A video game console is a dedicated electronic device designed to play video games. Often the output device is a separate television or a computer monitor. Once, video game consoles were easily distinguishable from personal computers: consoles used a standard television for display, and did not support standard PC accessories such as keyboards or modems. However, as consoles have become more powerful, the distinction has blurred: some consoles can have full Linux operating systems running with hard drives and keyboards (like the Sega Dreamcast) (one university has even created a Beowulf cluster of PlayStation 2 consoles), and Microsoft's Xbox is basically a stripped down PC running a version of Microsoft Windows.

The console market has steadily developed from simple one-off games (Pong) to fully featured general purpose games systems.

Older game consoles and their software now live on in emulators as they are no longer supported by their manufacturers; however, console makers try to prevent their games from being played on emulators, using a special mask work copyright and a protection of encrypted media created by the United States' Digital Millennium Copyright Act and foreign counterparts, this is especially true for the newer game consoles. The emulation of older video game consoles, such as the NES and SNES, is generally less contested by the manufacturers.

Note that the "bit" names of generations were in large part created by the console makers' marketing departments and may have little to do with the actual architecture of the systems.

See also

• Console manufacturer
  • Atari
  • Microsoft
  • Nintendo
  • Sega
  • Sony
• List of video game consoles
• Handheld game console
• Family game
• Console emulator
• Regional lockout
• Regional converter

External links

• Console Database, video game console information
• MobyGames, an Internet database of video games, including console games
• Video Game and Console Timeline, a Brief Video Game and Console Timeline