit is difficult to see, hum As a conclusion, the emulator is a real thing intended to work, the simulator is a fake intended to trick the user.

To understand the difference between a simulator and an emulator, keep in mind that a simulator tries to mimic the behavior of a real device. However, the Simulator itself uses the various libraries installed on the Mac such as QuickTime to perform its rendering so that the effect looks the same as an actual iPhone.

In addition, applications tested on the Simulator are compiled into x86 code, which is the byte-code understood by the Simulator. A real iPhone device, conversely, uses ARM-based code. In contrast, an emulator emulates the working of a real device. Applications tested on an emulator are compiled into the actual byte-code used by the real device. The emulator executes the application by translating the byte-code into a form that can be executed by the host computer running the emulator.

To understand the subtle difference between simulation and emulation, imagine you are trying to convince a child that playing with knives is dangerous.

To simulate this, you pretend to cut yourself with a knife and groan in pain. To emulate this, you actually cut yourself. An emulator is a model of a system which will accept any valid input that that the emulated system would accept, and produce the same output or result.

So your software is an emulator, only if it reproduces the behavior of the emulated system precisely. Some years ago I came up with a very short adage that, I believe, captures the essence of the difference quite nicely:. By that I mean that you use an emulator when you can't use the real thing, and you use a simulator when you can't use the real thing and you want to find something out about it.

So, your PC feels more like Mac, but you can't actually run any Mac programs. Now you can even run Mac programs successfully and expect the same output as on Mac. In the first case, you can experience Mac, but you can't expect the same output as on Mac. In the second case, you can expect the same output as on Mac, but still the fact remains that it is only a PC.

In more or less normal parlance: If your software can do everything the mimicked system can do, it's an emulator. If it only approximates the results of a system IT or otherwise , it's a simulator. Simulator: it is similar to interpreter. Emulator: it is similar executable. An emulator is an alternative to the real system but a simulator is used to optimize, understand and estimate the real system.

The distintion between the two terms is a bit fuzzy. Coming from a world where "Emulators" are pieces of hardware that allow you debug embedded systems. My justification for the current use of the term is Emulation is that it may "augment" the functionality, and only is concerned with a "reasonable" approximation of the behaviour of the system. It allows you to run the system as if the actual processor was present.

Typically these have a variant of the processor on them to actually execute the software with glue logic to allow the user to break executation and single step under hardware control.

Some would also provide logging capability. Most modern processors development systems have replace ICE type emulation with JTAG Emulation, where the JTAG just talks to the processor via a special purpose serial link and all execution is perform by the processor mounted on the board. Bochs is an example of this. QEMU does this, but also allows "virtualization" using special kernel modules. The Internet is your best friend when searching for the ROMs.

Once you have found the ROM you wish to play on the Emulator, download it. Check for viruses on this as well. Sometimes, it is easier to leave the ZIP file compressed, and just place in its own folder. All of the save files should go directly into the created folder, nicely organizing your ROMs. Some emulators have a folder set as the default for games, so make sure the ROM file goes in that folder.

If there is no folder automatically set, you will have to set one yourself. You can't. You would ruin the cartridge and the save file on the cartridge, if you have one. Yes No. Not Helpful 4 Helpful 7. Not Helpful 16 Helpful Emulators themselves are legal. It's about the ROMS that have a fight over if they are legal or not. Not Helpful 4 Helpful Not Helpful 3 Helpful 3. What should I do if my extracting program says it's corrupted, but I have downloaded many games that are from different sites?

Maybe the emulator itself is corrupted. I would try using a different emulator. To find out, we asked Derek E. Unfortunately, we discovered that no definitive answer truly exists, since these arguments have yet to be tested in court. But we can at least bust some myths that are floating around out there. There are exceptions, of course, such as the BIOS files that are required by certain emulators to play games.

In the United States, copyright protects works for 75 years, meaning no major console titles will be public domain for decades.

But is there a legal defense? Possibly, if you already own a Super Mario World cartridge. Then, according to Bambauer, you might be covered by fair use. He says he could imagine a few possible defensible scenarios.

But, while there is no precedent specific to gaming, there is in other markets. You can see where this gets complicated. A common argument online is that extracting a ROM from a cartridge you own is perfectly legal, but downloading ROMs from the web is a crime. After all, ripping a CD you own with iTunes or other software is broadly considered legal, at least in the United States. So is ripping a ROM you own any different than downloading one?

Now, Bambauer could imagine constructing an argument about how one is different than the other, and he admits the optics are different.

This fair use argument is potentially very wide reaching, but there are limits. Consider the entertainment industry. For ROMs it largely works the same way, which is why sites that share games are so frequently shut down. Instead of leaving films constantly on the market, they periodically re-release them, which builds up demand and increases sales when that release actually comes. Browse All iPhone Articles Browse All Mac Articles