A $1k laptop could dualbox WoW.. depending on the type of game you were playing consoles were not that much cheaper. Hardware prices in the mid oughts were getting very good.
$400 buys you a decent laptop from 10 years before.
My $400 used Dell laptop from eBay is able to emulate PSX games and most PS2 games (albeit dipping in < 100% emulation speed at times) with its integrated Intel card.
20 years ago (2006) a $400 laptop from 1996 had a pre-Pentium CPU barely able to run Windows 95. In fact I’m not even sure you could find laptops that cheap, used or new.