I’m looking at getting a cheap oldschool laptop off ebay that I just want to use sega, snes emulators on but what would minimum specs be to run them? Hopefully a pII would do?
16-bit emulators should run fairly well on a P2, but you probably won’t be able to use fancy bilinear filters and superscaling effects.
The hardware they require is next to nothing. You can run 16-BIT emulators on a P166 32MB RAM 
I’d recommend ZSNESW for you Nintendo needs.
And Gens+ for you Sega needs. Gens+ is based on Gens, but adds MasterSystem and GameGear support, alongside MegaDrive, MegaCD & 32X
awesome, thanks
[QUOTE=megamaced]
The hardware they require is next to nothing. You can run 16-BIT emulators on a P166 32MB RAM
[/QUOTE]
That is, above and beyond the resources your OS requires to run. And you wouldn’t be able to emulate many games at full speed on those specs.
[QUOTE=Anti-Trend]
That is, above and beyond the resources your OS requires to run. And you wouldn’t be able to emulate many games at full speed on those specs.
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It is possible to run 16-BIT emulators on those specs, but the gameplay isn’t that smooth. You can’t run the games with any screen effects, and the picture needs to be reduced to a small window in order for it to be playable (or a very pixalated full-screen mode)!
I’d recommend the old DOS based Genecyst emulator for specs such as a P1. Genecyst used to be the best MegaDrive emulator around, and it’s compatibility is STILL awesome. But it’s been discontinued for a while now, and as a result it’s very out-dated
[QUOTE=megamaced]
And Gens+ for you Sega needs. Gens+ is based on Gens, but adds MasterSystem and GameGear support, alongside MegaDrive, MegaCD & 32X
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You need the Sega BIOS to play MegaCD and 32X games.