a while back there was posts about how Sony has stopped production of PS2's in Japan so it wont be long before they are no longer around
with that said, i have 2 PS2 units, one is PAL and one is NTSC, now i have a 1st gen PS3 which can play PS2 games however there are compatibility issues
1. PS2 games are region locked so games like .hack//G.U wont play on it
2. some PS2 games lag like hell like Ratchet and Clank 3 when there is a lot of action (like when i do a back flip with the volcano cannon when it shoots out the stream) or just crash like with Jack and Daxter (just in the tutorial Level)
now i'm paranoid to the point i brought a second PS3 unit in-case if something happens to mine (i do treat them right however i live in Victoria Australia, would i have the time to unplug and pack the PS3 away when there is a bushfire caused by the stupid CFA doing a 'controlled' burn off? it has happened) however it will not be harder to buy backup units of NTSC and PAL PS2 units, even if i find them seller would be gouging the f*&$ out of sellers about now because they would be rare
with all that said, i now plan on getting a PS2 Emulator, when i got my PS1 Emulator i got it from a friend and when i do a search for PS2 Emulators there are quite a few, i thought i'd ask here which are the good ones instead
things i'm looking for in the Emulator are
1. Ease of Setup: the problem even with the ePSXE Emulator i got from my friend was that it came which a crap tone of sound/video/cd rom plugins and that the default settings one didn't work on my computer, it took a few months of trial and error before i had the right setup, so the easier the Emulator is to set up the better
2. PC Compatibility: when i moved from my old XP computer to my Windows 7 one i thought my plugin selection for ePSXE would work even better cause my computer at the time was a powerhouse (could play Crysis at max settings with no problems and every other game up to Skyrim, lags a bit with anti-aliasing turned on) however it wouldn't work, took a bit more time to find the plugins to work, since an Emulator just emulates the hardware of the system asking for this is a bit of a stretch however if the PS2 Emulator comes with plugins which are a bit more compatible between machine that's great (just for when i upgrade my computer)
3. ISO and Disk Support: with the ePSXE Emulator i could create ISO Backups of my PS1 Games and use them but with how i back them up, the hardrive with them isn't always connected to the computer or in the house and it can take a day or 2 before i can get it so being able to use the original disks was great, i'm looking for the same in a PS2 Emulator
4. Region Free: when i got my NTSC PS2, it was really only to play .hack//G.U however i now have a bunch of NISA Games like Soul Nomad and Makai Kingdom which were either only released in the US, i was unable to find a PAL Copy or i chose the NTSC copy over the PAL because it was limited edition (cause i'm a sucker), i know with DVDs if their outer region i have to change something in the OS but i can only do it 5 times, i'm hoping a PS2 Emulator is unaffected by this (then again if it uses ISOs then i very much doubt it would be affected)
5. Saves: ePSXE came with a Memory Card Manager so i could create new memory cards, i would like that in the PS2 Emulator but if not then i would just use the Save State functionality, that's if it has it
6. Controller Support: obviously i would like to either use a PS3 Controller or another controller with twin sticks, the emulator would need to support that
now the Emulator doesn't have to have all of the above but the more the better, now i'm not sure of links, if you can post one then go ahead but if not then name the emulator and/or the sites i could download it then i can then search for it, also, i don't want to know where i can get ISO games (At this time, there's this real old NISA PS2 game i've having trouble finding on ebay and i may ask about that later)