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I've seen NES and combination SNES/NES clones for sale at Microcenter (or maybe it was somewhere else, I don't recall, but it wasn't the type of store to be selling illegal things). So, yeah. Bleem! (a commercially sold PlayStation emulator) was found to be legal in court. I don't think hardware products doing it are any different.
The main problem is that most places selling handheld emulators out there are also bundling ROMs of every game. And that is illegal.
anyone with the skill set to build that and access to the supply chain and fabs required to build it isn't going to risk getting sued for that.
but you can buy retro style devices that can emulate most consoles older than 20 years, they're pretty common. some even go as far as literal cartridge compatibility.
Why would you? You won't be able to replicate the custom hardware, drivers and software. Why not just build an sff pc?
Yes, but realistically only for much older hardware. Usually such "counterfeit" systems are based around an FPGA, e.g. MiSTer. The advantage is the hardware itself doesn't violate IP laws since it's a generic FPGA, while the legally questionable "programing" to make it copy a console's architecture (e.g. an N64) can distributed through decentralized channels on the internet.
Sometimes you'll get a reverse engineered System on a Chip like the C64 Direct to TV, but only where there's little to no risk of getting sued.
With modern hardware your end product will almost certainly be more expensive than the real deal (if you're able to pull it off in the first place). The company whose hardware you're copying is also far more motivated to find and destroy you. Hacking the real hardware to run pirated games makes much more sense.
Not for any modern console. Easier to sell you a portable android box that can run emulators.
I'm pretty sure there's open source schematics for making NES's and GameBoy's, no emulation or FPGAs, just using off the shelf chips.
Schematics are one thing, being able to market and sell them another. The older Nintendo consoles are basically public domain now, or whatever the patent equivalent is. Anyone can make their own modern NES hardware if they have the ability and desire.
But you wouldn't be able to do so with the Switch 1 or 2. The Wii. The Wii U. GameCube, maybe? I know for sure the NES and SNES are open. I know for sure the current gen isn't. Not sure about in between tho.
If you reverse engineered the Switch 2 (as the schematics are not publicly available afaik) and designed your own version of it, that would be a form of "piracy" if you also tried to sell it. Not sure the legality of simply making such a thing that only you, the creator, would use tho. I am curious about that.
Seems like you answered your own question
It's not very viable compared to just generic handhelds and mini-PCs that can run emulators or pirated PC/android games.
It's common for very low cost machines like famiclones tho.
you can try to emulate certain games from consoles on a PC, but its limited.
People managed to run ios without apple parts?
No, it's just Android. If you're lucky, it's less than 5 years old and has an iOS skin, but they don't always put in that much effort.
lame but understandable.