1. At least one non-transitory computer-readable storage medium having a plurality of instructions to enable a computing device, in response to execution of the instructions by the computing device, to: receive a usage model having a plurality of user event/behavior statistics; generate a plurality of traces of user events/behaviors over a period of time, based at least in part of the on the user event/behavior statistics of the usage model, form a workload from the plurality of traces for input into an emulator that emulates a perceptual computing system; and output the workload to the emulator to enable evaluation of performance of the perceptual computing system based on the workload; wherein the emulator emulates the perceptual computing system; wherein evaluation of performance includes evaluation of power consumption or latency of hardware components of the perceptual computing system; wherein for evaluation of performance, the emulator is to receive a plurality of component models of the perceptual computing system that specify power consumption or latency behaviors of corresponding hardware or software components of the perceptual computing system; wherein the emulator is to further receive a plurality of usage modality algorithms to recognize usage modalities from output data of the component models; and generate and output emulated responses of the perceptual computing system to the workload, using the component models and the usage modality algorithms; and wherein the emulated responses include corresponding power consumption or latency information of the hardware or software components of the perceptual computing system associated with processing the workload.