Laptop vs Desktop Gaming Cost

In general, when buying a high end gaming laptop, how much more money do you spend compare to building your own gaming desktop with equal performance (monitor included).

 

I'd say at least twice as much in most cases.

 

you mean budget desktop to budget laptop?
high end desktop to high end laptop?

the gap can be as close as $500 to as much as couple of thousand dollars.

there are tons of variations to consider it's not worth comparing.

 

You can also take a new budget desktop and put a higher-end graphics card in it at a later date (provided that the power supply is adequate), and it could smoke some gaming laptops that costs 5x more. The desktops have the upgradeability advantage, which will always make them a cheaper gaming rig....

 

Also if you think ... they charge you about $1000 for SLI 8800m GTX cards ... when you could get better performance in a desktop using Dual ATI 4850's and that costs under $350. Also the overclockability factor and upgradability factor come in to play in a desktop. If I had to choose ... I would get a super high end desktop for gaming and then just a mediocre laptop for more basic things and that would cost a lot less than getting a super high end gaming laptop (but then again if I was loaded I would just have high end both )

 

A $1500 desktop and monitor will out perform a $3000 laptop, easily.

 

But it's not quite as easy to haul around on long train rides.

 

lol, can't argue with that!

 

I mean, with oil prices today, using a gas generator to power your train gaming rig would easily put you over the price of a high-end gaming laptop.

It would also attract unwanted attention, what with the noise and gas fumes.

 

My gaming desktop with with Quad-core 2.4 GHz Q6600 CPU, 4 GB RAM, 600W PSU, 500 GB 7200rpm HDD and ATI Radeon HD 4850 costs me about $700 USD without monitor/keyboard/mouse that I already have. Meanwhile, my Sony Vaio SR cost about $1300 and only has a Mobility Radeon 3470 in it. I'd actually be curious what a comparable performance laptop would cost.

Anyway, my approach was to get a relatively light laptop that could still do gaming at low settings so I can play *something* when I'm travelling, but otherwise, I just stick with my desktop. For $2000 total, a nice laptop and a good gaming PC isn't such a bad deal.

 

I have a Core 2 Duo 3.0 GHz desktop with Asus P5Q motherboard that i'm putting together with the HD 4850, 4GBram, and 640GB HDD for about 900 ish without monitor/keyboard/mouse

 

The Laptop I was gonna get: £995

9600M GT 512mb GDDR3
4GB RAM
2.5ghz Dual Core
200GB HDD

Compare that to a gaming rig without mouse and keyboard:

HD 4870 512MB GDDR5
3.0ghz Dual Core
4GB RAM
750GB HDD
Fancy sound proof case
PSU, CPU cooler etc

£740ish I think.

Desktop gaming is the way to go!

 

Desktop I plan to build in my sig is about $1165 w/rebates included. Vista is also reflected in the price

 

I bought a T61P (specs in sig) for a little under $1200.

I also (basically) bought a new desktop (sig): new mobo, PSU, CPU, RAM, video card, cpu heatsink for ~$650, but after MIRs it should come out to ~$580.

Performance wise, desktop > laptop.

However, you can't compare portability.

So, if you just want performance, a desktop is MUCH better/cheaper. It's also very easy to upgrade desktop components. Did I mention it's cheaper?