Heres my opinion,and its just that, an opinion,but it is based on experience with both hardware and software synths.
They are both great. As with any new technology there have been growing pains with soft synths in the past,but that is largely in the past. I know of some class pro acts that use software synths in live performance with thousands of people.They have gravitated this way becuse it has cut down on carrying so much heavy gear on the road. They have an extra computer on hand all loaded up and ready to go just like the big acts had extra synths on hand years ago.
I think that if Rick Wakeman would have had software synths back in his heyday he would have used the heck out of them.They all played the Prophet 5 and korg polys(and others) because thats all there was and it was cutting edge at the time.Noone had Abelton or Reason to play with.
Maybe you can tell the difference between the two but I honestly cant tell on the good emulations.
Have you heard about the Panasonic toughbook? This computer is the one used by the military and police forces.If your afraid you might damage your laptop check that computer out,it will probably withstand twice what the average pro synth will. I have velcro holding my Averatec on the controller pretty good and have had no problems.
Don't get me wrong,I also love hardware,but honestly I can do more for less money with software synths.As someone has already mentioned,most "hardware" synths are just a midi controller with a small OS and some sounds to be recalled from ROM.So they are just software synths themselves.
One big issue right now is that I think the big synth hardware manufacturers are scared to death of them because they can import sounds from anything and sound like anything for less money.
Seeing as how most all of us in this day and age depend on a microprocessor and OS for just about everything,your car,your heating system,your paycheck.......and on it goes. The argument that somehow laptops and software synths are more falureprone is hard to buy.