Did you know you can emulate your Android phone on your PC? You can, and here’s how
Emulation is a fascinating thing and can be used to turn your PC into a vast array of different devices. Often skirting the grey area of legality, emulation has been used for all manner of things – from the very grey area of emulating past games systems, to running different operating systems, such as Apple’s OS X within Windows. It’s a very useful software trick, and one that opens up a great deal of functionality.
One area of emulation that’s becoming very popular is that of mobile devices. Although most already have some form of mobile phone or tablet, it’s often advantageous to be able to run mobile phone software on your home PC. This could be in order to share your information between your phone and your home office, or it could be to run mobile apps that won’t run on your phone, such as apps that are too recent to run on older models of phone, or just run too slowly.
Android phones are the most popular around next to Apple’s iPhone, and there’s no shortage of them. There’s also no shortage of Android apps, which can be found on the Google Play store. These run the gamut of usefulness, from productivity software to games and gadgets. There’s a massive amount on offer, an with emulation you can run it all on your home PC, even if you don’t own an Android phone. Thanks to Android’s Google heritage, it’s even easier in terms of user accounts, as you’ll likely already have a Google account, and this is also used for Android. If not, you can create one for free.
What Is Emulation?
For the uninitiated who may not be aware of emulation, it’s a method of using software to recreate another platform, often hardwarebased. This includes, but is not limited to, old games consoles like the NES, Mega Drive and PlayStation, as well as other computers like the Commodore Amiga and 64, Spectrum and Atari ST.
This is made possible by software that’s written to emulate the hardware of the target system within a software environment. When the program is run on a PC, the emulation can be used to run software designed for the emulated platform. This software can take the form of special ROMs – software versions of hardware cartridges or disks that used to be used (which is where the legality issue comes in) – original software, or downloads from the Internet. When it comes to Android emulation, the software emulates the actual OS, so it can contact and download apps directly from the Google Play store. This makes it easy to run your favourite apps on your PC.
So, simply put, emulation is software masquerading as hardware, which in turn runs software. This is a very complex task and one that can tax any system, regardless of its specification. Even emulators that reproduce older systems, such as 8-bit computers require a surprising amount of system resources and can make the CPU work very hard. Because of this, emulation usually requires fairly decent to powerful specification, with emulators that mimic more up to date platforms needing the most power. This includes Android, and to run some of the software we’ll be covering here, you’ll need to ensure your PC is up to the task. Even if it is, don’t expect perfect performance. Even the best emulators can struggle maintaining full speeds.
Emulators
There are a number of emulators available for PC users wishing to run Android apps on their system. Some of these are free, while others ask a small fee. All are different, and as with any software, not all are equal. Let’s have a look as some of the most popular.
AMIDuOS (www.amiduos.com)
$15 (Lollipop), $10 (Jellybean), free trial available
Considered the best overall Android emulator by many, AMIDuOS is a commercial Android emulator that comes in different flavours depending on the version of Android you want to emulate. The latest version of the app, which can run Lollipop, is the most expensive, but not by much, and if you’re going to shell out for an Android emulator as you need to use it a lot, you may as well ensure you have the latest version.
The emulator makes full use a PC’s capabilities which, naturally, dwarf those of most mobile phones. It can emulate the the ARM processor, but can run applications natively using the PC’s x86 processor. This means it’s a fast and reliable option, and it manages some of the best speeds of any Android emulator. It supports Windows 7 and up and will run on touch devices too, such as Windows tablets.
The emulator is powerful, and we found it was able to run pretty much anything we threw at it, including infamously resource-heavy apps like Google Maps. It was also able to handle Google’s advanced services and even used the PC’s mic to enable voice searching.
The desktop mode of AMIDuOS runs in full screen mode and offers full keyboard and mouse support to the emulator, making it very easy to use – and you can change the screen orientation with the click of a single icon. Internet connectivity, as to be expected with emulation, was a little shaky at times, but it was able to use both Ethernet and Wi-Fi, and the speeds were decent.
Sadly, the app doesn’t ship with Google Play installed, instead it uses the Amazon store, which charges for apps that would be free via Play. You can download and install this, however (look for gapps emulation using Google), so with a little tinkering, you can get the full experience.
Andy (www.andyroid.net)
Free
Andy certainly appears to be the most promising Android emulator on paper, with being free the most obvious benefit. Once installed, it offers a range of great features, including full emulation of Android, (with full screen mode) and all the usual apps and tools you’d find on a typical Android device, including Google Play as standard.
Its more advanced features are what makes Andy stand out, however. It supports app sync to mobile, access to your local PC’s file system, full cloud save support, system backup, and you can even use your phone as a controller. Hardware support is fullyfledged, and like AMIDuOS it makes use of x86 architecture. Touchscreens, cameras and microphones are integrated via the PC, and OpenGL is fully supported. You can even use Xbox or PlayStation controllers with the emulator.
Sadly, as great as Andy’s feature set is, it’s performance isn’t up to the same standard as AMIDuOS. We found the emulator to be very sluggish, and it used up a great deal of system resources, more so than many other emulators. There was even a good deal of unresponsiveness and lock ups – and that was on a PC that far exceeds the recommended specs of Dual core CPU and 3GB RAM. We’ve also seen many user reports of suspected adware. Although we can’t confirm this, as we had no problems, it may be something to look into.
Although it’s not as fast or stable as others, Andy is still an impressive emulator that’s packed with features, and it embraces not only the Android emulation, but the PC it’s running on with some useful cross-platform capabilities.
BlueStacks (www.bluestacks.com)
$2 per month (premium), Free (forced app installs)
BlueStacks in an interesting one. Unlike AMIDuOS or Andy, which emulate the entire OS in a virtual machine, BlueStacks instead has a custom interface that allows selection of apps or games to be run on PC. This will turn off the most technical Android users who want the entire OS, but for those who simply want to run apps, this is a good thing.
Although BlueStacks can run the majority of Google Apps, the emulator is heavily focused on gaming, and so naturally the program pushes games to the forefront. This is perfect for people who do a lot of Android gaming and what that facility on their PC, and thus a bigger screen, or if their mobile device doesn’t support the latest games.
Performance of BlueStacks is quite good, and it runs at a decent speed without breaking your system’s resource bank. This is presumably as it doesn’t emulate the entire OS, so needs less power. However, there are major downsides, with the big one being the subscription cost and how the app deals with it.
BlueStacks is technically free, and you can use it without spending a penny. However, if you do this, you’ll be forced to install sponsored apps of the day in order to continue using the emulator. To prevent this, you have to take up a subscription to the program, which costs $2 per month.
Now, this isn’t much, and there’s really not much to complain about if you game on Android all the time, but with other free options available, any charge may put some people off. If you play so much, you may not mind trying out new apps each day, though, so you may or may not find this to be a problem, so you can avoid the charges.
Other problems were minor. Occasionally the GUI can be very twitchy, and we noticed a couple of crashes during some, more intensive games. On the whole, however, this is a solid emulator and perhaps the best option for Android gamers.
Genymotion (www.genymotion.com)
Free (personal use), Variable for development/enterprise
This is an emulator to watch, as it boasts strong performance, on par with AMIDuOS. It’s also free for personal use, which is always a plus.
The emulator is actually more geared towards developers and professionals, such as technical support, so it’s not quite as user friendly as other options. It also requires more knowledge to set up and lacks support for Google Play without user workarounds.
Aside from these problems, Genymotion is an impressive emulator, and it’s fast, using the x86 architecture of the PC. It doesn’t simply emulate Android on PC, but can be set to actually emulate specific devices, such as Google’s Nexus. This is very useful for app developers testing new software, but could also be useful in the home if you want to emulate your own device perfectly. It can also be used to create multiple virtual machines, so you’re not limited to one at a time.
YouWave (youwave.com)
$30 (premium), Free (w/ ads, limited to Ice Cream Sandwich)
Now supporting Lollipop, YouWave is a small and fast emulator that features a mixture of Android OS and Windows GUIs to make a very easy to use tool. The app recreates an Android device in one window and stores all of your apps in a separate control panel for easy access. Windows buttons are always present for navigation, and the device screen can be rotated easily. The program can run most Android apps, and you can download them from the Amazon appstore (not Google Play, sadly). It supports Windows XP and up, and you can use SD cards with it for added storage.
As an emulator, YouWave is decent enough, and it emulates Android and runs apps well. The interface is clean and very easy to use, and in terms of resource usage it’s very good. However, the limitation of Ice Cream Sandwich for the free version, with Lollipop only being available in the premium version is a problem, and the cost is quite high, especially given the lower $10 cost for AMIDuOS, which has more features and is more powerful.
Android Studio SDK (developer.android.com)
Free
The Android Software Development Kit is not one for the layman, that’s clear from the very start, but it’s a set of tools comes with an emulator so it is a viable option and we wanted to include it here. However, as it’s a software development tool designed for Android app developers, this isn’t an option for most home users. If you’re an aspiring programmer who wants to get a start developing their own software, though, you could do worse.
The actual emulation is pretty bad to be honest and is possibly the slowest and most resource hungry of all the options we’ve covered. It’s simply not optimised, and this limits its use to those wanting to easily test their code. To run actual programs as an end user, this just isn’t a good option.
Being a development platform, it has the benefit of supporting all versions of Android, including the most recent, Marshmallow (6.0), and it’s fully cross-platform, supporting Windows, Linux and Mac OS X. Support for the very latest OS will make this appealing to technophiles, and this alone may prompt interest for those who want to stay up to date and in touch with new Android developments.
That covers our look at some of the different Android emulators, and with any of these, you can get Android up and running on your PC. Whether you want to play games, use Android apps, or want to get buried in development code, it’s there for the taking. Have fun!
Using AMIDuOS
It’s not at all difficult to emulate Android on your PC. Some emulators are easier to use than others, but there are rarely any real worries to be had. Here’s how to get up and running using AMIDuOS.
Assuming you’ve already downloaded and installed AMIDuOS, before you run it, it’s wise to fire up the configuration. Here you can change a few options that can be of use. One of the most important is the amount of system RAM the emulator can use. The more you share, the faster the emulator will run. You can also pick system options, such as enabling the emulator’s root mode, which can be very useful (see 'Rooting it out'). For Network, it’s usually best to leave it on Simulated. Other options here involve the input mapping, camera integration, and GPS.
Once you’re happy with the settings, all you need to do is fire up the program and it’ll create the virtual machine. You’ll find yourself at the device lock screen, just as if you were using a phone or tablet. Swipe it up and you’ll find your home screen. From here on it works just like a phone. Simply click and drag to swipe, and click apps or the icons at the bottom to use the typical Android features.
Once you’ve installed the Google Play code, you’ll also be able to use the Google Play store, and can download and install anything you like, including games. There will be updated and handled just as they would on a normal Android device. If you want to change your wallpaper, click and hold and select the Wallpaper option. Easy.
Rooting It Out
Android owners may be aware of the ability to ‘root’ a device. This is similar to ‘jailbreaking’ an Apple device, and involves hacking it so it can run unofficial content, such as apps or even altered versions of the core OS. Many users choose to do this, even though it voids any warranty, which can lead to problems, including a bricked phone that no longer works. It’s a gamble, but for many, one that pays off as it allows the use of all sorts of programs and tools the vanilla, out of the box OS doesn’t permit.
If you’d like to try this, but you don’t want to risk that expensive phone or tablet, emulation on PC is a good alternative. Some emulators feature the ability to run in a rooted mode, and this allows you to use the unofficial content on your PC, without the worry of breaking your precious mobile device. If anything goes wrong, it’s just a virtual machine, and can easily be replaced.
iOS?
Although it may be more difficult to emulate, Apple’s iOS can also be run on a PC with the right emulator. Reliable ones can be harder to find than Android, but they do exist. One example is iPadan (www.xpadian.com). This is a free emulator that is able to fully emulate iOS within Windows.
The free version of the app is ad-supported, and features some limitations, but for the most part, it’s perfectly usable. A paid for version includes more features, such as full 3D game support, no ads, and support for Whatsapp, Snapchat and more. It costs $10, which may be a good deal if you use a lot of iOS software.
Once installed the app is just like the the Android emulators we’ve covered, in that it features a fully emulated version of iOS, and runs and feels just like the Apple system. If you’ve used any Apple mobile devices, you’ll be at home here.