I know we've had some topics discussing this off and on, but let's get some numbers up on the board.
I know I left out SECAM; sorry, it would have made for a bewildering combination of choices.
My personal path was as follows:
1. Real hardware only, BITD
2. Emulation only, once emulation was good enough to make it worth while. For me, that meant Atari800WinPLus
in around 2004/2005. I didn't own any real hardware until about 2008.
3. Mostly emulation, with some real hardware, since 2008 until now.
My real hardware setup is right next to me when I'm at my PC. They share the same audio connection via a compact
Behringer mixing board (which sounds fantastic), and my SIO2PC is always ready to go. I use real hardware quite a
bit at times, but I always have and most likely always will use emulation more because of the speed and convenience
of having it on my PC. I spend a lot of time using my PC, mainly for Atari-related activities also (aside from emulation).
So most of my computing is directed towards Atari 8-bit computer related use and production.
I love my real hardware and CRT though. I consider them a necessity for testing. Emulation -- as good as it is --
still isn't there in areas that I consider important. I'll get on kicks of using it almost exclusively for a day or so. Gaming
is great on it, and there's nothing like it. My real setup is also fast and convenient, just not as fast and convenient as
emulation.